Honey Bees

Leveling the ground at the new bee yard is boring. The ground is a mix of clay and more clay. I’ve been dragging a rig behind my mower trying to get it even. I will be finished today, no matter how it looks. Lol.
Had to bring a stump grinder with me yesterday. Had 2 big pine stumps that needed to be gone as well as several roots. I’m seeing progress and that’s a good thing.
 
Well I fed my bees pollen substitute and sugar syrup before the cold snap. Went by today to top off feeders and refill pollen sub containers.
My electric fence was messed up so I figured a deer hit it or something. Nope!
Somebody pulled the electric wire up and put it on top of the t-post. Then it hit me. Someone stole around 30 of my colonies of bees. They dumped 3 on the ground outside the fence that didn’t have bees in them. They hand carried every one of them out. They could have easily just opened the gate and drove their truck into the yard.
Contacted the police in Leland. Basically got my information and told me to check Craig’s list, next door app, market place etc. The told me I probably wouldn’t find them. They suggested I put up trail cameras so I could catch them. Pretty much on my own it seems.
I’m positive I won’t find them. Those bees are heading to California for the almond pollination.
This just sucks.
 
I believe it was last year they busted a guy in California that had stolen over $250K worth of bee hives.

@Leadchunker, if you use an iPhone, you could put Apple airtags in your other hives to locate them if they get stolen. Since they know what you have, they will probably be back. Too bad you couldn't put yellow jackets in some hives for them to steal.
 
Leadchunker said:
Well I fed my bees pollen substitute and sugar syrup before the cold snap. Went by today to top off feeders and refill pollen sub containers.
My electric fence was messed up so I figured a deer hit it or something. Nope!
Somebody pulled the electric wire up and put it on top of the t-post. Then it hit me. Someone stole around 30 of my colonies of bees. They dumped 3 on the ground outside the fence that didn’t have bees in them. They hand carried every one of them out. They could have easily just opened the gate and drove their truck into the yard.
Contacted the police in Leland. Basically got my information and told me to check Craig’s list, next door app, market place etc. The told me I probably wouldn’t find them. They suggested I put up trail cameras so I could catch them. Pretty much on my own it seems.
I’m positive I won’t find them. Those bees are heading to California for the almond pollination.
This just sucks.
Click to expand...
Dirtbags.
 
Maybe set up a hive but instead of bees have murder hornets in there. And a camera. Because that needs to be on YouTube.
 
ProfMagoo(ret) said:
Understood. I'm just pissed off and venting. I don't own bees, but I try to support our local bee honey providers so this really ...
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Yeah, it's bad enough that you loose a bunch of hives anyway, without some a$$hole stealing them. I've lost 6 so far, from unknown reasons, down to 8 right now.
 
I moved all the new Woodware stored at the yard to another location. I’ll get the rest tomorrow. A lot of wasted effort getting that yard expanded this year.
I won’t be putting any colonies on that property again. Thieves always come back.
 
Leadchunker said:
Well I fed my bees pollen substitute and sugar syrup before the cold snap. Went by today to top off feeders and refill pollen sub containers.
My electric fence was messed up so I figured a deer hit it or something. Nope!
Somebody pulled the electric wire up and put it on top of the t-post. Then it hit me. Someone stole around 30 of my colonies of bees. They dumped 3 on the ground outside the fence that didn’t have bees in them. They hand carried every one of them out. They could have easily just opened the gate and drove their truck into the yard.
Contacted the police in Leland. Basically got my information and told me to check Craig’s list, next door app, market place etc. The told me I probably wouldn’t find them. They suggested I put up trail cameras so I could catch them. Pretty much on my own it seems.
I’m positive I won’t find them. Those bees are heading to California for the almond pollination.
This just sucks.
Click to expand...

So if you are on your own did they give you permission to shoot the bastards if you catch them? Seems that would only be fair.

I’d also suggest with answers like that a no vote on all future PD budgets and issues should be a priority.
 
CZfool68 said:
So if you are on your own did they give you permission to shoot the bastards if you catch them? Seems that would only be fair.

I’d also suggest with answers like that a no vote on all future PD budgets and issues should be a priority.
Click to expand...
I did mention that there was a backhoe nearby. I also mentioned I was just kidding. They laughed, but I didn’t.
 
First let me say Im a member of the NC Bee Keepers Association and a certified bee keeper. Of course Im no fan of chemical dousing in the environment. However I live in the midst of heavy farm country. Glyphosate is a major part of no till farming and last year a cotton year. 24D and dicamba hung heavy in the air at times. My hives thrive and I dont treat them. Honey bees know what to avoid. Inert ingredients can be toxic to bees but bees arent weeds.

Also for everyone helping/saving the bees. They are a non native invasive species that stomp out natural pollinators like nobodies business. Fact is we dont need them for anything but honey. They wouldnt survive without us anyway and bees live 42 days. Honey bees are like cattle or poultry. They arent nature in the US. Honey Bee populations have never been better around the world.

Nothing against the bees but all these save the bees foundations just rolled in cash by marketing Honey bees as some poor soils that only you can save with a donation.

The Truth About Honey Bees

Raising nonnatives does not “save the bees”—and may harm them.
www.nwf.org
 
Planet24 said:
First let me say Im a member of the NC Bee Keepers Association and a certified bee keeper. Of course Im no fan of chemical dousing in the environment. However I live in the midst of heavy farm country. Glyphosate is a major part of no till farming and last year a cotton year. 24D and dicamba hung heavy in the air at times. My hives thrive and I dont treat them. Honey bees know what to avoid. Inert ingredients can be toxic to bees but bees arent weeds.

Also for everyone helping/saving the bees. They are a non native invasive species that stomp out natural pollinators like nobodies business. Fact is we dont need them for anything but honey. They wouldnt survive without us anyway and bees live 42 days. Honey bees are like cattle or poultry. They arent nature in the US. Honey Bee populations have never been better around the world.

Nothing against the bees but all these save the bees foundations just rolled in cash by marketing Honey bees as some poor soils that only you can save with a donation.

The Truth About Honey Bees

Raising nonnatives does not “save the bees”—and may harm them.
www.nwf.org
Click to expand...
I seriously learn so much from this thread. I never knew that honey bees came from Europe or that we didn't have native honey producing bees here!
 
Leadchunker said:
Well I fed my bees pollen substitute and sugar syrup before the cold snap. Went by today to top off feeders and refill pollen sub containers.
My electric fence was messed up so I figured a deer hit it or something. Nope!
Somebody pulled the electric wire up and put it on top of the t-post. Then it hit me. Someone stole around 30 of my colonies of bees. They dumped 3 on the ground outside the fence that didn’t have bees in them. They hand carried every one of them out. They could have easily just opened the gate and drove their truck into the yard.
Contacted the police in Leland. Basically got my information and told me to check Craig’s list, next door app, market place etc. The told me I probably wouldn’t find them. They suggested I put up trail cameras so I could catch them. Pretty much on my own it seems.
I’m positive I won’t find them. Those bees are heading to California for the almond pollination.
This just sucks.
Click to expand...
I'm not a bee guy, but I thought about having some out on property I own, so I'm interested in bee stuff. I had no idea bee theft was this bad. So they stole 30 whole bee hives from you?? Are they stealing them for the bees, the honey, the hives themselves, or sort of a combination of those??
 
phideux said:
I'm not a bee guy, but I thought about having some out on property I own, so I'm interested in bee stuff. I had no idea bee theft was this bad. So they stole 30 whole bee hives from you?? Are they stealing them for the bees, the honey, the hives themselves, or sort of a combination of those??
Click to expand...
All the above.

In CA, where providing pollination services is a huge business, most are stolen to be rented to unsuspecting farmers.
 
phideux said:
I'm not a bee guy, but I thought about having some out on property I own, so I'm interested in bee stuff. I had no idea bee theft was this bad. So they stole 30 whole bee hives from you?? Are they stealing them for the bees, the honey, the hives themselves, or sort of a combination of those??
Click to expand...
$200 per colony of bees to set on almond groves for 3 weeks is the low end price for bees. Generally speaking they need 2 colonies per acre to get good results. Over a million colonies go to just California for this every January.
 
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Fact is we dont need them for anything but honey.
Planet24 we do need bees for more than honey.

About 90% of crops in the US are pollinated by honey bees. 60% of the fruits and vegetables we feed our families need honey bees for pollination. So roughly 2/3 of our food supply is a direct result of honey bee pollination. The other roughly 1/3 feeds the animals we eat or process into other products.
 
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Been repairing, sanding, painting Woodware. I picked up two boxes of bees from a buddy of mine. He donated them to help me get built back up.
My girlfriend set up a go fund me page. That’s doing ok so far. I’ve located a place to get some nuc colonies in April.
The colonies I still have are bringing in the pollen and nectar big time. I’ll be going into boxes this week, weather permitting to check for drones. If the have plenty of drones I will start splitting colonies.
 
Leadchunker said:
Been repairing, sanding, painting Woodware. I picked up two boxes of bees from a buddy of mine. He donated them to help me get built back up.
My girlfriend set up a go fund me page. That’s doing ok so far. I’ve located a place to get some nuc colonies in April.
The colonies I still have are bringing in the pollen and nectar big time. I’ll be going into boxes this week, weather permitting to check for drones. If the have plenty of drones I will start splitting colonies.
Click to expand...
Please post a link for the Go Fund Me page, sir.
 
Going to pick up three colonies of bees in Calabash this morning. One of the people that attended a bee keeping class that I taught is donating them too me.
I still have the battle of locating queens for sale. So far the earliest I’ve located is an April delivery date. God is good!
 
Leadchunker said:
Going to pick up three colonies of bees in Calabash this morning. One of the people that attended a bee keeping class that I taught is donating them too me.
I still have the battle of locating queens for sale. So far the earliest I’ve located is an April delivery date. God is good!
Click to expand...
Garden Supply has some coming in beginning of March.
 
Located some queens from Gardner Apiaries in Georgia. They should arrive on 11 March. That will get my season kick started
I assembled a cell builder colony and left them queenless for 24 hours and then inserted the frame with queen cups. They polished the cups up for 24 hours. I grafted 54 larvae and installed them around the 36 hours mark. I’ll check their progress every few days and prep mating boxes. Hopefully get a lot of nice queen cells. I’ve had pretty good success using this method. I usually get above a 90 % cell builder success and above a 70% mating success.
I helped an older gentleman in Columbus county treat his hives and split them for him. He surprised me and gave me half the splits. I’m not used to people helping me and I rarely ask for help. It’s a situation I find myself uncomfortable with. He told me we all need help at times. It seems we do.
 
Yesterday was a busy day. Obviously still painting, sanding repairing Woodware. Got a call I was expecting from Duke Energy.
I removed a colony of bees from a power box mounted in the ground. The bees had the entire box filled with comb, and bees. I mean from the top down two feet to the dirt.
I had to tie the comb into empty frames. The comb must be oriented correctly or the bees will not use it again. Most folks don’t know comb is angled slightly upwards on the outer end. I used 40lb Berkeley game fish line.
I had my gear on for the removal as I didn’t know if the bees were going to cooperate. They were amazingly calm. I tied all the comb I could into 7 frames without any gear on. I only got stung twice. Once on my finger when I smashed a be on the comb. The other was when a bee landed on my eyebrow. I kinda squinted and pinned her between my glasses. This morning it looks like I took a punch to the eye. Lol.
I went back after dark and retrieved the nuc box I left for stragglers. They are all in their new home in my back yard.
I will be grafting queen stock off this colony. They were so calm it is beyond belief. They also had lots of honey.
 
Sitting in the man cave having a snack yesterday. I had the door open to air out the house and I heard a loud roaring outside. Went out and a huge swarm was just beginning. I ran down the street after them and finally they stopped on a bush. They were 2 feet off the ground. One of the easiest swarms I ever caught.
Put them in a box and placed them in their new location. Yay!!!!
 
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