Modern basic beekeeping began with a book titled “A Practical Treatise on the Hive and Honey-bee” by L.L. Langstroth. Many of you will have heard something about the bee space for which Langstroth has been given credit. But this book really introduced methods on how to manage bees without great labor and effort. It opened up the world of the honey bee to our seeing eyes.
In reality, Langstroth did not invent the frame nor was he the first to recognize that the bees left a space between comb and hive appliances. What he did was design a hive with requisites as he described them. In fact, he lists 61 advantages that his hive had which allowed beekeepers “to manage bees in an effective way.” [From A Practical Treatise on the Hive and Honey-bee, 3rd edition, published in 1862 by L.L. Langstroth, page 105. (See “From the Archives” in this issue.)] Almost every technique we use in our apiary goes back to one of these requisites.
I am asked many times about making a beekeeping calendar. I have kept bees in Geogia, Indiana, Ohio, and North Carolina. There are variations in climate dates for temperature, rain, or snow. The growing season is longer in the South than in the North. Add the complexity of honey bee biology to the mix and no one calendar will be able to address management issues. Great crops of honey are produced in Canada. Canada has areas with long summer days and 100 growing days. Beekeepers in Canada must adapt management to meet the demands of climate conditions. Those are far different from conditions in North Carolina.
August is an interesting month. The summer solstice occurred on June 20 this year. That is the day when the northern hemisphere has its maximum tilt toward the sun. Almost any temperature chart will show that heat index figures level off and begin to decline when days get shorter. Generally speaking, the plant world is responding to shorter days and so are the bees.
Summer is winding down, with many states still having hot weather. As I mentioned last month, this is not the time to relax. Some beekeepers will have bees securing honey crops and many will have honey already extracted. All this variation will determine hive activities. The bee year is rapidly closing, and a colony needing help requires immediate attention.
When you open a hive and lift a frame from the box, have you ever given any thought to the fact that you have control of all the comb in the hive? You can make a number of observations about the condition of the comb or the bees on a frame. In Langstroth’s words, his hive allowed inspection without “exciting or angering the bees.”
It promises no splendid results to those who are too ignorant or too careless to be entrusted with the management of bees. In bee-keeping, as in all other pursuits, a man must first understand his business, and then proceed upon the good maxim, that “the hand of the diligent maketh rich.”
Summer is just one phase of keeping bees. What was done in the spring should now be producing the fruits of the labor spent getting hives to their maximum potential. Without all those inspections I discussed last month, things can go downhill really fast.
The first principle of beekeeping is to keep colonies strong. When I walk through my bee yard, the very first thing I see is the amount of bee activity at a hive entrance. Bee populations should be strong now! Bees hanging out on the fronts of hives do not indicate they are about to swarm. As beekeepers, we add boxes to give the bees storage room for honey and room for the queen to expand her brood nest. Harvest time is a stressful time for beekeepers. The work is hot, the bees are more defensive, and the problem managing a hive is
more demanding.
