Bought a new toy! A Flir

[addy1]

Bought a flir = infrared camera that attaches to my cell phone. Amazon ordered late last night arrived at 7am,

We always struggle trying to figure out if the bees are still alive this time of year. Too cold to open and inspect, some do fly out during cold days, they have to use the potty, some fly out a lot less. So you can not watch the hive and decide.

Our hives are alive, this one is cranking ie huge, it will need to be split come spring. The bees still in the upper part of the bottom box and the mid box.

one is struggling, smaller cluster, but still alive! Red equals heat. The cluster is still in the second box but totally against the left side of the hive.

This hive, the bees are at the top of the hive, which means they have eaten all of their food we need to monitor and feed sugar blocks as needed until around the first of April
.

This is a nasty hive very aggressive. They will be requeened come spring. I went out at 25 degrees, you need to be aware that your body heat can be reflected from the hives, so I watch for the heat signature at the handles. This hive is still in the second box/ top box, a large amount of bees creating heat.

 

[Mmathis]

So cool! Or should I say, “warm!”

 

[addy1]

Warm is good!

 

[Lisak1]

I saw you posted this on your Facebook page - very cool!

 

[addy1]

I saw you posted this on your Facebook page - very cool!

I was so thrilled had to share!

 

[j.w]

What a great invention for you!

 

[poconojoe]

That's great! A non-invasive way of monitoring the hives!

 

[Tula]

Very cool !! How will you handle the aggressive hive and requeening in the Spring?

 

[Mmathis]

Very cool !! How will you handle the aggressive hive and requeening in the Spring?

I was wondering the same thing. @addy1 has really enlightened us to the intricacies of this hobby — it is fascinating!

 

[GBBUDD]

Honey gone hi tech , and to think i thought it was the simplest of all sweets. Looks very similar to a corona cam and they are not cheap at all. you would have to sell a boat load of honey to pay for it.

 

[brokensword]

I bet this makes your job a lot easier...

 

[cas]

How interesting. Thanks for taking the time to explain each hive. Interesting about the 'nasty hive'. Nice that you can change that just by changing out the queen.

 

[addy1]

Very cool !! How will you handle the aggressive hive and requeening in the Spring?

We suit up, smoke the heck out of them and then search and search for the queen. Find her, pinch her, replace her. She is real hard to find in all of those bees. She runs fast, the nurse bees hide her.

The queen runs the temperature of the hive, a hot hive remove the queen and they usually calm down.
Or we can also split the hive, take a box of brood and nurse bees from the hive (the brood box with the frames) set up a new hive. Leave the queen with the bees that are left. Sometimes that helps, but this hive did requeen themselves last year and they are still nasty.
Either buy a queen or let them make a new one. But need to wait for the drones to be flying for that.

They attack us anytime we open them, the other hives mostly ignore us. Last time I went to feed them I had around 25 stinging my gloves.

Looks very similar to a corona cam and they are not cheap at all. you would have to sell a boat load of honey to pay for it.

The Flir was not real expensive, Amazon 177 well worth the expense. It uses your phone rather than buying a dedicated camera with infrared. Losing a hive to starvation is equal to losing around 600-800 bucks. They have around 30k bees during the winter, right now brooding up for spring, they will have around 80k bees during the summer. A package of bees now costs around 150 that is 10k bees and 1 queen. Then it takes all summer for them to get to the size to make honey.

I did just buy a new piece of equipment to do Oxalic Acid Vaporization to the hives, will not mention what that cost. We treat with the OVA to kill off the mites that carry virus that kill the bees. But the cost of it will be covered by saving one or two hives from dying off due to the mites.

You can see the queen in this picture. The nurse bees surrounding her to feed her and guide her to where she should lay eggs.

I bet this makes your job a lot easier...

Esp this time of year. During the summer no need we just open the hives.

 

[Tula]

@addy1 when you say you pick the queen once you find her, does that mean you kill her?

 

[addy1]

In the mean hive yes, we hate doing it but there are times you must. We pinch her, ie quick death.
We will, most likely, try a split first. Sometimes that calms them down. Make the hive smaller and create a second hive.