The Great Bee Rescue

Tragedies happen, and on a farm they seem to happen more frequently than elsewhere!

We had a tragedy this week. While working outside we watched a good sized "twister" come through (the type that has cost us a couple of coops and a pool in the past). It was an awesome sight, kicking up dust and "things" as far as the eye can see into the sky as it drifted across the ground. Things get re-arranged quite a bit as the raw power of nature is unleashed on a small scale.

But then.. it drifted right by the bee hives! Sure enough, one hive lifted up and was dropped on it's side into the driveway. Bees, comb, wood all spilled out across the driveway.  Those bees were ANGRY to saw the least! We decided for everyone's safety it is best to allow them to calm down before acting out a rescue.  So we let them be for the rest of the day.

This is how the twister left the hive, surrounded by angry bees!

Upon inspection the next morning, half the bees had gathered up into a swarm on the inside edge of the original hive, still on it's side. The other half was bust raiding the honey from the spilled combs. We were able to get a closer look and made the educated guess that the queen was in the mound of bees inside the hive. So now was time to act.

In the closeup you can see the combs mashed into the ground upside down to the left, and a few bees gathered in the corner of the hive. 

We very carefully picked up the hive, bees and all, and placed it back on the legs, being very careful to avoid all bumps or jars that might upset them again. For the most part they accepted this and kept quiet. Then we pulled what top bars we could one by one and placed them back over the hive to cover the bees. They seemed to accept this also.

Then the tough part. The combs were actually upside down, a mound of wax and honey resting on top of the wooden top bars. Not Optimal at all! It was possible to pull a few out without disturbing the mound, but most actually had comb still attached. For these, we had to twist the bars to break off the comb and then slip them from under the comb. This usually left an half inch or so of dripping honey and damaged comb, which we cut off and placed into a bowl.  We were able to recover enough bars this way to cover 3/4 of the hive.

Last step was to replace the wooden hive roof to provide cover and shade. It was damaged but fit ok.  Then we placed the bowl of honey on top of the hive so the bees could continue cleaning up the mess and recover their food source.

Here is the almost finished scene. The box in the driveway was placed over the broken comb to provide shelter. 

To prevent the spilled comb from overheating in the direct summer sun, we placed a cardboard box or two with multiple holes over the pile of comb. There is a slim chance that the bees might be able to hatch some of the larva from this odd arrangement. time will tell!

If you come for a visit over the next few days, do NOT stop along the driveway in front of the fence. Keep your windows up.  Hopefully everything will be resolved in a week or so.

Bee Swarm #8 ! What a spring!

Amazingly... our one lone hive has now produced 8, yes 8 swarms this spring!

Swarm *7 got away. It landed in a tree for only an hour or so and before we could get set to catch it, they left and traveled over a mile to a new unknown location.  Cant catch them all!

But today, in the midst of feverishly working on another time sensitive project, swarm #8 emerged and landed in a tree in the front yard. This was .. was BIG. the biggest swarm yet.  (sorry, in our haste we did not get any pictures).

We managed to repair one of the old damaged hives, and clean it up in time to catch this one.  IT was an easy catch, simply brushing them into a box worked. We put them into their new home and they immediately went to work. This seemed the strongest queen, attracting the bees from far away as we moved them to the waiting hive. It was quite a sight!

So now, there are not one, but seven working healthy hives on the farm. And.. they are all emerged from the genetics of that one hive! Very calm, efficient, dedicated bees!

We checked the main hive, the one that produced all the others, and it is becoming quite sparse. maybe 1/5 of the number of bees there was originally. checking a few of the combs showed that the swarm had taken most of the honey with them. We took this opportunity to remove some old twisted empty comb so that they can start fresh now.  And WOW.. the little bit of honey left in those combs... nothing short of incredible! The flavor of truly aged honey.. aged in the hive, is indescribable. I have never tasted honey from any store that even comes close!

So stay tuned! as soon as we can, we will be offering what I consider to be... the worlds best honey!

Bee swarm #6!

Incredibly, that one same hive had produced try another swarm! Number 6 showed up today, 6 in only two weeks. And the are still plenty of bees in the original hive.

We managed to catch these bees. They landed on the fence right by the hive. It was of though, they landed as 3 groups... Large medium and small. First time for that!



The clump in the middle had the queen. She actually showed herself! As I was contemplating which clump to take first, she crawled right out of the center, across a pile of bees for a few inches, then back inside. The worker bees around her went crazy !

So now we have 5 growing hives, all birthed from the one remaining hive that stayed for 3 years without maintenance.

How many more? Who knows! But it is time to repair one of the three damaged hives to catch the next one!

posted from Bloggeroid

2 more bee swarms

What a year that is!

That same one hive produced 2 more healthy sized swarms today. The first one landed in that same bush as the other 3. But unfortunately, we didn't have a hive ready to place it, so by the time we assembled a new hive, it left. I mean... Minutes before. If it had waited 15 more minutes we could have captured it. But alas... It took off. We followed the mass of bees for a few hundred yards and then lost them. Very sad.

But.... We came home and were complaining about missing that one when Brenda announced... "There is another cloud of bees!"

Sure enough , just a couple hours after the fourth swarm there arose a fifth!

This time we were ready. Hunter and I scrambled into our gear and got busy. This one landed on the small oak tree right by by the now infamous "bee landing bush". It was a simple matter to cut the branch and place the whole swarm inside a brand new hive.

So now we have 3 hives along the driveway, one inside the gate, and the original hive. Plus the one that got away, makes a total of 5 swarms inside of 2 weeks!



Tonight we must move the hives into position away from the driveway.

posted from Bloggeroid

Bees Everywhere!

We have been blessed with an unusual event! Out one bee hive has exploded into 4 now!

Last week it produced a swarm... and we caught it in the bush by the driveway, used our improvised bee hive vacuum to get them into a hive safe and sound.

The remainder of the hive spent the rest of the week hanging out behind the original hive. "bearding" it is called, when most of the bees come outside either due to overcrowding or high temps. We watched them for a few days and they seems peaceful, just hanging out outside the hive.

The original hive, after the first swarm, with quite the "beard" going!

Then, this morning (sunday) we witnessed another swarm arising from the same hive! It swarmed up and quickly landed on the same post, same spot, as the one last week. We had not even taken time to move the second hive from the position where we caught that first swarm. The second swarm didn't seem to care, they just collected up on the post and formed a really nice mound of bees.

While we were preparing to collect those bees, an emergency arose in town that we couldn't miss. Hesitantly we loaded up and ran into town for a couple hours. On the way home we were hoping and praying that the second swarm was still sitting on the post. As we pulled into the driveway, there were bees everywhere! Was the swarm moving? Had we missed it?

But it didn't look right... something was up...

Sure enough, the second swarm was still mounded up in the same spot quiet as can be, but the air was filled with bees! We parked and ran over to investigate. To our surprise, there was yet another swarm in progress! A third swarm from that one original hive within a week, two on this same day! This swarm was settling on the back side of that same bush!

Ok.. so.. change of plan! We had built a second bee hive vacuum to collect the second swarm, but that swarm was mounded up on one side of the post in plain sight. It could be captured with just a bee brush and a box. So that's what we did! After moving the hive from the first swarm out of the way a bit, we swept the second swarm into a box and checked for the queen. She was in there! We could tell from the action of the worker bees. So that swarm went into a cleaned and waiting hive just a few feet from the original hive.

By this time the third swarm had settled into the bush and was quietly waiting for us. The many branches made it difficult to extract, so we decided to use the bee hive vacuum that we had made this morning for the second hive (confused yet? we were too!) We moved the taped up hive into position beside the bush and connected the vacuum. This hive was a newer design and much better sealed, with a larger entrance hole. It worked even better as a vacuum box! We had the entire third swarm into the hive within about 20 minutes. After removing the tape and vacuum, it was clear that the queen was in this hive also.

Success! We now had 2 new hives along the driveway and a newly populated one next to the original hive that birthed them all! Four healthy hives from one, in less than a week.  Not bad!

Here are the two hives, housing swarms #1 and #3 along the driveway.  The bush in the middle is the now infamous "bee catcher" bush

Closeup of swarm #1 in their hive. If you look closely you can see spots where the nice white comb shows through the bees inside. There is about 6 or 8 combs built already.

Swarm #2 in thier hive, picture taken from inside. They are hanging out in the front left corner... planning their new home. 

DIY Bee Vacuum, Direct to Hive!

Continuing from the last post, of the bee swarm that we watched happen from our one remaining hive...

The bees had landed on the old post inside a bush along the driveway. But then they shifted from the top of the post to the bottom of the bush!  The mound of bees was partly in the grass, situated inside 3 thick trunks of the bush.  An impossible situation for any normal recovery.

So, we built a special bee vacuum! Not really a vacuum, more of a method of moving the bees into a hive right on the spot.

Here is the starting point... a clump of bees in the grass and shrub trunk. 

First thing to do was to move a fresh top bar hive within a few feet of the swarm without disturbing them. this worked perfectly!

The top bar hive is placed to the right of the swarm, within a couple feet. We placed the divider in the middle to give an appropriate sized home for this little swarm. 

The next step was to seal the hive. Yes, seal it. This was accomplished with two kitchen garbage bags across the top, and duct tape all around. The tape sealed the edges of the bags to the outside of the hive. plus the entrance and vent holes. We even sealed around the glass viewing window. the only opening was one bar, removed to make room for the vacuum hose that would bring the bees. The hose fit perfectly through the slot left by one bar, and that was securely taped into position.

Here is the completely sealed hive, with vacuum hose for bee extraction in the middle and shop vac on the right. 

The hose for the shop vac was taped over a vent hole, that had screen inside to prevent the bees from getting into the vacuum. To hold the hose in position, we taped it to the fence right behind (past the right of the pic)

Here is a closeup of the vacuum hose connection. You can see the extra top bar holding the lid just open enough to provide easy access. 

Now, just turn on the shop vac and here we go ! The vacuum was perfect. Just enough to barely pull the bees into the hose, but not hurt them. In fact, we had to stop multiple times to "clear" the bee clog inside the hose. The little bees kept grabbing the ribs of the hose and each other.. instant clog! Otherwise it worked perfectly!

Hunter takes a turn sucking up bees into the hive

Here you ca see the hose taped to the fence to hold the weight. 

The silly looking contraption worked amazingly well! We managed to get 90% of the bees into the hive, including the queen, with virtually no causalities! The hive remained so calm for most of the operation that we didnt even need a bee suit or gloves.  Thy got a little flustered when the queen disappeared up the hose, but otherwise they just stayed happily crawling around or buzzing around.

The bee vacuum at work, almost done!

When we were all done, we had to remove hte hose to prevent the bees from escaping or gluing it shut! So we did pulled off the tape around the hose and quickly, very quickly removed the hose and dropped the bar back into place. The bees almost started spilling out to attack us, but things went just well enough. Everyone was tired and testy, so we just walked away to give them a chance to calm down.

Here is the after shot, all bees inside but not totally cleaned up yet. They got a little testy when we started pulling the tape off. We decided they had been through enough and waited till nightfall to finish

Now isnt this peaceful! by evening, all was quiet, we cleaned everything up and the bees are busily building their new home inside. 

The gently buzz of happy bees hard at work... a few scouts coming and going... all is well!

The bee vacuum was such a success, we are talking about ways to take this on the road and collect wild swarms this year to populate all the hives again.

Little Sprouts is back int he honey business!

Bee Swarm!

In the middle of the Friday morning we discovered that our one remaining bee hive was swarming!

You may recall, we stopped our bee operation when the GMO alfalfa went in near us, becasue we could not guarantee that the bees would stay out of the alfalfa field and the excessive  chemicals used on the GMO crop. That effectively shut down our bee operation and honey products for a few years. During that time, we had one very healthy hive that just hung in there... year after year. And this spring it is stronger than ever.  So.. as all hives do, it swarmed to make a new generation.

Here is the top bar hive that they came out of, under the larger tree on the left. Where the eventually ended up landing on the first day is the shrub you can see right in the middle of this pic, along the driveway. If you look closely you can see thousands of bees in the air. 

Here they are starting to gather up around the shrub. There is actually a 4x4 post right next to the shrub that the queen landed on, In this pic you can see the cloud of bees hovering around the bush. 

These are the guys that stayed behind to make a new queen and start a new generation. They clumped on the back of the hive for a few hours then went inside to get to work by nightfall. 

It was fascinating to be there to watch the entire process from start to finish. We were able to clearly see each stage as it happened:

1. The bees clumped outside the hive, waiting for the queen to make her appearance from inside. 
2. Once she emerged, she takes off flying and all the clumped bees joined her in the air, making a cloud of bees.
3. The cloud expanded to maybe 100 feet as they sought the queen's direction. 
4. The queen lands on the top of the post inside that bush, and the cloud followed her and condensed down to a clump of bees on the post.
5. Most bees clumped to protect the queen, but a few scouts started flying around looking for a new home. 

The whole process only took about 4 hours start to finish.  They only move maybe a hundred feet, but it was a tightly choreographed operation!

Here is a video showing the start of the swarming.

And this video shows them landing on the post. Listen closely to the awesome sound of a swarm of bees!

Now the race was on to assemble a new hive and capture the swarm  so that we could keep them. We are reentering the honey production business this year, since the GMO alfalfa is now illegal in the county and must be removed. We are once again able to make the best raw honey possible!

IF... we can catch this swarm.

At first, we thought  the challenge would be removing the queen from the holes in the old post. But no. By the end of the day, the swarm had move from the top of the post to the BOTTOM!

Now that is a challenge! There seems no easy way to get them out from between the branches and the grass.  So, the only option was.. a bee vacuum! We don't have one, (although I always wanted a "real" bee vacuum) So we decided to build one. Not just any bee vacuum, but one specifically designed for this particular situation...

Check out the next post for the answer!

No Honey available for 2016 till maybe 2023

With all the good news for 2016, there is one black cloud. We will not be bringing back Little Sprouts honey for this next year.

As you may recall, we stopped producing honey as soon as we learned that a somewhat local farmer had planted GMO alfalfa in the Sams Valley area. The subsequent legal battle and court settlement between that farm, and the county has been in the works for quite some time. Now that the settlement is reached, and GMO alfalfa is here to stay for 5 to 8 years, Little Sprouts is forced out of the honey business.

Why?  The GMO alfalfa is within feeding distance of any hives located on our land. Offering honey produced that is likely to contain GMO pollen from that alfalfa field is not something we are willing to do. WE will not compromise on quality or health in our products.

GMO testing?  not practical... since each hive feeds independently, we would have to test each and every hive when harvested. At the cost of about $300 per test, the cost removes any potential profit from a natural type hive as we use. To raise the quality of honey we were raising, it requires lots of smaller hives... but that would mean lots of testing, so not practical.

So, as much as we would like to offer the unique honey we were producing, we simply cant. Our honey business is shut down until the other farm decides to remove the gmo alfalfa crop, which could be 5 to max of 8 years from now. This is why the popular phrase"co-existence" is totally bogus. organic and gmo can not co-exist. Not unless the GMO farm is required to pay for testing of potential contamination of their crop ot surrounding farms.  But legally they are not. not even in Jackson county. The responsibility of protecting the public from GMO toxins is solely on the organic farmer.

Fair? no.  Just? No.  Legal? yes.

There seems little we can do but pause our own business until they decide to follow the county ordinance. If anything changes... we will certainly let you know.. but as of now.. GMO wins for the next half a decade.

Little Sprouts will not Compromise Quality --- period

With the celebrations floating around (and rightfully so) over the jackson county GMO ban settlement, we have receive a number of suggestions... to compromise.

We would like it to be officially known that we, Little Sprouts Farm, will not compromise quality of our products. Our commitment to you, our customer, stands firm that we will do everything in our power to maintain the highest standard of health and quality possible.

Even in light of the court accepted settlement which means Jackson county will be GMO free... in almost a decade. Yes, it could take as long as 8 years to rid our county of the GMOs already planted here.

In light of this, and to not dampen the "celebrations" of the ordinance remaining strong through the settlement, some have suggested that Little Sprouts can continue business as usual with a GMO alfalfa field within feeding distance to our farm. The controls put into place  give a very low chance that any contamination could take place (assuming they are followed).  But... as one customer put it "Little sprouts would be only a little GMO".

Well we are not.  If there is even a small chance that the honey could contain GMO pollen, we will not produce it.  That is our commitment to you, and our business model.  So, the bottom line is.. my farm has been the sacrifice in this settlement. I have to give up producing honey, because of my commitment to quality, for 5 to 8 years.  The time frame is not even under my control. The judge has given precedence to the GMO farm, and allowed them to choose when to replant their field... with apparently no regard for this farm and its business concerns.  We are forced to STOP our production of honey, so that they can continue their production of GMO alfalfa.

Hence, people suggesting that "just go ahead, all the other honey producers in that part of the valley are continuing"...  well I do not speak for them, and I do not know what their plans are... but we will not compromise.  So, because of our commitment to quality for our customers, we are forced out of the honey business on our land to support the gmo alfalfa business on a neighboring property.

This is why coexistence is not possible... It is not based on "if contamination happens"... it is based on the fact that quality must be compromised.  My business model of quality first is not compatible with GMO farming.  I have already suffered a financial and personal loss, whether contamination happens or not.

For the record, I do support the settlement. However, we need to be honest and open about the damage caused by this judge forced "coexistence" experiment.  It has already failed, because we lost an entire aspect of our farm, due directly to co-existence.

Bottom line - Little Sprouts will not, for the next several years, be producing honey products on our land.

I do not have a recommendation for where to purchase honey, other than to remind you that bees feed up to 10 miles from the hive, and are attracted to the largest color spot seen from the air.


More to come---

Bee swarm!

We collected a wild bee swarm this week.  This one was at a neighbors house...  And was quite challenging!  The swarm was nestled up about 30 feet high in a willow tree!  A tall extension ladder,  a pole saw,  and some careful balancing did the trick.  The only approach was to cut the branch and let it fall to the ground.  Hunter then quickly picked it up and set it in the box.  Fortunately it worked,   the queen was safe and sound in the center and then in the box.  Within a couple hours all the rest of the bees joined her.

Unfortunately myself and Kaelyn suffered a bee sting or two this time.  Those bees were angry!

The swarm is safely in a new hive now,  living at Little Sprouts...  And soon making you honey!

Bee swarm in a box

We have been waiting for our strongest hive to swarm,  and they finally did today.  We found the swarm on one of the bushes near the front hives. 

Unfortunately the new top bar hive we had waiting to receive them was not assembled yet,  and as I was assembling it I discovered a missing piece.  So....  No spare hive!

Instead,  I built a temporary hive out of a cardboard box and the extra top bars.   To protect from the rain we raised it up and put a table over it.  That should hold them till the missing piece arrives.

Bees swarming?

It looks like our strongest hive is readying for an early season swarm.  There are Lots of bees outside the hive preparing for....  Something.  Must be time.

Problem is,  we just filled all our hives with packages so we have no place to put this swarm if it launches tomorrow.  I would hate to miss it,  this is the best colony we have ever had.

We shall see what tomorrow brings.  Too late to do anything tonight but watch.  I suspect at sun up will be a cloud of bees.

There be bees!

We happened upon a golden opportunity to purchase some bees this year to repopulate our hives.  These bees are retired from a busy season pollinating some orchards in California. Now they live at little sprouts to bring you the best tasting honey available!

Tomorrow after deliveries we will be moving the new colonies into the old top bar hives as their new homes. Hopefully we will get some great pics to share!

Closeup of a Real Bee Swarm

Today, the bees got angry with me.  If you recall from the post yesterday... one of our hives swarmed and we caught it to keep it in a new hive.  Well, while I had the bee suit on, I figured it was a good time to check on the last swarm we caught.

It was too late. They had already created comb  and started filling it with precious honey... BUT I had never removed the branch they swarmed on. (I like ot catch them by cutting off the branch they are resting on and placing the whole thing in the new hive. Less trauma and injury to the bees). The comb they created was an interesting piece of artwork around and in between the branch forks.  Not at all a situation that allows for collection of honey later.  So.. I removed the branch and in the process destroyed their honeycomb.

Well, today they decided enough was enough and.. they tried to leave! Hunter found then landing on the same shrub that the swarm yesterday used.  So we collected them back up and this time put them in the hive without the branch.

Here is a nice closeup of the swarm and a video also.

What an incredible sight....

Be sure to turn up the sound for the full effect!

Unfortunately the video quality after uploading leaves a lot to be desired... 

Bees Everywhere! Its a Swarm!

This is a good year for bees! Today we had yet another swarm take off. Fortunately we were able to follow and catch it.  They settled on a high branch, one I was barely able to reach with the tallest step ladder. Hunter was right there at my side the whole time, in his bee suit also!

Here are some pics and videos of the process:

Can you see the swarm as it starts to collect in the branches? Look closely and you will see quite a few buzzing around.

Here is a closeup ... 

now you can see it better... almost all have landed

The collection bucket on top of the ladder. The branch was too thick to cut easily so i knocked the bees off into the bucket instead. On the second try the queen was in!

 And... we took some videos!

Now this is a swarm! Bees everywhere! You can even hear the buzzing of a thousand wings in the video

By here about half had settled on the branch. 

By now almost all have settled, about time to collect these guys up to go into their new home. 

Here they are looking for the queen, who is now in the bucket. It didn't take long for the rest to settle in the bucket to be with her.

At the end of today we now have 4 healthy populated hives running. only 2 more to fill to replace all the bees that left last year.  Amazing that we haven't had to go out to catch a wild swarm yet! (but we are ready if you see one!)

Bees Returning?

Just as in the days of Noah, when God brought all the animals to be saved to the ark two by two, we are experiencing an odd phenomena. You may recall that last fall all 6 of our bee hives left. Just up and left. No dead bees, no sign of any reason, they just disappeared.  We have since learned that a neighbor had the exact same experience last fall.

Well, they are coming back! Yep... so far this year we have had 2 hives repopulated. One came back mid winter and moved right into the hive. It has since grown so large that is already swarmed once this year and Hunter caught the swarm. So now that hive is two healthy hives. Last week, we were blessed with another wild swarm that actually showed up, parked just above another hive.  IT was not a swarm from the two we had! So of course we caught that one and they are now happily building comb in a new box.

That makes 3 active and productive hives so far, that have come to us with little to no effort on our part!

Will there be more? are these the same bees that left last year? Who knows.  Bees are amazing little creatures.  For now, we are just thankful for these little guys who will be producing honey very soon!

Honey officially joins the list of fake foods

Shock finding: More than 75 percent of all 'honey' sold in grocery stores contains no honey at all, by definition (Updated)
Here we go yet again. You apparently can't  buy honey in a grocery store and know that it is honey. According to these tests, if you do purchase something labelled as honey in a store, you only have a 25% chance that it is actually honey. There is a 75% chance that it is  chemically just liquid white sugar.
How do you buy honey today? Simple, the same as do many other foods, buy only from the producer you have met and know and trust.
I contend that it is the modern model of several middle men in the food industry that allows such lies to exist. The public had no means to verify what the label says, and virtually no way to trace the origin. The government is no use, they are way too busy pouring bleach on locally grown food. (recent news out of nevada)
Several thoughts here...
1. Government agencies like fda are eating our time and cash attacking local farmers for supposed violations where no one is harmed, while ignoring situations where health of consumers is damaged by practices of big ag.
2. The fix here is again to change the model to what had historically worked.... Buy food from small local farmers only. look your good creater in the eye and form a trust relationship with him.
3. All the studies that show honey as harmful and nothing more than sugar make sense... Chances are, the honey tested was actually only sugar! Demonstrating why studies that do not cite the source of the food being studied and production methods are worthless.
4. Any good can be healthy or unhealthy based on how it is created and processed. There is no such thing as common nutritional content of modern food. the nutritional content if based more on methods of production than nature and original content. Most labels today do not at all represent this.
Eggs are another example of this. I was appalled to find that labels of most eggs list the content that the government assigns to eggs, not what the eggs in the package actually are. THE EGGS ARE NEVER TESTED! Yet we more for a fact that nutritional content of eggs varies widely, sometimes by an order of magnitude! Eggs, like honey, can be good for your health, or bad for your health.
5. By the same reasoning, nutritional advice that does not specify the source of good to be used is worthless. most of the advice floating around today  is just false for this reason. Again the example of eggs.... Eggs from most producers should be limited in the dirty because they area in fact unhealthy, while eggs grown right actually reduce cholesterol instead of raise it. it all depend on the production. If your nutritionist doesn't recognize this.. Find another that does!
6. it is more implant to understand the production method than to know where the food comes from. JUST BECAUSE IT COMES FROM A SMALL OUT LOCAL FARM DOES NOT GUARANTEE QUALITY!  Sadly many small local farms follow many of the same teachings of big ag, so their product is similar. The only way to know the good is healthy is to know the farmer and find out what he believes and does.
For instance, I recently spoke with a small local farmer about potential animal feed. When asked if it was organic, he admitted "not certified but really the same thing". When questioned further, he explains that he only sprays poison  ( weed killer) once when the seeds are planted, and poison (pesticide) once when the flowers emerge. But he never sprays the produce, so it is "just as good as organic." IF YOU DON'T ASK DETAILED QUESTIONS, YOU DON'T YET KNOW THE SITUATION!
Bottom line... Honey gets added to the list of foods that you can no longer buy in the store... Another reason to find a local farmer, learn about his beliefs, training, processes, and stick with one you trust.
Your family's health depends on it.

The honeybee, partner or slave?

My recent post here concerning our discovery that some of the "natural" honey we had been buying was in fact not natural (the bees are fed sugar) has generated some interest among readers. I have received email asking more on the topic, enough so that perhaps a followup post is in order.

A common practice among conventional beekeepers (even those selling natural honey) is to harvest all the honey produced by the bees and feed sugar in it's place. The common belief being that sugar and honey are identical and fine for bees to live on.

To help understand the choices being made behind the scenes, here are the three basic scenarios possible in beekeeping:

1. Harvest 100% of produced honey throughout the year when it is ready
2. Harvest 100% of produced honey once a year
3. Harvest honey throughout the year at times when production is high, leaving enough honey or enough time to replace the honey until the next production period. 

options 1 and 2 require feeding of sugar, because there are periods of time when the bees have lost their entire feed store. Remember that bees produce honey not intentionally for other animals or man, but for their own survival. honey is the natural food for bees during non-nectar months. Without honey or a suitable replacement, they die from starvation. 

the difference between 1 and 2 is frequency and affect on the finished product. in #1 honey is harvested whenever it is ready, and it if hat happens to be when there is no nectar flowing the bees are fed sugar water as a replacement until they can find nectar/pollen  to live on. The feeding of sugar allows some straight sugar to get into the honey in much the same way that pollen and nectar do. The finished product during these times is not pure natural honey, it is honey contaminated with sugar. This is unavoidable during these times. The only difference between 1 and 2 is that 2 happens once a year, 1 happens multiple times a year. In wither case the is either periods of time or percentages of honey that contain traces of sugar. 

option 3 is a partnership with the bees. Only the "excess" production is taken so that the bees live year round on the natural food they are intended to eat. When weather is good, plants thrive, nectar flows..honey production goes up and the careful beekeeper takes advantage of these times to properly harvest only the excess. 

Why does this all matter?  well.. there are two aspects to the problem.. the quality of the product and the health of the bees. 

For honey to be labeled "Natural" I believe it should be produced naturally.. from bees that are living in in their natural environment. No bees in nature have access to sugar water. Sugar in itself is a completely unnatural product, since sugar is evaporated cane juice (at best). Where do you see pools of evaporated cane juice in nature? It simply doesn't exist. sugar itself is a man made product produced by separating a natural plant into pieces and discarded the undesirable pieces (fiber). Only those foods occurring in nature can be truly considered natural. sugar simply is not.  Therefore honey produced by bees fed sugar can not be considered natural honey. In farming the feed makes the product, and in this case the feed is nothing but a man mad processed food substitute. 

The other major issue is the health of the bees themselves. Anyone that believes sugar water is equivalent to honey is sadly misinformed. Honey is a fermented product full of beneficial nutrients and substances. sugar water is.. well.. a man made processed food substitute devoid of nutrition. To deny the difference in health for bees between the two foods is just foolish. Perhaps if bees were allowed to live on their natural feed, the colony health problems in bees would be lessor or non-extent. how we can feed processed foods to bees and expect them to maintain health ? 

Perhaps an even bigger issue is respect for God's creation. Farming is not about profit, it is about a harmonious balance between man and animal and God's creation. When man is motivated by profit, the balance is thrown off and something suffers. Think for a minute from the bee;s point of view. the beekeeper that takes only the excess of good times is working in partnership with bees. The bees get protection, place to live, oversight, etc. and the beekeeper gets the excess honey produced.  On the other hand you have the situation where the bees are kept for production only, forced to eat cheap unnatural foods that barely keep them alive.  all of the fruits of their labor are taken by the keepers. This is not a partnership.. this is slavery. Are god's creatures due any less respect than any other creatures? Is slavery warranted on animals that produce food for us as the earth's keepers?  

Perhaps this seems extreme, but it is the basis of why we do what we do here at little sprouts farm.  Respect for God's creatures is important, as is health, and product quality.  Neither of these should be compromised in the search of personal profits. 

Bee hive inspection

I did the first bee hive inspection this morning. What a fun task on the cool of the morning surrounded by happily buzzing bees. It truly is a pleasant sound.
The breakdown is this:
One hive is going like gang busters I've had to open the entire hive to fit them. One was about half open and all but one bar had comb. The comb were so big that most were attached to the front of the box. It was a little messy but I managed to get the hang if the hive tool to scrape the comb loose before moving the bar. I did break three or four in the process. A few were crooked and had a corner attached to the next bar. In the end I damaged maybe 6 combs slightly. Theses I kept in a clean bucket as our first fruits.
Two other hives are expanding but not as fast. In these I opened about half the hive more.
The other two hives are struggling. They don't seem to have grown and one seems to be lightly populated I fear these may not make it through the winter. I didn't add any space to them as the comb is only on about 5 bars and only about half of each bar.
Bees are certainly the most fascinating critters we have on the farm. Sure glad we decided to add them!



I must add.. this honey is Y-U-M-M-Y!!!!! There is nothing like totally unheated fresh from the hive honey. 

Late season bee swarm!

We got a surprise all today. Someone found a bee swarm! Seems late in the season for a swarm but we still need to fill one hive so it is worth checking out!

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This turned out to be a picture perfect swarm capture! It was a smaller swarm hanging onto a plum tree just a few feet from the ground. Clipping a few branches enabled me to drop them into the bucket easily. As usual I set the bucket down with the lid cracked open and let them alone for 10 or 20 minutes and sure enough, 100% of the bees climbed inside! It was amazing to watch them all calm down and one by one crawl inside the bucket. This is the first time we caught every single bee!

the only down side was that Hunter got stung! He was standing maybe 10 feet way but for some reason at the first light touch of the clipper the swarm rustled to life and a couple of bees shot out. One of those shot straight to Hunter and stung him under his chin! there was no delay, no thinking about it, the little fellow flew straight to him and stung within a half second of me touching the branch. That was a first! too. the rest of the bees seemed docile enough, it was just he single bee.

We met a really nice couple who ended up in the end letting the kids pick plums from the tree to take home. They happily picked a bag full of fresh juicy plums after the bees were gone.

Now the bees are adjusting to their new home, our 6th hive for the season. Hopefully they will make a happy long lived home of Little Sprouts Farm.

The swarm resting between the plum branches

Snipping some branches off around it 

time to snip the main branch off

and in the bucket

we finished the evening by picking plums!