Join Brown County Beekeepers Association President Dave Elsen and Vice President Julie Mazzoleni as they demonstrate how to install a nuc and a package of new honey bees. They also take questions from club members on lots of related topics to include feeding the new bees. The presentation is an hour long but well worth it.
During the April 15, 2020 virtual club meeting the subject of performing a sugar roll to check mite load came up. The Minnesota Bee Squad does a lot of good work in the area of mite testing and controls. The only issue with this video, in the club’s opinion, is the person is only wearing head protection. She is not wearing gloves or arm protection. The club always recommends taking the level of personal protection you are comfortable with.
We are hopeful this event will be rescheduled, however, at this time it has to be CANCELLED.
The Brown County Library – Denmark Branch, is hosting the Brown County Beekeepers Association in a one hour presentation on BEGINNING BEEKEEPING. The presentation will be on Monday April 13th at 6:00 PM and will cover : equipment, cost and time.
LOCATION: Brown County Library – 450 N Wall St, Denmark, WI 54208
TIME: 6:00 – 7:00 PM
A quick assessment of overall hive health before a full inspection can be done by tilting the hive forward on the bottom board. In this way you get a feel for the weight of the hive, colony size, and a critical look at the bottom board. Read the full article by Bee Informed Partnership here
The Marathon County Beekeepers Association is presenting a full day of speakers in Wausau WI on the campus of North Central Technical College. Registration is now open. Cost is $49 until February 29, 2020 and then it is $59. NOTE: If you are over 62 years of age the cost is only $21.90. The discount is given at checkout. For more information or to register.
Last year 6 BCBA club members carpooled to Wausau. There are already 3 folks from BCBA have signed up and are planning to carpool again. If you would like to carpool contact the club president, Dave Elsen.
Within a hive there are three types of bees. The queen, drones, and worker bees. There is only one queen in a hive, is female, and lays eggs to produce more bees. About 15% of the hive population are drone bees which are male and their only job is to mate with a different queen. Finally about 85% of the bees are female worker bees and they do all of the work around the hive. They take care of the brood, clean and defend the hive, and gather pollen and nectar.
There are numerous factors to consider when determining where to place your hive(s) which include they physical location, bee needs, and human needs. A good starting point is to do an internet search to determine if your local community has set guidelines for maintaining hives. Allouez Wisconsin, for one, has a number of rules to be followed.
Location
Bee Needs
Human Needs
The following video discusses the most basic bee equipment that a first time beekeeper will need. You will learn about different personal protection gear, gloves, hive tools, bee brushes and smokers.
There is promising research coming out of Finland which, if successful, will be the first insect vaccine. American foulbrood is a devastating disease that requires killing all of the bees and burning of all equipment to prevent the spread to other colonies. The vaccine is edible and is passed from the queen to her offsprings. Read the full article here.
Purchase your tickets by January 12, 2020 for the movie “The Pollinators” and it will be shown in Green Bay at Marcus Bay Park Cinema on January 23, 2020.
Watch the Movie Trailer
Overview: Much of the food on our tables comes from the intrinsic act of pollinating the flowers that become the fruits, vegetables and nuts we eat, but agricultural practices, pesticides and politics are making that simple act of nature more difficult everyday. Honey bees pollinate one third of the food we eat, yet alarmingly honey bee populations in this country have fallen by half since the 1940’s and continue to decline. Honey bees are threatened by indiscriminate pesticide use, disease, industrial scale mono-culture farming and powerful corporate lobbying interests that work to influence the EPA and USDA, who are our gatekeepers for a safe agricultural system. Our very food system is under threat and rests on the wings of these tiny insects and the commercial beekeepers that move them from farm to orchard pollinating crops that native pollinators can no longer adequately accomplish.
This film will follow migratory beekeepers and their bees throughout a growing season, joining them as they stop to pollinate the myriad plants and trees that depend upon honey bees to grow and produce our food. Much of the work moving bees is done at night when the bees are in their hives so few people actually get to see what these beekeepers do. Throughout the journey we will meet farmers, scientists, chefs and academics to give perspective to this complex food system that we all depend on. We will explain the problems of modern large scale agriculture, offer ideas on how it can be improved and learn about these pollinators that are a subculture of agriculture and a vital cornerstone of our entire food system. It’s a cinematic road trip that will result in a feature length documentary film about the importance of pollination to our food system, the complex interrelationship between migratory beekeepers, their bees and the agriculture system that needs these migratory honey bees in order to grow the food we eat.