Up Close And Personal With Wildlife

If you recall the other day I mentioned in my latest post that a bear came into the yard and trashed some of our reserve hives.  Well, he came back this morning!   I first took a photo through the porch window, then quietly opened the back door and went out into the yard.   I took a couple other photos of the bear.  I wanted to get closer, but was afraid of scaring him off!  I guess 100 feet away was close enough anyway.  Based on the one photo of the bear standing over a fence post, we estimate that he stood about 6 1/2 feet tall.  And he probably weighed close to 450 lbs.   He was a HUGE bear!  I think it's kind of neat to be able to see wildlife this close.  When you live in the woods like we do, you have to expect to see all kinds of animals.  But - we will definitely have to find another spot to store our reserve hives.  We do have a very powerful electric fence on the new beehives, and the bear must know this because he never went anywhere close to the new hives.   After I got my photos, Harold scared the bear off with a couple of gun shots in the air.  The bear went into the woods and came around the other side of the house and down the road.   I could have gotten a great picture of him in the front yard, but my camera batteries died!  Grrrr...

My first picture taken through the porch window.

I managed to get the bear to look at me!

By now the bear was getting nervous about me being there and stood up to act defensively.  The post he is standing behind is a little over 5 feet tall, so this bear must be about 6 1/2 feet tall.

All this bear business makes for an exciting start to the day!

Animal Wars

Some days it's a real battle with animals around here!  We woke up this morning to see that our favorite cat, Smokey, had a face full of porcupine quills!  Oh no!  These weren't the real big ones, but smaller inch and a half size.  He must have found a baby porcupine somewhere and tangled with it.   Poor thing had them in his nose, mouth, and under his chin.  I wrapped him in a thick blanket, put on heavy leather gloves, gripped him with a 'death grip' by the nape, and Harold began pulling them out with pliers.   Of course Smokey would have none of this and it was a real battle.  I think dogs are much more patient about this than cats are!  We got down to the last one on his nose when he went totally berserk and worked his way out of everything, put a few new scratches in my arm and ran off to sulk.   We found him behind a hay bale in his cat house with a bloody face.    I tried to comfort him and pet his paws and he went for that OK because I think he was so scared.   Tonight we may try to get that last one out.   If we don't, according to the internet quills will work their way out but sometimes not in a good way.  Smokey comes to me now again, but I don't dare try the procedure until much later.  The last quill is only sticking out by 1/8 of an inch, so it will be a trick to get that one!  The scratches he gave me this morning are still bleeding when I move my arm.

After all this, Harold and I decided to start planting corn.  Things were going well until the other 14 farm cats decided it was time to inspect our business.   Have you ever tried to plant seeds with 14 curious cats running, jumping, digging, and chasing all around you?  We took a short break and that's when Harold discovered the extra beehives that we have reserved honey in, were scattered all over.   Bears!  During the night they must have decided to see if the unused hives had anything good in them to eat.   The bears  destroyed 5 hives worth of reserved honey-filled frames that we had planned to use for this year's bees.    And they tore things up pretty good.   The bears were most likely after bee larva, but they will take honey if larva isn't there.  We will either have to move those empty hives somewhere else, or put an electric fence on them, too.   I'm sure the bears will be back tonight for more honey.

While Harold decided to fix his truck, I started planting tomatoes.  Pretty soon bees were after me!  They were angry!!  One bit me on the side of the head.   I told Harold that the bees were very angry about something to come after me like that.   Sure enough, upon inspection he found out that ANTS were getting into another hive and eating the bees' honey and the sugar syrup we put out for them!   Yesterday we had a problem with ants in one of the hives, too.   We can't use ant poison because that would kill our bees.   So an alternative is to put used motor oil in cups (like a Cool Whip container) and set the hive on blocks inside the containers of oil.    The ants will not cross the oil to get up into the hive, and the bees don't bother the oil.    The ants that are in the hive already  are stung and taken out by the bees.  Harold did that yesterday and it solved the ant problem.  Today he has to do the same thing for the other two hives.   We have never had such a problem with ants before, so we don't know what's going on here.

Yesterday when Harold first tried to inspect what the bee problem was, he got stung badly  at least a half dozen times in the eye.   Today his eye is swollen and red and he looks like a prize fighter who lost the fight!

As if things weren't enough for today, when I went back to planting tomatoes one of my cats decided to come over and barf up his dinner right in front of me where I wanted to plant a tomato plant!  I tell you - some days the battle against animal life is something else!!  Living in the country can sometimes be real exciting!

Edited to add:  We got the last porcupine quill out of Smokey's nose tonight!  He didn't fight us too bad this time.  I think he knew we were trying to help him.   Afterwards I petted him, fed him, and gave him some warm milk.   He is happy now, and hopefully will not tangle with any more porcupines!

Bee Talk

Today we went to Clearbrook Minnesota to pick up 3 hives of bees.  We have to start all over again with our bees because all of our hives died over the winter.  The fellow who usually takes our bees to California for the winter did not do so this year for various reasons.   We tried to winter them over but did not succeed.   Sometimes that happens.   Sometimes it is good to start all over fresh.   We could only afford 3 new hives, so that's what we will start with.   Harold built some new hive boxes for winter time use that are 3 inches thick all around and will be able to accommodate a heater and extra foam insulation underneath.   When cold weather comes this fall, we will transfer our bees to those thick boxes and heat them in the back yard this winter.   We will no longer rely on others to take our bees elsewhere for the winter, and our bees will not be going to California anymore.   After all, if Canadians can winter over their bees, then surely Minnesotans should be able to do so!  We will see if our new winter hive design will work or not.   Having only 3 hives will set us back a lot regarding honey production, but we can hope for a really good bee year, take what honey we get - and then it's only up from there!  Later when one of the hives is really strong we can split the hive into two boxes, or catch a swarm and take it to another bee yard at our friend Joe's place.   This is our 9th year for doing bees.  We hate the thought of having to start from scratch again, but it just can't be helped.  We have learned a lot in 9 years, and we can always hope for a really good year!
     Here are some photos that I took this morning.  These bees came from Beaumont Texas, on the eastern part of the state.

One of the bee workers prepares a hive box we brought to fill up with a nuc full of bees. 

 A full frame of bees going from the nuc box on the left to our hive box on the right.  He is checking to see that there is a queen on the frame.

Two other workers prepare our other two hives.

A closer look.  This bee seller brought up about 300 hives from Texas.

Our three new hives ready for the long ride home to Honey B Farm!  The lids are screwed on tight for the ride and air spaces are nailed with screening.

Harold (in the blue jeans) talks shop with the other beekeepers.

When we got home, we opened up the entrances so the Texas girls could get out and start getting used to the place!

Harold opens up the entrances on another hive.

We put the hives on blocks and kept the entrance holes fairly small for now.

Then Harold put on good covers and took off the temporary covers.   One is finished, two more to go.

Within 20 minutes, the bees were already working!  They already did their orientation flights, and started gathering food from the dandelions!  You can see two bees working in this photo.

Lots of bee food here!  The Nanking cherries are blossoming, and there are tons of dandelions around. 

Plenty of bee food .  Beekeepers don't kill  dandelions!  This is good bee food.  I should be mowing the grass, but I will hold off for a day or so until the bees work over the plants.  At this time of the year, wild plum is in bloom, as well as forest wildflowers.  Our Texas girls will have plenty to do for a long time now.   What a feast for them!

And so another year of beekeeping begins...................we hope for a great summer, warm sunny weather, lots of wildflowers and natural bee food, AND as good a honey crop as we can get with 3 hives.