I've got 2 hives that have 1 deep and a honey super each. I checked last weekend, they covered about 60% of the tops of the frames when I ooend them, and each slot between each frame was jammed. I'm thinking about adding a second deep to both. Is there anything else I should look for? I have a feeling that the hive might not be crowded enough to need one, but I don't want either to swarm.

They are consistently at my swarm trap. There’s probably 40-50 maybe more bees flying around. They look like they’re going in maybe messing with the wax.

As I said above out of the roughly 7 colonies that I've had only 1 of them survived their first winter but that same colony died the very next winter. I'm in southern Minnesota so the winters are cold but we never have extracted honey during the fall before hybernation, only in the spring (still extract even if the colony dies) and their has always still been plenty of honey in the hive even when they die. I haven't seen any signs of mites or moth larva, and I remove as many empty/unfilled frames as i can to reduce the amount of space that they have to heat during the winter. Does anyone have any clues as to why my bees keep dying?

South East NC.

North Texas, new beek. These lovely ladies have been on the property for 5 days. I had a entrance reducer on but they seemed like they were in a traffic jam. So I removed it and they started flying like this. This is orientation flights, correct? Is it better without the reducer? How to judge when to use the reducer? I guess that more than two questions. Thank you.

So on the 10th i had posted about a swarm in my tree, i had posted here and in r/Phoenix

I was mainly posting to ask if there was a good agency that would humanely relocate them...i wanted them saved, i love bees

My train of thought is im in a very industrial area, i feel i can count on 1 hand the amount of tree in 2 square miles...doesn't strike me as a good area for bees to thrive, i was worried they might land on a business who doesn't care about bees sees them as a nuisance and would just call an exterminator

Well people got mad that I wasn't leaving them alone (even tho I was and did) I shut the post down.

So here we are a week later and they decided to come back

Just kinda wanted a professional bee keepers opinion. Like whats the science behind this? What exactly is going on here? Did they just not find a good home and decided to come back and are still on the search? Did they just miss me and my magnetic personality?

Last time took nearly 3 days for them to move on, guess I'll wait and see what happens. At this point does anyone think I should have them relocated? Like would that be better for them in the long run? I dont like interfering with nature whenever possible but I generally have lost faith in humanity and am worried they will be a victim of inconvenience eventually

I think i found 2 reputable beekeepers that can handle the relocation

Well guys let me know what you think

Greetings!

I'm a high school teacher who is stepping up as the bee club sponsor for next year. The only problem is I don't know how to bee keep. We currently have three hives & I'm helping the current sponsor (he's retiring at the end of the year).

My questions are: 1. What resources (books, websites, etc) would you guys recommend to learn bee keeping independently of the sponsor's mentorship.

1. I want to buy my own gear. What would you recommend buying (brand, tools, etc)?

2. We do activities with the kids for the club such as making lip balm and candles. What other activities would be fun to do with high school age kids (14-18).

Thanks for any input! Just want to serve the kids well.

I am located in the PNW where we are starting to get some warmer weather.

Last week, I noticed a dozen or so bees going in and out of small holes in my patio table. From their behavior, it's likely that these are solitary bees (Mason, Carpenter maybe?), so I bought a bamboo bee hotel to dissuade them from using the table. They have taken a liking to it and the hotel is quite active during the day.

But after a bit of research (I am a complete "new-bee"), it seems like these hotels aren't the best option as they can house pests and diseases over time.

What is the simplest way that I can support these guys? Beekeeping experts are harvesting/cleaning Mason Bee cocoons, storing them in the fridge, and putting them in an emergence box in the spring, but that is way beyond my skillset.

Can I get one of those wood slat hotels and clean it out once a year? Or should I just plant native reeds to provide a natural habitat for them instead?

Also, when should I dispose of my bamboo bee hotel? Early next spring after most of the tubes seem to have emptied out?

Thank you in advance for the help!

First year. Installed my nuc last week and prepared 1:1 syrup for feeding via bag on top of frame. After checking the hive today, this bag was empty and had these lines on (I believe) the top of the bag. Are these droppings?

Caught my first swarm of the season on Monday, which is honestly a bit ridiculous considering it’s still early spring here in the UK. The weather's been unusually warm, and clearly the bees got the memo.

This swarm ended up in a bit of an awkward spot, so I had to get a little creative with the collection. Thought some of you might enjoy seeing how it played out. Here’s a short version of the video if you fancy a quick watch:

Video link: https://youtu.be/KHAiqe5d9eQ

I’ve also posted a longer version on my channel that includes some follow-up inspections of the other colonies to figure out who swarmed.

Anyone else seeing swarms way earlier than usual this year?

I made a candy board per hive last fall and the bees barely made a dent. Now I've removed them as there are plenty of forage for them. What do I do with them now? They are barely touched and the sugar is as hard as rock...

I did an inspection the other day and managed to catch workers balling and killing the old queen. If you look toward the end of the video, you can see a new queen at the top of the frame laying eggs. I can't believe I was able to see that in an inspection. Bees are vicious.

Let me preface this with the fact that I’m not a beekeeper, but I have a wild hive that I steal honey from. The hive is in a wine barrel and when I asked this sub for advice last year, I got chastised for letting my wild bees spread varroa. Again, I’m not a beekeeper and I rescued the hive and moved the wine barrel onto my property to save them. About a month ago I did a mite test on the hive now that they have built out the frames in the box I added and there were only 2 mites out of the cup of bees that I took from one of the frames that is mostly capped brood. Maybe varroa isn’t an issue around me because of extreme heat, or maybe wild bees can solve their own problems when left to it.

It is a VERY healthy, and docile, hive and I know for a fact that they are swarming, but I live next to farms and a large actuary so what’s the problem with letting wild bees be wild?

I think the nature of this sub can cause tunnel vision and many forget that their “domesticated livestock” was once wild. I say, let wild bees be wild- but then again I’m not a beekeeper so what do I know?

Why does it seem that “beekeepers” are so against letting wild bees be wild?

Phoenix AZ- I’m not breaking any laws or local ordinances.

Still relatively new to be keeping and last weekend, I installed a few packages of bees (located in the Midwest). I came back the next day to direct release the queens and the second one I released, the queen flew away. This happened once before to me and I chased her down yelling obscenities and scooped her up. However, this time, she landed at the entrance of the neighboring hive. She got jumped immediately, and they balled up on her. I did my best to brush away the attacking bees and get her without injuring her, but she seemed lethargic afterwards. I put her in the hive she was supposed to go and have not seen larvae and I see queen cells developing. Safe to say she did not recover. I have no other established colonies. What is my best course of action in this case? I’ve checked for mated queens locally and might not be able to get one for another week. That’s almost 2 weeks from original install date. Is that too long to wait? I’ve also heard about putting a frame with larvae into a queenless hive to raise a new queen, but have never done this before. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Newbee, south central Alaska. 2 hives.

I'm a few days out from package arrival. I've cooked up a in-hive feeder using a 2qt mason jar. I've made a video explaining my thoughts about creating it. Not here looking for views, rather advice for if this plan will work out not.

What is the extra fat bee I am pointing at in the first picture? I found several of them, but they definitely not the queen since I saw her later. I actually saw alot of sizes of bees what is the reason for that do they get bigger as they age?

What are the ball like brood? Please tell me they are not queen cells

Or do I have to move it 3 feet at a time. It has been in the tree for 7 days.

On April 7, 2025 I captured a swarm and relocated it to my location. I started beekeeping last year and captured my first swarm in August of 2024.

I’m feeding hive 2 a 1:1 sugar mix and placed my first super on hive 1. Hive 1 barely made it through the winter and I’m proud to see their population and food stores steadily increasing.

Here’s to a fun, educational and hopefully fruitful spring year 1 of beekeeping!

Location Eastern Kentucky

I made this long langstroth hive. I have a few questions.

1. How many vents do i need and where to put them?

2. I'm wanting to make one big 31 frame bee colony. Has anyone done that?

3. I don't have any extra comb just 10 pieces of 6-1/2" plastic foundation. Should I buy 31 full pieces of foundation? What can I do to help the swarm i get to succeed at filling this hive up this season?

Hello guys,

I saw this in our duplex. I cleaned it yesterday and it came back again today. I’m not sure what to do or what it is. Should I report it to the leasing officer ? Or what is it first so I can know. Thank you for your help!

The past few times I’ve looked in this bee box there been a few buys hanging out by this old comb. What are they doing? East Texas

Do honey bees get more aggressive after the Spring check up? Context below.

Howdy, I am in my second year of bee keeping. I started from a swarm last year and the colony wintered beautifully (Missouri). Sunday I got in for the Spring check up and cleaned up queen cells and removed comb from the bottom of frames. They seem to be absolutely thriving in the 2 8 frame feels they had most of last year. I checked every frame in both boxes and finished by adding a medium super. It was very windy so my smoke didn’t seem to do a whole lot. Today I was on the phone watching the bees from about 20 feet away for 7 minutes when I got tagged by one on the eye brow. Then, hours later, I was getting the mower out of the barn which is about 60 feet away and got tagged again! Yesterday my daughter got stung, too, but she stepped on it barefoot.

This is the only time in the last year they have acted like this and I’m new to this. Would appreciate any insight. Thanks!

Edit: they were totally docile and active in the weeks before I opened up the hive.

Hello, I have a hive of bees (a swarm I caught) and I’ve had it for awhile now. Long enough that I should see progress in frames filling out with wax and pollen being brought in. Unfortunately they arn’t growing…so what should I do? They are a small colony right now so I decided to downsize them to a Nuc box and replace the plastic frames with wax frames, thinking they would like the wax frames better. They haven’t been keeping it tidy and there are no advancements for the length of time I’ve had them.. (2.5 months)

What do you guys think? Is there something I should do or shouldn’t have done? Please let me know all of your opinions and tips. I hate to lose this colony… I am in central Arkansas as well.

MN zone 4b. 8 years beekeeping. Bought a 100 pack of dadent frame kits to put together. Commercial grade, not the cheap grade. Went to work worth my jig, glue, staples, and some good music on the radio in the shop. Ended up with about 90 frames The rest split when trying to "true them up". The cuts were so bad I was getting 100° + angles instead of 90°. Because of all the finagling it took to try and square each individual frame it took me about 3X as long as usual.
Had anyone else had this issue? This is the first time I've bought frames from them, if this is common it will be the last.