By Amy Gusefski

Durham County Beekeeping School 2016

Honey

Beeswax

Pollen

Propolis

Bee venom

Royal jelly

Nucs, queens

I began keeping bees in the spring of 2014

I have 2 hives in southern Durham. I live in the Parkwood neighborhood.

I’ve harvested honey once (~2.5 gallons from one hive); I use beeswax to make lip balm and propolis to make tinctures and oils.

Harvesting

During the hive’s second year, the bees will be ready for you to harvest honey in the summer after the spring flow – June, July, or August

The honey that is ready for harvest has been capped. The bees evaporated most of the water out of it. Having moisture content below 18% is very important for preserving the honey (ie, not fermenting) and selling/showing honey.

You need: fume board and repellent; smoker, hive tool, protective gear, extra frames; bee-tight container to put frames in (like a big rubbermaid box); a cart if it’s too heavy to carry; someone who knows what they’re doing

Put the fume board in the top of the hive and wait a few minutes

Remove frames of honey from the hive

Shake or brush the bees back into the hive

Put the frames into a box or container with a lid

We set up the extractor in the garage

Uncap the honey – you can use a scratcher, a unheated serrated edge knife, a heated knife, or a rolling uncapper.

An extractor uses centrifugal force to spin the honey out of the frames, the honey runs down the sides of the extractor, and then out through a faucet

Drain the faucet into a 5 gallon bucket with a filter in the top

Store the honey in easy access jars – canning jars, honey jars, old growlers that have been really really cleaned out.

Pricing honey

Honey is priced by the pound

1 pound is about 12 fluid ounces

I sell honey for $10/pound (wholesale, honey sells about $6/pound)

Labeling

To sell honey you must have a label stating:

Your name or your apiary name

Location

Type of honey (probably wildflower honey)

When it was harvested

Contact information

Bees secrete wax from glands in their abdomen

They use the wax to build their nursery, their pantry, and for insulation

White wax is the cleanest, this is best for cosmetics. As wax is used by the bees it becomes dark. Recycle the wax from your hives every 3 years.

How to get it

As you harvest honey, save the cappings in a bucket. You’ll need to clean the wax before using.

Clean the wax by melting it in a double boiler (have one just for wax, this is nearly impossible to clean). Pour the wax through a cheesecloth into a quart carton which you have removed the top. It helps to rubber band the cheesecloth to the carton. Let the wax drip all the way through and cool completely. The honey and wax will separate as they cool. Voila! A block of beeswax.

What to make with it

Lip balm, candles, lotion/cream

A simple lip balm recipe:

2.5 tablespoons coconut oil

1.5 tablespoons beeswax

Anything you want to add, like vitamin E oil, essential oils for scent, honey, or propolis oil

Melt coconut oil and beeswax in a double boiler. Remove from heat and add any extras. Pour into tubes or tins

You can buy coconut oil and empty chapstick tubes on amazon relatively inexpensively. Makes a great gift.

Bees collect pollen from flowers and carry it back to the hive in their pollen baskets

Beekeepers use pollen traps to collect pollen

Use it short term, empty several times a day, and store pollen in the fridge

Humans use pollen as a source of protein and to combat allergies

When using to address allergies, it is important to start slowly, use local pollen, and use pollen that corresponds to the season (don’t take fall-harvested pollen to combat spring allergies)

What is it

Propolis is a sticky substance formed from resin collected by 10% of the foraging bee force.

It’s antimicrobial, and bees use it to seal up holes, carpet the hive, make tunnels, and coat unwanted things in the hive (like mice).

It’s an external immune system and a building material

How to collect

Scrape propolis off the frames and sides of your hive as you work in it

Some beekeepers scratch up the insides of their hives to encourage bees to lay down propolis

Buy a propolis net!

How to use

Healthy for humans too, use it in oil, tinctures and products made with oil and tincture

Use it on cuts and scrapes (in a tincture it’ll sting!); propolis has the same antimicrobial products for humans

Freeze propolis for a couple of days, break it into small bits and remove bits of wood, pollen and other objects

Tincture

By weight, 1 part propolis to 9 parts alcohol 75 proof or higher. Store in a jar in a dark place and shake 2-3 x daily. Filter and store in a brown jar.

Oil

Place ½ tablespoon propolis and 2.5 oz olive oil in a double boiler. Heat gently, keeping the temperature around 122 degrees, for 10 minutes. Strain through a cheesecloth or coffee filter and store in a dark jar.

Bees use venom in communication and defense

Bees have 0.15-0.30 mg venom in a sac; quality of venom depends on the quality of the pollen they’re eating

Mellitin is in bee venom, has antimicrobial properties

People use bee venom to help with arthritis pain; it’s known as apitherapy

Some people have the bee sting them directly (I’ve never tried this on purpose)

A beekeeper can collect bee venom using a charged glass plate at the front of the hive. When a bee lands, the plate shocks her, causing her to drop her backside and release venom. After enough venom is on the plate, the beekeeper scrapes off the plate and collects the venom.

What is it?

Nurse bees make royal jelly when they are 5-15 days old using 2 glands in their heads

Very unstable, needs cold storage and preserving in beeswax or honey

Doolittle method of collection

Humans use it internally and on their skin

Another possible way to make money from the hive is selling nucs and queens

Queen rearing takes special equipment and techniques

The Beekeeper’s Bible, Stewart, Tabori & Chang

Two Million Blossoms, Kirsten S. Traynor

www.durhambeekeepers.org

www.ncbeekeepers.org

The Hive and the Honeybee, Dadant & Sons, www.dadant.com

Beeswax Alchemy, Petra Ahnert

First Lessons in Beekeeping, Keith S. Delaplane

The Backyard Beekeeper, Kim Flottum

USDA website