
Loyalty Nearly Killed My Beehive - dnetesn
http://nautil.us/issue/16/nothingness/loyalty-nearly-killed-my-beehive?utm_source=tss&utm_medium=desktop&utm_campaign=linkfrom
======
mudil
I started beekeeping 2 years ago, and I cannot be any happier about this
hobby. It's easy and fun. Bees do not require feeding, cleaning, just an
occasional check up. And they give my family the best honey the money can buy.

To start, I read (believe it or not) Beeking for Dummies
([http://www.amazon.com/Beekeeping-For-Dummies-Howland-
Blackis...](http://www.amazon.com/Beekeeping-For-Dummies-Howland-
Blackiston/dp/0470430656)). It's a well rated book, and it has all the basic
info. Then I watched various YouTube videos.

Then I ordered the following list of supplies. (I buy all my equipment from
Mann Lake. $100+ it's free shipping.
[http://mannlakeltd.com/](http://mannlakeltd.com/))

This is a list I recommend:

Note that the hive boxes and frames, are unassembled. Mann lake does have
assembled hives. Assembly is easy, and I did it with my kids.

1) WW-605_b Med Hive Qty. 5 2) FR-811 Med Frames Case of 10. Qty. 5 (so you
get 50 frames) 3) CV-305 Suit - economy - Medium (Buy YOUR size.) Qty. 1 4)
HD-540 Smoker Qty. 1 5) CL-620 Economy cowhide leather gloves(Buy YOUR size.
This is small) Qty. 1 6) HD-210 7D Nails (1lb) Qty. 1 7) HD-220 Frame Nails
Qty. 1 8) HD-620 Hive tool 9) HD-660 Bee Brush 10) WW-310 Bottom Board 11)
Your choice of top cover (buy with Inner cover)...
[http://www.mannlakeltd.com/beekeeping-
supplies/page29.html](http://www.mannlakeltd.com/beekeeping-
supplies/page29.html) I practice foundationless but some prefer not to deal
with the cross comb headaches and use foundation. Foundation part number is
(FN-720).

I adopted my hive from Jack at Los Altos Honey Bees
([http://losaltoshoneybees.wordpress.com/](http://losaltoshoneybees.wordpress.com/)).
He goes and rescues feral colonies.

I also joined Beekeepers' Guild Of San Mateo County
([http://www.sanmateobeeguild.org/](http://www.sanmateobeeguild.org/)). The
club is great: the mailing list discussions keep me informed about things to
do right now, and what to do to prepare for upcoming seasons.

~~~
mudil
For those of you who are concerned about getting stung, I can say that I never
was stung, and I cannot possibly get stung. I am completely covered, with
gloves and boots.

~~~
SheepSlapper
I've kept bees for years, and I don't know anyone who does it that hasn't
_ever_ been stung. You get stung all the time, regardless of the safety gear
you're wearing. Bees will get stuck in a fold of cloth, get mad, and sting
(your suit isn't THAT thick). It's hot in those suits too, and your veil will
sometimes stick to your skin, which is another way they get you. Or you use
the same gear for a few years and it starts to wear. What's really no fun is
when a bee finds its way _into_ your suit. Been there, done that :)

What changes is you stop caring about being stung after a while, and you build
up an immunity to it (stings start to swell less and clear up faster). And you
learn to know when the hive is getting _real_ angry, and it's time to back off
for a while. But bees will be bees, and they sting things that mess with them.

~~~
mudil
I don't know: I've done it for two years and I have not been stung. I check my
clothing, make sure I am all zipped, put my boots on, and there I go.

------
radicaledward
DO NOT FEED YOUR INFANT HONEY

Just in case anyone read the first paragraph and thought, "Hey that's a good
idea!" Honey contains bacteria that causes infant botulism [1]. Once a child
has a more fully developed digestive system, this is no longer a problem.

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Botulism#Infant_botulism](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Botulism#Infant_botulism)

~~~
spikels
Just to be clear - the story in the first paragraph is about royal jelly not
honey. Royal jelly a totally different thing than honey: a bee glandular
secretion rather than bee processed plant nectar [1].

However I doubt it should be given to infants either and would not base any
health decisions on anecdotes like this no matter how appealing the narrative.

[1]
[http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_jelly](http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_jelly)

~~~
SideburnsOfDoom
> not base any health decisions on anecdote

It's not even an anecdote. It's a "short story by Roald Dahl". You know,
_fiction_ from a writer known for his "unsentimental, often very dark humour."
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roald_Dahl](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roald_Dahl)

Really, don't base health decisions on surreal horror stories.

------
SEJeff
Absolutely fascinating article. I'm really glad that HN contains the
occasional non-tech related story. It seems somewhat obvious how an
engineering mindset transfers very well to other disciplines, and unbeknownst
to me, beekeeping is one of them.

~~~
205guy
While I really like the non-tech topics (I remember one about raising chickens
as well), and I love reading all the HN comments (more detailed how-to
experiences, startup metaphors, and beehive monitoring devices), I really did
not like the tone of this article. I felt the form actually detracted from the
content enough to come here and mention it.

I like learning about the details of a new field, and I like to hear about
issues facing beginners, but this article seemed somewhat pretentious and
naïve. I'm all for admitting and learning from mistakes, but not making them
into some Shakepearian drama (loyalty, death, duels). The whole tie-in with
literature seemed formulaic, not to mention strained, as if it were an
assignment for a writing class. I felt this story would've been better served
with a straight-up blog-like narrative--just the facts. Not every story
belongs in the New Yorker.

~~~
roghummal
>I felt this story would've been better served with a straight-up blog-like
narrative--just the facts.

And now blogs are the gold standard for 'just the facts, ma'am'?

------
flatline
> Queens typically live for about four or five years

This figure is from an old study that others have repeatedly failed to
reproduce. More recent attempts to determine queen longevity have shown they
live to an average of about a year, and furthermore failed to find any of
significantly advanced age. So it shouldn't too much of a surprise that she
only lasted a season. Since there seem to be a few beekeepers hanging out
here, I'd be curious to hear anecdotal evidence of queen lifespan.

~~~
xanderstrike
My uncle ran a hive for about four years on a single queen. He had a name for
it and everything (Betty or Beatrice or something else typically reserved for
cows). When the queen finally did die, he said it was a really bad time of
year for that to happen and the hive never recovered. That was the end of his
beekeeping adventure.

I still miss the honey he'd bring by when I was a kid.

------
Qworg
If you like this story, I'd unabashedly recommend that you try and keep bees.
They are relatively low maintenance, interesting to observe and fun to debug
(no pun intended). Success is amazing - both to eat and think about.

The other benefit is psychological - beekeeping requires an almost zen like
approach when dealing with the hive. You cannot get angry or flustered, even
when surrounded by thousands of bees desperately trying to sting you. You have
to focus, be calm, and do the work.

~~~
codebeaker
My first thought after reading this, being a couple of weeks away from owning
my first home with land, and a roof terrace was… is it safe to keep bees on a
3rd floor balcony where there's occasionally going to be people? The terrace
is 16 square meters, and right outside what will be our bedroom.. but I'd love
to keep bees. Especially since the evidence suggests we need them, and they
thrive in cities.

~~~
durkie
Point the entrance to the hive facing "out".

During high season, bees don't really hang around the hive; they leave and go
forage. You can stand 2 meters in front of my hives and turn your back and
have no idea there's a beehive anywhere near you.

~~~
saalweachter
Stinging insects in general are remarkably unaggressive when you are not
directly threatening their hive. I've a hornet nest in my woodpile that I
discovered after being stung after moving a piece of wood, and since then I've
stayed 2-4 feet away and they haven't attacked again.

Likewise, you don't need to be garbed for most of your beekeeping activities.
You can change out feeders or pop open the top for a quick peek without being
bothered. Many beekeepers have found that they can pull frames or shuffle
boxes if they are gentle and don't rile up the bees.

------
MechSkep
One of my side projects is building a sensing electronics package to monitor
the health and activity of beehives. The idea is to make it easier for someone
just starting to maintain their hive.

Any one have feedback on the concept? Or features we haven't thought of?

~~~
csorrell
I'd love to hear more about it! What is it exactly that the package is
sensing? I've often thought it would be interesting to record the internal
buzzing of a hive, then go on observing the colonies behavior. I have found
there is a subtle but noticeable shift in the sound of a hive that has gone
queen less, and there is a distinct piping sound that queens will make before
swarming or taking their virgin flight.
[https://archive.org/details/QueenBeesPiping](https://archive.org/details/QueenBeesPiping)

I've also heard rumors of old timers being able to tell when a colony is
hungry just by putting an ear to the hive. It all makes me wonder what other
kinds of information we could gather by studying the buzz.

~~~
MechSkep
We certainly have a microphone. There is such a richness in the sounds a
colony produces. Our minimal sensing package also contains temperature and
humidity sensing. We're shooting for collecting a labeled data set this coming
season to see what we can pull out of the information we collect.

~~~
mlrtime
I know nothing about beekeeping but having read the article it seems that
weight would be an important measure.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
Presumably the weight change you're looking to monitor mainly is volume of
honey produced? Perhaps there's an analogue for that - maybe reflectivity of
the frames or opacity to IR or some such?

Perhaps even just look at the heat retention against time accounting for
external temperature (eg cooling rate at night vs. the ambient cooling curve)
as that will give you the thermal capacity which should increase with
increased honey volume. That should give you a first-order approximation at
least (humidity would factor in to rule out waterlogging, not sure what the
other main causes of hive weight change are beyond bee numbers which you'll
also presumably have from the audio-volume and/or the ingress-egress
readings).

~~~
cc439
Throw some load cells on the base. Hell, you could make a frame that acts like
a 1 load cell bench scale, it's not like it'll weigh too much.

------
qwerta
I never heard of replacing queens, beehive always raised new one. But perhaps
there are different methods in Europe.

I have good story to share: we had 10 beehives at cabin in middle of woods and
one of them got stolen! We moved remaining across the town to safer location.
Carrying 100 pounds out of which 40 pounds are life bees is quite something
:-)

~~~
bhousel
The thief might have been a bear :)

~~~
Qworg
Or it could have been a thief. =)

Bee rustling is a thing!
[http://stories.weather.com/stolenbees](http://stories.weather.com/stolenbees)

~~~
qwerta
Back than the average month net salary was $200 and unemployment rate 30%.
Stolen things included rain gutters, copper wires inside building walls...

------
csorrell
This is why I always recommend new beekeepers start out with at least two
hives. If the author had another healthy hive, he could have moved a frame of
young brood to his queenless hive and they would have raised a new queen on
their own.

~~~
GuiA
Is there a book/resource you'd recommend to people who know absolutely nothing
about beekeeping but think it sounds terribly awesome and would like to know
what it takes to get started?

~~~
csorrell
I've learned the most from lurking around the forums at
[http://www.beesource.com/forums/](http://www.beesource.com/forums/). Some
kind of beginners beekeeping book that covers the basics would probably be
good too, but I don't really have any good recommendations.

------
jackgavigan
There's a whole industry around renting beehives to farmers to pollinate
crops: [http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/migratory-
beekeepi...](http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/migratory-beekeeping-
mind-boggling-math/)

There's an interesting supply'n'demand thing going on as a result of the
decline in the bee population, coupled with the growth of almonds as a cash
crop: [http://scientificbeekeeping.com/2012-almond-pollination-
upda...](http://scientificbeekeeping.com/2012-almond-pollination-update/)

~~~
idlewords
I lived in southern France for a year, and it was interesting to watch the
beekeepers move their hives from week to week based on what was in bloom. They
kept to a pretty elaborate schedule, and they would market the honey based on
what the predominant plant was. The variations in color were amazing, from
dark mahogany brown to almost transparent.

These were mainly family businesses and you had to be careful not to tailgate
the wrong pickup truck, lest you wind up with a cloud of angry bees suddenly
filling your car.

~~~
roghummal
Bees here (Western US) produce a similar range of honeys(sp?). During the
busiest seasons it's hard to drive a highway and not find one, two, or three
bee keepers selling honey 'harvested' from different crops.

Bees are mighty good workers, I tell ya what.

------
k_sze
I'm a huge fan of ants, bees, and wasps, but I have never kept bees, only
ants. There is something I don't understand.

Is there any rational advantage to keeping the beehive alive between the two
queens, especially since the new queen is probably only remotely related in
terms of genealogy? Is it just so the production of honey, propolis, etc
remains uninterrupted? What happens if you let a beehive completely die and
then put in a new queen? Would the beehive become too filthy for the new
colony to develop easily?

Or does the author's wish to keep the beehive alive only stem from emotional
attachment?

~~~
Qworg
Keeping the hive alive is actually the most natural thing to do. While the
bees won't carry the same genetics, they will support the queen while she
lays. This is crucial, because a mated queen cannot truly defend herself. The
new queen an immediately get to work if bees remain.

The hive won't be too "dirty" \- bees are remarkably fastidious. The queen
just won't survive/thrive without bees.

The best way to think about it is that while the queen is the center Of the
hive, she is just one part of the whole organism. The bees will even kill her
off if she stops producing and raise another queen.

------
gresrun
My friends are currently serving as missionaries in Tanzania and are teaching
the art of beekeeping to help diversify the local economy and diet:
[http://makondefrasers.wordpress.com/](http://makondefrasers.wordpress.com/)

------
hiharryhere
Great article, well written and fun. Though how is nobody weirded out by him
just leaving his hive on the roof of an apartment he no longer lives in. What
a hilarious dude.

------
Nanzikambe
A beautiful article, makes me yearn for that recent-convert's enthusiasm for a
new hobby. Reminds me of when I first took up mycoculture. Perhaps I'll get a
behive and join the legion of "that guy" :)

------
S_A_P
So is there any truth to the "africanized/killer"(I dont know any other way to
state it but I dont like the term) bees being more difficult to manage and
more aggressive? I live in Texas where they arrived in the early 1990s. I
would be leery of keeping bees that were not as docile as the european
variety. I am not too worried about getting stung once or twice, but I have
heard that the "killer" bees go ape shit once the stinging pheromones have
been released and you can get stung hundreds of times in a short time span.

~~~
nwp90
Yes. In NZ we don't have them, but one of the guys who works for AsureQuality
(google them) on bee-related stuff here is from Paraguay, and his description
of beekeeping experience there (where basically all their bees are apparently
Africanised) makes me think I probably wouldn't enjoy the experience over
there.

Here, you can open a hive of "gentle bees" on a warm day and they will sit on
the frames and basically completely ignore you.

There, I'm told once you take the lid off, most of the colony will take to the
air to have a go at you. Which makes examining the frames easier, as they're
no longer covered in bees - if there aren't too many on your veil, I guess.

------
beginrescueend
Great article!

We're on our 3rd season beekeeping; we just collected honey, last night.

In fact, I got my first ever bee/wasp/hornet sting ever, last night, from one
of our bees. I was being sloppy, wearing running shoes under my bee suit,
instead of boots. It hardly hurt at all, though. (I've had worse mosquito
bites; so far, horseflies are the worst bites/stings I've ever had).

We captured our first swarm, this year, and got another hive "for free." Woo
hoo!

As far as ordering stuff, since somebody mentioned it, we just go to
[http://www.beekeepers.com/](http://www.beekeepers.com/) to get our gear,
since our local farm stores don't carry much.

I am interested in these projects, so I can get my bee geek on, but I don't
know if I should commit the time and money to them (any success stories out
there)?
[http://www.opensourcebeehives.net/](http://www.opensourcebeehives.net/)
[http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/Beekeeping](http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/Beekeeping)
[http://openenergymonitor.org/emon/node/102](http://openenergymonitor.org/emon/node/102)

------
ncourage
I don't know why I didn't expect this, but this article was the most
interesting thing I've read all day. It made me almost feel compassion for the
bee hive by my mailbox (if you can call it that), in a hole in the grass.
We've tried to be rid of them.

~~~
ericcope
you can call local beekeepers who will come out and take them home. I had a
swarm adopt my tree as a new home. I called a local keeper and he came and
removed them free of charge.

------
orenjacob
For those interested, Beekeeping For Dummies
([http://www.amazon.com/dp/0470430656](http://www.amazon.com/dp/0470430656))
is actually quite a good way to start. We've had our queen replaced by our
swarm and it was quite an amazing thing to witness. Our hive/swarm gave more
than 40 pounds of honey a year and we kept our whole street well fed with
local honey for a few years. And my garden almost doubled in productivity once
the bees were in place. A win all around. Sadly a family member developed an
allergy so we have to discontinue keeping bees, but it was amazing while we
had them and I strongly keeping bees to anyone interested.

------
mathattack
"Undeterred, I installed the bees on the roof of my Brooklyn apartment and
began the absurd process of learning how to keep them alive. Incredibly, they
flourished, and by October I had perhaps 70,000 bees..."

That has to make one unpopular with the neighbors.

------
brianbreslin
My biggest fear of putting a beehive in my parents yard is that it would
result in my dog getting stung or my parents.

~~~
ndespres
They learn quickly (dogs and parents). Most people aren't as allergic as they
think they are, and it would have to be pretty persistently dumb dog to keep
bothering a hive that continues to sting it. Anyhow unless you aggressively
bother most hives, the bees want nothing to do with you even when you're right
up close: if you're not a predator or a source of nectar, you're not
interesting.

Even my turkeys, quite possibly the dumbest animals I have around, don't mess
with the bees any more after their first time!

~~~
bhousel
Yes, this. Honey bees aren't aggressive, unless you really threaten their hive
(e.g. knock it over).

I think a lot of people just mentally lump them together with wasps and
hornets, which can be much more aggressive.

~~~
ajuc
I don't know I've been mostly stung by bees, and I had hornets and wasps live
in attic of my parents house at different timesand they never stung us. Maybe
it's because both my grandfathers kept bees and sometimes they swarm out.

Usually a bee flies into hairs and can't escape, people panic and try to make
it go away and then it stings.

It's not that bad, hurts for a few minutes only, if you are not allergic. My
grandpa said it helps for reumatism and he tended to bees with only a veil.

I wonder if American bees are the same as European ones.

Trading queens and trying to switch them seems to be very popular here. I
remember my parents trying to catch the queen in some grandpa hives.

Reading all this I feel a little bad for never being particulary intrested in
bees, my parents even met in beekeeping high school, but they ended up working
different jobs.

------
Elzair
Is Colony Collapse Disorder largely affecting only domesticated beehives?

~~~
MechSkep
It's hard to say with CCD being so large and varied. One thing we know is that
beehives exposed to certain pesticides [1] are much more likely to collapse.

[1] [http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/press-releases/study-
streng...](http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/press-releases/study-strengthens-
link-between-neonicotinoids-and-collapse-of-honey-bee-colonies/)

~~~
dllthomas
It's hard to believe that spraying a bunch of stuff to kill insects all over
might have a negative affect on insects.

------
hywel
Kept waiting for this to turn out to be an allegory about a startup.

~~~
Intermernet
Fortunately, not everything on HN is "an allegory about a startup". We still
get some interesting articles on non-startup related material.

Personally, I'm here for the hacking content, not the startup content,
although I'm occasionally interested by something from the startup camp.

I've been wondering, and no insult to the startup oriented crowd out there, if
it would be possible to add a 3 tag system to HN posts; "startups", "hacking",
"other".

The guidelines[1] state "On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find
interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups" which, in a naive
sense, means that the simplest classification scheme would be the 3 terms
listed previously.

This would allow a simple search query such as "-startups" to exclude posts
tagged exclusively with "startups", or "-other -hacking" to include only posts
tagged exclusively with "startups", or "+startups" to include any post with
the tag "startups" etc.

[1]:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

------
andyl
I have two hives in the yard. (Palo Alto) We produce 10-20 gallons of honey
per year. Fun to harvest - kids love to get hands-on. Fun to give away esp to
random strangers.

------
Thesaurus
I can't believe I read that whole thing, it was written so well. Quite
informative and very interesting.

------
McDoku
This is so meta.

~~~
eru
Why? It's a perfectly straight-forward article about beekeeping, isn't it?

~~~
McDoku
How is bee keeping not analogous to start up development? The anxiety and
experience of the bee keeper is parallel to building a user base for an
application.

I was reading the article while writing a user acquisition strategy. I almost
died laughing.

~~~
eru
Might be a case of
[http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/EveryoneIsJesusIn...](http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/EveryoneIsJesusInPurgatory)

~~~
McDoku
I'd argue that the illusion of grander depth within a narrative is the very
thing that makes a work great.

I did mean 'meta' some what humorously. I had not expected it to be received
so literally. Of course it is a subjective parallel.

Also, I think their are quantifiable parallels that many people on HN would
relate too. It may explain the rise of a random bee keeping article. It would
stand to reason that if the attributes and narrative were familiar it could
possibly take on certain unconscious meaning to that group.

~~~
eru
Lots of people (including me) have actually toyed with keeping bees. I think
it's just one of the things that appeals here, like eg practicing martial
arts. (Even though we don't get many articles about that.)

