BEELINES

From the President ~ Swap Meet, Evergreen Fair, Honey

Straws, Picnic...

Annual Picnic ~ July 20, 2014

NORTHWEST DISTRICT BEEKEEPERS ASSOCIATION JULY 2014

Our mission: to promote interest in honey bees and beekeeping through the

northwest district of western Washington, and, in particular, Snohomish County. Regularly scheduled meetings are

held on the second Tuesday of each

month at 7 PM at:

Christ the King Lutheran Church

1305 Pine Avenue

Snohomish, WA

All are welcome, from “newbees” to

experts. Please drop by and join the

conversation. Share your

experience—and your questions!

New members are welcome

to mail the completed form, or sim-

ply bring it to the next

meeting.

We look forward to seeing you there!

July is our annual Picnic. We are going all out this year. Please see the flier below. Of particular note is our featured guest. Steve Sheppard and hopefully several of his grad students will be joining us. Dr. Sheppard who heads WSU's entomology division will be spending the day with us. Extremely knowledgeable about all aspects of bees and bee keeping, he and his team have been, and are presently leading the effort to bring new genetic material to the USA. Along with Dr. Sue Cobey (October's speaker) they introduced the New World Carniolan queens too our genetic pool.

But, beside his numerous contributions, and wealth of knowledge, he is humorous and will be doing hive side talks/inspections. Questions are welcomed, and encouraged. Experienced and beginner beekeepers will all learn a lot.

MORE DETAILS ON PAGE 2...

SWAP MEET… (More details on page 2…) HONEY & HIVE PRODUCT PREPARATION FOR FAIR ENTRY… (How to prepare honey and other hive products for entry into the fair.) FAIR PRESENTATION by Dave Pearson… (explanation of how our bee booth will work and sign-ups will begin.) HONEY STRAWS PRESENTATION by Joe Canfield… (teaching on how easy and relatively economical it is to make “Honey Straws” with our own honey. ) FINAL PICNIC PREPARATIONS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS...

Bee Giggles

Visit Us Online:

www.nwdba.org

Sign up for email subscription to

Beelines:

http://

app.expressemailmarketing.com/

Survey.aspx?SFID=154456

WSBA ~ Washington State

Beekeepers Association is

a great website with great

articles, events, research and

the “how to’s”. Please check

them out regularly!

http://wasba.org/

Why did the bee go to the dermatologist? ……..It had hives. What do you call a bee that eats too much? …... Chubb-bee.

Mark your calendars, July 20th is the Annual Bee Club Picnic

Place: The picnic will be held at Mark Salser's farm just outside Lake Stevens. This is an amazing 400 acre horse farm with plenty of parking and covered space.

Key Guest: Our key guest will be Steve Sheppard PhD. Steve is head of WSU's entomology department whose main interest is the Honey Bee and Beekeeping. Steve, along with a few of his grad students will be giving mini talks per-taining to our favorite subject, and Steve will do several hive side inspection/talks a on all sorts of interesting tidbits. Steve will be available to field your questions.

Additional Picnic Activities: We are also planning to have demonstrations on the following topics and activities:

making mead

wax and candle making

cosmetics from hive products

bee beard contest!!!

a "bouncy house" for the kids

There WILL NOT be any interactions with the horses.

Food: The club is providing free hot dogs, hamburgers and drinks. We ask you to bring something to share that is edible.

We will need an RSVP to Mark Salser ( mark@polestarfarm.com ) with numbers of attendees so we can assure enough food. More on this later, stay tuned.

Swap Meet Please bring any and all useful used equipment you may wish to sell, donate or give away. Many of us have perfectly good equipment that we may have used, but for any number of reasons do not any longer. Instead of giving valuable storage space to that old set of feeders, smaller extractor, un-used queen excluder, or that gizmo you thought you needed, but have never used (like a pollen trap, or a pollen cleaner, etc. when we had fewer hives, and now have moved along to other stuff, or maybe you bought a set of warre hives you never used, or something that is simply too heavy for your aging back)....bring it to the July meeting, and maybe some other beek will find it’s just what they need. Guidelines: You set your own prices Transactions are between participants...so the club is not taking any "cut".

Page 2 NORTHWEST DISTRICT BEEKEEPERS BEELINES

BEELINES Page 3 NORTHWEST DISTRICT BEEKEEPERS ASSOCIATION

Water Your Bees to maintain good neighbor relations!

By Mike Miller

Honey bees need to collect water, particularly during the heat of summer. While bees can sometimes be fussy about where they collect water they do give us tips on what attracts them. They seem to love small ponds and creeks as well as the neighbors bird baths, swimming pools and hot tubs. To deter bees from going to a neighbor's yard for a drink, the suburban beekeeper should provide an attractive water supply for their bees. One good way to provide an attractive water source is with a half-whiskey barrel and floating plants. It makes a great "water feature" in your yard and the bees love it since the water "stains and ages" which is attractive to bees. Another great although "less attractive" water source is a shallow plastic bird-bath or container filled about half full of organic matter like mulch or potting soil and rocks. Then this container is filled with water. Leave about 50% of the soil above the water for the bees to land. They love it. Bees seem to prefer water that is not TOO close to the hive, so placing it 30 or more feet away can make a difference in their use. Great additional sources: http://www.glenn-apiaries.com/beepond.html http://www.honeybeesuite.com/water-sources-for-bees/

CATCH THE BUZZ

THE WHITE HOUSE — Office of the Press Secretary

Honey is the ONLY food that includes all the substances necessary to sustain life, including water. Honeybees have five eyes, 3 small ones on top of the head and two big ones in front. They also have hair on their eyes! The Honeybee's wings stroke incredibly fast, about 200 beats per second, thus making their famous, distinctive buzz. A honey bee can fly for up to six miles, and as fast as 15 miles per hour.

It is estimated that 1100 honey bee stings are required to be fatal. Honeybee colonies have unique odors that members flash like ID cards at the hive's front door, so the guard bees can recognize the entering bees.

SUBJECT: Creating a Federal Strategy to Promote the Health of Honey Bees and Other Pollinators Pollinators contribute substantially to the economy of the United States and are vital to keeping fruits, nuts, and vegetables in our diets. Honey bee pollination alone adds more than $15 billion in value to agricultural crops each year in the United States. For the full article: http://home.ezezine.com/1636/1636-2014.06.20.13.26.archive.html

Meeting Minutes ~ June 2014 By David Whitlock

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Beginners Q&A: Q: I feed my bees in the morning, and noticed significant bees in the morning on the outside of the hive. A: early activity is normal, they get started at first light sending out scout bees Q: how should we manage room for brood if they lay in the not-bottom box? A: if the bottom deep gets empty, reverse the boxes and rotate them if no brood in bottom. Even if 1-2 frames of brood. If plastic frames, outside frames don't get drawn or are drawn last. They tend to do the inner sides of the frames, Dave will rotate them to swap he drawn side. Q: are earwigs in the hive ok? A, yes they are fine, all of Dave's hives have them. The earwigs like the dark area. Ants are not good but earwigs present no issues. Q: is Cinnamon on the inner cover okay for treating invading ants? A: Might end up with cinnamon flavored honey, so be careful. Q: have you seen ants bringing gravel into the hive? A: Dave has never seen that, but one member reported seeing it. Ants in general if they are the small kind aren't too bad, the big ones will eat honey and brood. Q: Are moths bad in the hive? In empty or dead out equipment yes, in a strong hive they aren't an issue. You can't see the larva without a microscope. They leave something like spider webs all over the frames. Q: Smokey point has tent caterpillars, but they should not be a problem for the hive. Q: anyone putting up bait hives? How should they be situated. A: strapped to a tree trunk or even ground level. Don't put it up too high. 9-15 feet optimum given in Seeley's "Honey Bee Democracy", but safety first. Dave has bait hives that get occupied when at ground level. Old brood comb attracts them. Artificial queen pheromone if you don't have old comb. Lemongrass in a baggie with a small hole. Size of cavity is most important, size of opening are the main things they look at. Position. Southwest exposure. Dave reports round concrete tubes 18-24 inches in length from Home Depot for bait hives. Disadvantage is getting them out. Mark has caught some in 8frame boxes using pheromone lures. Read the directions on the packs of pheromone. Swarm from package landed on bush 2 feet off ground. They moved to a high tree while he was getting backup. Why are you suiting up? Allergic. They were spread out on this branch and he used a long pole. Warning don't extend over your limit. 3 pounds drops into a box and you are already at your limit, you will have a bad time. He knew a fellow who duct taped a bucket to a pole, bucket snapped the pole once filled with the swarm. He was wearing shorts and had a bad time. Honey flow progress? Dave put supers on every hive. Last year and collected 2/3rds back. This year most are already on. If the honey dome is in the brood box., they won't want to cross it. They clean the supers wet or dry. In this area we may have only 2-3 weeks of nectar flow, depending on the weather, the forage needs rain. If it stays too hot the nectar can dry right off the flower. A little rain replenishes the ground water. End of July we are going to see flowers on the knotweed. Dave thinks knotweed will be flowering early this year. We hope the state isn't able to afford to spray them this year. Bait hive, block the old home with a drone escape. In a cut out, use bee escape to get them out and not let them back in. Starves the larva left behind. End up having to requeen, she won't leave them even if the workers all come out. If they are in the walls it's critical to get them out because they are a pest attractant and get future problems with more swarms, plus the honey mess in the walls. Dave charges couple hundred bucks to cut in and doesn't repair because he is not licensed. We licensed bee keepers can charge to remove bees from a residence. However unless a bonded and licensed contractor, we cannot repair and charge. He's used a stethoscope to find them in the walls, they don't always come back in the same hole they flew out of, so finding them in the walls can be tricky, up to an 8 hour job. Which is why he charges for his time, it can be a mess. Cut outs are a big deal in structures. Get a contract from online that you have the homeowner sign to protect you from liability. Jeff Thompson gets up for announcements. Swarm list, sign ups, get on the list for those. Remember Tim Lawrence last month? It's a great experience to

Meeting Minutes ~ June 2014 By David Whitlock continued…

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watch someone work so sign up for the study he is doing to look in the hives for neo-nicotinoids. He has Lots of experience, & needs 30 more people. Takes 20 minutes and doesn't hurt the colony. July 20th will be the club picnic, lots of activities already, lip balm making, mead making, hive talks, creamed honey, 4h chapter present. Hamburgers and hotdogs planned. Potluck. RSVP for food and head count to Marc our host to attend. Become a member while there, however the picnic is free to attend. Steve is a great speaker in small groups, and is coming from quite some distance with great material to share. Meeting Jeff Thompson president this year making announcements. Treasurer was absent so no report from her. Mikes wife is now the editor. We are working on the website and should have something new up in the next 2 weeks. Swarm list here, sign up but limit your range to 4 towns. Eagle pest management asked to call on the list and wants to be able to call someone and have them come out that day, in order to save more honey bees. If you didn't get emailed the most recent bee notes, sign up. Please put your name on the list. Write legibly. Lawrence study sign up looking for neo nics. Q swarm list, do you have to take care of it yourself? Yes. Free bees without scaring anybody. Whole food market Saturday the 21 st. Mentor list signups. Hands on learning is very important. Please have at least 2 yrs experience. Next month meeting, swap meet, give away trade, good condition. Honey judging next month. Picnic need head count. Food plan is club provided, buns and burgers and hotdogs. Potluck so bring something to share. Alcohol ok. Marc is teaching mead making. Bee beard will be there. July 20th at 11 am. Between lake Stevens and granite falls about 15 minutes away. Directions in the newsletter. 4H club is coming and will do a tasting. Bouncy castle. No horse access. Speaker: Danny Najera is an insect guy, PHD. Teaches biology and involved with PSBA educational outreach. Going to talk about the waggle dance.

The news for this month, as the signage displays, is the club's new apiary on city of Snohomish

property. We are hoping to serve local kids who can walk or ride bicycles to the hives if

transportation costs were hindering their participation. We sincerely thank the Shurvinton family for

their donation of 2 splits to make this happen.

The club will participate in the Snohomish Farmers Market "Kid's Day" on July 10th where they will

fundraise with candle/soap sales, and attend KlaHaYa parade on July 19th with a small trailer float.

The 21st of July is the NWDBA picnic, and we are happy to be invited. Thanks NWDBA!

We also are going to be at the Stanwood-Camano fair on August 1st thru 3rd, so it's a busy month for

us!

We would like to bring attention to the University of WA Biology Dept

http://dailyuw.com/archive/2013/07/23/science/love-bees#.U7GT6id5mc0

and especially Evan Sugden PhD, who graciously gave the club a tour of their apiary last

month. The kids enjoyed seeing new ideas, eating drone brood (YUK!) as well as a tour of the

medicinal gardens with Keith Possee. The program at UW is in need of funding to move forward

with carbon filtering projects, and we would like everyone to consider attending an upcoming

fundraiser for them.

BEESLINGER ACTIVITIES Beeslingers 4-H Club: beeslingers4h@hotmail.com

WSU 4-H Extension Office / 425.357.6044

600, 128th St. SE, Everett, WA 98208

Calendar vs Weather: It is important to keep in mind that decisions are more dependent on prevailing weather condi-

tions than on specific calendar dates!

Food stores: The Blackberry Nectar Flow is (or has) tailed off. During this time in the Puget Sound, the availability of

adequate nectar/pollen resources falls dramatically, which is known as a ‘dearth’. Once ‘surplus’ honey is removed from

your colonies, it is very important to monitor the stores in each colony and feed as needed. Keep in mind that a colony

typically reaches its greatest population size at this time (through the blackberry flow), and it therefore requires its

greatest food supply.

Hive Inspections: Following the Blackberry Nectar Flow, it is important to inspect the Hive. Among the important

items to look for are: 1) Brood and Brood pattern, 2) are eggs, larvae and capped brood present? 3) are there any Queen

Cells (Swarm, Supersedure, emergency) present? 4) Are there any signs of pests or diseases? 5) Does the Hive still have

empty comb on which to grow and store nectar and pollen?

Honey Harvest: Once your Honey Supers are mostly filled and capped, it is time to Harvest the surplus Honey. As a

general rule, a frame that is at least 80% capped and no liquid nectar droplets are released when one shakes the frame is

ready for harvest. To reduce the propensity of robbing, consider removing honey supers in the early morning or

evenings. Note: Avoid using frames from the Brood Nest in your honey supers so that frames that have been exposed to

Miticides and other chemicals are not used to collect surplus honey.

Ventilation: July and August can be among the hottest months in the Puget Sound. It is important to assure good

ventilation through the hive to assist the colony’s ability to maintain optimal conditions inside the hive. The following are

a couple of symptoms where added ventilation is needed: one observes many bees fanning at the entrance, or a large

portion of the colony ‘bearding’ outside of the hive.

Swarm Management: Check for Swarm Cells; are the brood nest and or honey supers getting crowded? Conventional

understanding is that after the Blackberry flow, the propensity for the swarming instinct diminishes. The reality is that

many colonies don’t get this message!!

Queen Bees: There is a growing number of Beekeepers who believe that re-Queening each colony with Queens that

were mated AFTER the Summer Solstice (June 21) helps to position the colony for greater chances of winter survival in

the Puget Sound.

Pests and Diseases: Investigate colonies for various possible pests and diseases. Among those with which beekeepers

need to be familiar are: Varroa and Tracheal Mites; Nosema, AFB and EFB.

Hive Treatment: Early August is an appropriate time to treat hives for Mites. Depending on your choice of Miticides,

remove Honey Supers prior to treatment.

Northwest District Beekeepers Assn. TO-DO List for the Puget Sound ~ July & August By Larry Brainard

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Jeff Thompson: president@nwdba.fatcow.com Mike Miller: millermd10@gmail.com David Whitlock: secretary@nwdba.fatcow.com Larry Brainard: larrybrainard@comcast.net Mark Salser: mark@polestarfarm.com Elisabeth Douglas: hotredracer@yahoo.com

NWBDA Board Members… Got Ideas?

Please send suggestions and/or newsletter content

(announcements, articles, humor,

links, news, photos, reviews, etc.) to: christa.miller@live.com

Beelines Editor’s Mike & Christa Miller