Better Beekeeping The Ultimate Guide to Keeping Stronger Colonies and Healthier, More Productive Bees

by Flottum, Kim

• ISBN13: 9781592536528
• ISBN10: 1592536522
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2011-08-01
• Publisher: Quarry Books

Summary

Backyard beekeepers everywhere agree, a successful colony is a thing of beauty. Thousands of beekeepers have started beekeeping thanks to Kim Flottum's first book, The Backyard Beekeeper, and they have added to their repertoire of skills with The Backyard Beekeeper's Honey Handbook. Now, Better Beekeeping answers the question, "What do I do now that I'm a beekeeper?" The essential theme is simple: If you produce the right number of bees of the right age at the right time in the right place in the right condition you will be successful. To accomplish this requires making intelligent decisions in the beeyard, sound planning, tuning into nature, and balancing biology and business savvy. There are not a lot of how-to instructions hidden within this, but there's a lot of real-world study, smart, intuitive thinking, and setting of goals.

Author Biography

Kim Flottum brings a rich background of plant science, honey bee research, and basic farming to his 30 years as the editor of Bee Culture magazine, where his main occupation has been finding the answers to the multitude of questions that beginning, intermediate, and even advanced and experienced beekeepers bring to the table. He teaches beginning and advanced beekeeping courses, travels extensively to educate and lecture, and contributes to a variety of other publications on the basics of honey bees and beekeeping biology, the business of bees and pollination, producing and using varietal honeys, and a host of other subjects. He is the author of The Backyard Beekeeper, First Time Beekeeping, In Business with Bees, and Common Sense Natural Beekeeping. His books, magazine articles, interviews, and blogs are widely read for both their fundamental and advanced contribution to beekeeping knowledge. He is beekeeping’s leading advocate for fundamental honey bee safety, including ensuring excellent honey bee health, providing extraordinary forage, and minimizing the use of agricultural pesticides.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1: Growing Your Operation: How Big Do You Want to Get?

Trading Time for Money

Buy Preassembled Frames

Planning Ahead Saves Time and Money (But You Knew That)

Use It Up, Wear It Out

Business Goals and Bigger Pictures:

1. Where Are You Now?

2. Where Do You Want to Be?

3. How Will You Get There?

Buying Equipment

Standardization and Value

The Mercy Buy

Places to Put More Bees

Breakthrough: Lease Land for Beeyards

Expanding Your Honey House

New Ways to Expand

More Better Honey

Chapter 2: A New Look at Honey Production, or if Muhammad Won’t Come to the Mountain...

What It Once Was and Why It Changed

How Beekeeping Changed

More Change: Honey Money

A Price to Be Paid

Non-Agricultural Areas

Expanding Natural Bloom

Early Nectar Crops, Then Farm Crops

Migratory Beekeeping for Nectar Crops

Planning a Honey Crop

Types of Honey Crops

Planting Perennial Shrubs and Bushes

Long-Term, Permanent Plantings

Growing Your Own, with Help

Other Cost Considerations

How Much Land Is Required?

Working with Landowners with Lots of Land

Costs per Acre

More Land: Bigger, Better, More Complicated

Recommended Plantings for Honey Bees

Shrubs and Bushes

Cover Crops

Wildflowers

Permanent Plantings

This Land Is My Land, This Land Is Your Land

Types of Contracts

Chapter 3: Royalty: Finding the Best Queen There Is

Royal Lineage

The Queens We Can Get

What Do You Want from Your Bees?

Know What You Want

Hybrids

Survivor Queens

What Kind of Beekeeper Are You?

What Kind of Beekeeper Are You, Really?

Buying Queens

Mated Production Queens

Uncapped Queen Cells

Getting Queen Cells

Acquiring Virgin Queens

Raising Your Own Queens

Getting Breeder Queens

Raising Production Queens

Random Queen Production

The Starter/Finisher: The King of Queen-Rearing Techniques

The Cloake Board Method

Background Check for Drone Colonies

Chapter 4: The Working Class or the Bees that Beekeepers Keep

Preventing Springtime Swarming

Before Spring Arrives

Early-Season Feeding

Opening and Repacking the Colony After Feeding

Reducing Congestion in the Brood Nest

Equalizing Colonies, Discarding Dinks

Reversing

Making Spring Splits

Making Summer Splits

All About Honey Production

Measuring Growth

Preventing a Welfare Bee Population

Pests and Other Problems

Rallying Cry: Varroa Mite Resistance or Death

Signs of Hope

Trapping, Avoidance, and IPM

Chemicals

The Rest of the Lot

Controlling Nosema

Chapter 5: Wintering Your Bees, or Baby, it’s Cold Outside

Winter Rules

Unnatural Habits

From the Past

Take Care of the Bees

The Natural Question

The New Nosema

The Golden Rule

How Much Honey?

Too Cold Too Long

Protection

When It’s Really Cold

Planning Your Wrap

Pollen

Common Sense and Practical Facts

Summary

Glossary

Resources

Suppliers

Index

Photographer Credits

About the Author

Acknowledgments