Keeping bees.

Joey the lips

Hi Farmers.

Wondered if you could advise me on your experience.

I am looking to keep bees. Will be starting traing course soon and intend to get public liability insurence (Just in case)

Any my biggest problem is where to keep them. Its suggested i approach a farmer and ask to use a corner of field that is not in use, Its literally a small pallet sized space i would need.

Initially i am not doing this for commercial reasons. Its just for the love and respect of the insect. I could go into telling you the advantages of bee hives on a farm but i am not selling you something.

All i really want to know is have you ever been approached to do this?

Would you bee open to it?

Would you allow a bee keeper access to your land for 15min once a week?

Anything else i should consider?

fits

Is there any particular reason why you cant keep them in your garden?

Big rise in urban beekeeping and if you put up a high fence around the bees they shouldnt bother your neigbours at all?

moy83

We have a lad that has a few hives in our place . When he asked permission I asked him would he throw in the odd pot to us ,but its three years now and still havent got a pot :mad: I must ask when i see him again .
But I dont see any reason not to have them other than that

Joey the lips

fits wrote: »

Is there any particular reason why you cant keep them in your garden?

Big rise in urban beekeeping and if you put up a high fence around the bees they shouldnt bother your neigbours at all?

The trick is not a high fence but a high hive. I have a lad that has a disability with simular traits to authism. I dont think the bees would survive.. But yes this is an avenue i am exploring in the right set up.

moy83 wrote: »

We have a lad that has a few hives in our place . When he asked permission I asked him would he throw in the odd pot to us ,but its three years now and still havent got a pot :mad: I must ask when i see him again .
But I dont see any reason not to have them other than that

The first year to 2 might not yield much. But yes i cannot see why he Ydoes not give you any... Its estimated you get about 25kg of honey a year but that depends on location

Did the lad approch you... Did you know him.... any other info.

moy83

No he just pulled in one day when I was doing a bit of fencing and asked about it . He seemed sound and responsible so I said fire away and leave the place tidy after yourself which he does .
Its on an outfarm so I rarely see him coming or going , maybe thats why he doesnt get the chance to give me a jar .
Would one hive give 25kg ? Thats a fair heap of honey

Joey the lips

"The Honey Crop

Honey yield is greatly influenced by seasonality. However a beekeeper who attends to the basic principles of management should be able to achieve an average of 20kg per hive per annum.

The yields obtained at the Teagasc Beekeeping Research Station at Clonroche, County Wexford confirm this view. The yield from 75 colonies managed commercially at Clonroche has been 25 kg per colony per annum. This has been achieved by working to a planned programme of management and disease control"

Thank you for that information. I will approach a couple of farmers locally.

moy83

Go for it , what have you to lose by asking a few farmers .
The way I see it is that someone that has an interest in keeping bees is a safe enough person give permission to .

SC Kevin

Are there any coillte forests near you? I have a few hives in one about 20 mins drive from me. I'd love to keep them in my garden but with a 4 year old and a dog, it wouldnt be possible (i did, however, have a few nuc's in the garden for a week or so while i was re-queening to keep on eye on them! )

Coillte dont mind bee keepers using the forests but you may have to pay for it. Im not sure exactly what thou as the manager of the forest near me was good enough to let me use it for a year for free just to see how i got on. Ive heard something in the region of 20 euro?

I think ill start asking a few local farmers if i can use their land just so the hives would be a bit closer and i would also have better access

A beekeeper who attends to the basic principles of management should be able to achieve an average of 20kg per hive per annum.

IF the weather is any way decent you would get 25kg. last year i got my hive at the start of june and it was queen less but it did had a few queen cells, she hatched, got mated fairly quickly and started laying and by the end of august i ended up with about 30 lbs of honey so i was well happy.

This year however has been a completely different story! From my 2 main hives, i got 8.8 lbs of honey and i know of a few who others who have 10+ hives who got nothing this year its been that bad.

My problems were mainly queens as in they tried to swarm and been clipped, didnt get very far and were lost so the hives were queen less for a number of weeks, also when i had virgin queens, it was nearly impossible for them to go out and get mated and the ones that did, didnt mate very well so the bees got rid of her! With no queen laying, no new bees to clean cells/collect pollen/nectar etc.

I would suggest that you have a ready supply of queens available to you just in case we have a "summer" like the one we just had either from a queen breeder or raise your own.

I myself have 3 apideas (mating hives) for next year so im hoping that if any of my hives are queen less again, i can pop in a newly mated queen and carry on. If the queens dont try and swarm, i can then use the newly mated ones to make up nuc's so its a win win!

Qualitymark

Where are you, Joey-the-Lips? "Sometimes I Just Don't Know" won't come up on my Apple maps for some reason.

This thread http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=80585405 might be useful.

That's on the Greystones forum, but there's also been a couple on the Smallholding forum (Farming and Forestry/Smallholding).

Joey the lips

Living in Duleek, Think the nearest forest is drogheda or navan.

Qualitymark

I've always thought bees were underrated as a burglar alarm.

Muckit

Joey the lips wrote: »

"The Honey Crop

Honey yield is greatly influenced by seasonality. However a beekeeper who attends to the basic principles of management should be able to achieve an average of 20kg per hive per annum.

My sister keeps bees on our farm. This is her first year to get honey. She spun off 17 jars from the one hive just last week. Not sure how that works out weight wise, well shy of 25kg anyway, half it I'd say Tastes much milder than the stuff you get in the shops.

She was putting in the liquid sugar syrup today. Said they'd have it ate in no time. Also gave them insecticide sticks or something like that? I'm fascinated by it all.

But mainly I'm just the taster

Lovely on the porridge these mornings

SC Kevin

Muckit wrote: »

My sister keeps bees on our farm. This is her first year to get honey. She spun off 17 jars from the one hive just last week. Not sure how that works out weight wise, well shy of 25kg anyway, half it I'd say Tastes much milder than the stuff you get in the shops.

She was putting in the liquid sugar syrup today. Said they'd have it ate in no time. Also gave them insecticide sticks or something like that? I'm fascinated by it all.

But mainly I'm just the taster

Lovely on the porridge these mornings

Hey muckit. you sister was lucky to get any honey at all, im well jealous! haha

If she only took it off last week, there may be some ivy honey in it as that usually starts around the middle of september. Usually thou, honey is taken off at the end of august/start of september because what ever they collect from then on is used for stores, as well as 2:1 sugar syrup

im going out tomorrow to give my second feed (3 litres to each hive) and your sister is correct, they will have that gone in a few days! :eek:

SC Kevin

Qualitymark wrote: »

I've always thought bees were underrated as a burglar alarm.

I love this!

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/local-national/northern-ireland/sting-operation-thieves-chased-off-by-swarm-of-bees-16201543.html

Qualitymark

Excellent!

In relation to the taste of the honey, it'll taste lighter or stronger depending on what flowers the bees are feeding off. I was kindly sold a couple of combs of Waterford honey recently and they're unbelievably delicious, dark and strong.

SC Kevin

Qualitymark wrote: »

Excellent!

In relation to the taste of the honey, it'll taste lighter or stronger depending on what flowers the bees are feeding off. I was kindly sold a couple of combs of Waterford honey recently and they're unbelievably delicious, dark and strong.

Do you remember what the name of the honey was as i help out someone from Waterford with their hives

kodoherty93

If you join The Federation of Irish Beekeepers' Associations i think you get public liability insurance included in your membership

Qualitymark

SC Kevin wrote: »

Do you remember what the name of the honey was as i help out someone from Waterford with their hives

No name, this was a private beekeeper using Warre hives, a Boardsie. Nice guy.

SC Kevin

Qualitymark wrote: »

No name, this was a private beekeeper using Warre hives, a Boardsie. Nice guy.

Fair enough, it wasnt the fella i know so!

kodoherty93 wrote: »

If you join The Federation of Irish Beekeepers' Associations i think you get public liability insurance included in your membership

Yes, very true kodoherty93! forgot to mention that. You also get a subscription to "An Beachaire" which is an irish beekeeping magazine

here is a list of the associations around the country

http://www.irishbeekeeping.ie/federation/affassoc.html

Joey the lips

Thanks for the additional info folks. I am in that process of signing up with them i am also attending the last couple of meetings before winter

bertie1

How did you get on with a spot for your hives

teddyteddy

im so curious on this topic . anyone keeping bees and cares to share fotos?

SC Kevin

teddyteddy wrote: »

im so curious on this topic . anyone keeping bees and cares to share fotos?

Ask and you shall receive!

A newly mated queen



Wax glands on a bee



A frame with some capped brood (babies) on it



A bee with pollen



And a frame of honey - yum yum!

Muckit

The sister is 'gearing up' from one to 4 hives for next year. Might be the right stock to get into!

Great photos there btw

SC Kevin

Muckit wrote: »

The sister is 'gearing up' from one to 4 hives for next year. Might be the right stock to get into!

Great photos there btw

Thanks Muckit!

Your sister is right to get another few, if she has any problems, it very hard to sort them with just to one hive. having 4, she will able to take a frame of eggs from one hive if another becomes queenless!

I have 5 so far and hoping to get 5 more next year.

If your sister is on facebook, there is a group she can join. Its pretty lively so if she has any questions, some one may be able to help. here is the link

https://www.facebook.com/groups/bees.ireland/?bookmark_t=group

Username John

We had bees here long ago, so we have the gear...

There are bees in neighbours flat roof, they swarmed twice last year - I put both swarms into hives (one swarm was poor now to be fair)
But both died during the springtime
They both had enough food I thought (the brood box had a lot of unopened honey in it)

I was disappointed. Maybe I should have Given em more care, I didn't feed them in the springtime, which is prob the issue - as I thought they were ok for food...

But maybe the queens weren't great either... I dunno...

Either way, no bees here now again

SC Kevin

Username John wrote: »

We had bees here long ago, so we have the gear...

There are bees in neighbours flat roof, they swarmed twice last year - I put both swarms into hives (one swarm was poor now to be fair)
But both died during the springtime
They both had enough food I thought (the brood box had a lot of unopened honey in it)

I was disappointed. Maybe I should have Given em more care, I didn't feed them in the springtime, which is prob the issue - as I thought they were ok for food...

But maybe the queens weren't great either... I dunno...

Either way, no bees here now again

Sorry to hear that Username John, but dont beat ur self up!

I had 4 hives last year, 3 tried to swarm, all the queens were clipped so i lost them.
The next few weeks was a nightmare trying to get queen mated. Eventually i did. I feed them going in to winter cause they had no honey what so ever, the weather was so bad!

Those 3 hives didnt make it, like you they had plenty of stores left, they just didnt have enough bees to get thru the winter and cold spring we had. Id say it was the queens were the problem, a lot of people had the same problem. i heard of people losing all 15 of their hives, another person lost 9 out of their 12 hives!

Muckit

Thanks for the link Kevin, I will tell her. She is part of a food local beekeeping club where she can borrow the spinner thingy to harvest the honey + buying the new swarms from another member.

I suppose I should have been more specific, she went from one hive to none to now aiming for four So no honey this year:( Spring caught a lot of beekeepers apparently.

kevthegaff

i have a hive in the attic, just noticed during the summer. Is it possible to move them into a hive in the garden

SC Kevin

Muckit wrote: »

...she went from one hive to none to now aiming for four So no honey this year:( Spring caught a lot of beekeepers apparently.

It did ya, there were a lot of people who lost everything and had to build up again this year

SC Kevin

kevthegaff wrote: »

i have a hive in the attic, just noticed during the summer. Is it possible to move them into a hive in the garden

Are you sure its a bee hive and not a wasps nest, I know a few people who had them this year

Bees can make a nest under a roof or in walls if there is enough space, wasps are usually the ones in an attic/shed etc

board_walker

Hi,
Does anyone know if it is permissible to keep a beehive in a built up residential area.
I am living in Dublin and was wondering if I need to get permission from the council.

bpmurray

board_walker wrote: »

Hi,
Does anyone know if it is permissible to keep a beehive in a built up residential area.
I am living in Dublin and was wondering if I need to get permission from the council.

Definitely! In fact, the variety of flowers in peoples' gardens means that the honey is absolutely delicious. You have to plan it carefully though: putting the hive on a garage roof is a great idea since the bees are above head-height and don't annoy folk. If you have a backyard with a high wall, that will have the same effect. Basically, it's good if you can have the bees leave & return at 7 feet or above.

There's actually a project for this: http://desireland.ie/bi-emergency-bait-hives-for-refugee-bees/

One more thing - find a local beekeeping association and do the preliminary course - it's not as simple as just dropping a hive somewhere!