Boxing Day Sale

     If you're shopping this boxing day you may want to buy a package of bees to start a new hive this spring.  To start a bee hive in Vancouver at the beginning of our season (approximately March 1st when it is warm enough and there is enough pollen and nectar available for bees to begin foraging) you either have to buy a pre-existing bee hive or a package of bees, usually coming from the southern hemisphere where it is late summer and the colonies are at full population.  The packaged bees come in the mail by air in 2 to 3 pound packages (8-12,000 bees with a caged queen) and usually come from Australia, New Zealand or Chile.  The shipped package has traditionally been of wood with screened sides or ends containing a feeder and a young, laying queen.  The B.C. Ministry of Agriculture has provided basic guidelines for the  installation, feeding and management of your package bees (agf.gov.bc.ca/apiculture/factsheets/301_packages.htm).

     Your packaged bees should be installed as soon as possible on a warm (preferably ar least 10 celsius or 50 fahrenheit) day when it is not raining.  Here is a video describing the installation of a package of bees.

       Most of the imported bees in Vancouver come from New Zealand because of the similarity in climate and lack of  hive beetle found in Australian bees.  Also, most beekeepers in Vancouver are not fluent in Spanish so are unable to communicate with Chilean bees.  Que pasa abeja?  Sometimes bees are shipped in tubular packages for easier and safer shipping and installation.  Urban Bee Supplies is now taking orders for New Zealand bees to arrive in tubular packages in the spring (urbanbeesupplies.ca/packaged%20bees.html).   These Arataki Carniolan Bees are bred for the Canadian climate and disease resistance (aratakihoneyrotorua.co.nz/packagebees.htm).  The Carniolan honey bee (Apis Mellifera carnaca Pollman) is a subspecies of the western honey bee and native to Slovenia and some parts of the former Yugoslavia, southern Austria, and parts of Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria.  I bought a New Zealand (the bees speak with an accent) Carniolan hybrid nuc (nuc- nucleus of a colony in a nuc box with 3-5 frames of 8-12,000 bees) last year from Urban Bee Supplies and it has done very well.  Studies show that the Carniolan hybrid bee ranks high in temperament, productivity, swarming (less) and varroa tolerance.  My personal experience supports these studies except that of temperament.  When talking of temperament I'm always amused when people say their bees are so gentle and would never sting them.  My girls are gentle til you mess with their hive (inspect) and then they become rabid pitbulls.  I keep my bees in a downtown eastside community garden which is open to the public.  The girls are exposed daily to mice, rats, squirrels, birds, wasps, skunks, raccoons, junkies, hookers and a teen gang that occasionally hits or knocks over the hive.  You don't mess with my downtown eastside girls.  I have witnessed them attacking in force a bald faced hornet twice their size trying to enter the hive with a viciousness that shocked me.  Their protective nature of their home is not only healthy but an added attribute to their character.  I was stung probably a dozen times this year and I'm glad my bees are so protective of their home.  I'm hoping that my body develops a tolerance for stings that I have heard some beekeepers develop over time.  Til then I'm happy (well, maybe not happy but amused) to receive the occasional reminder of their constant vigilance.  Here are three videos on tubular packaged bees and their installation.