5 Gallon Bucket Feeder For One Hive

5 gallon hive top feeder! Will this work??? 

What You'll Need To Start Beekeeping

This post is geared toward people wanting to start beekeeping and are looking to purchase their first colony of bees from West Louisiana Bee Farm and are looking to get their mentoring here as well. Before you come and purchase your first colony here is the list of things you will need to get started. To view the items you will need to click on them and you will be taken to their Amazon page. I've supplied the link to their location on Amazon at the best price I was able to find at the time of putting this together. You can use these links to purchase them online, or you can try to find these items from other sources. The only local beekeeping supply stores are Imperial Hardware in Leesville, LA. They have a very limited supply. For a larger in-house supply Sutherland's in Alexandria, LA has a better selection. If you prefer to just order online and have these items delivered to your door here is what you'll need:

1. You will need a beesuit. 

    This one will work fine:  

2. Gloves are handy...I prefer nitrile gloves. I like them because you can feel what you are doing while moving frames around in the hive. With leather gloves you don't know when you are about to squash bees. The bees can sting you through these gloves, but it is very uncommon as they cannot smell you through the glove, therefore their defensiveness is thwarted. The gloves below are the exact gloves I use, and I have never been stung while wearing this brand.

3. These are the tools you will need to make your hive inspections. The smoker is a must for the new beekeeper. Smoke causes the bees to not attack. I don't know why, and every beekeeper has an opinion. I don't care why, I just know it works. The hive too looks like a small pry-bar. Thats because it is a small pry-bar. You use it to pry the frames apart after the bees have glued them together. The brush is to help you brush the bees off the frame so that you can harvest honey. And the frame grabber....well, the name explains it. You use it to grab the frames and lift them from the hive. 

4. And of course the box. The hive is a combination of several components. The bottom of the hive is called the bottom board. It is where the bees will land prior to entering the hive. Next is the hive body or the box. The boxes come in different sizes. If you are buying bees from me you will to purchase what is called a deep box because I only sell colonies on deep frames. These frames will not fit into a medium or shallow box. The safest thing to do is buy this setup to be sure you have the right equipment when you come to pick up your colony. Inside the box are the frames. These frames will have either a wax or plastic foundation that will help start the bees in the comb building process. It is where they will raise young bees and store their food (pollen and honey). As you might guess, they are very important to the hive. Next is the inner cover. It is there to aid in ventilation, and to keep the top cover from getting stuck to the box making it very difficult to remove for inspections. Next is the top cover. Pretty self-explanatory. It goes on top to keep the bees safe from the elements. Keep in mind that this is only the first box of several you will be buying. As the bees build their home and fill each box with bees, wax, brood, and food you will need to add a box filled with frames. This will be where you will harvest honey and wax. That process will be covered as the time arrives. 

Before you come to purchase your bees you will need to paint or stain your box both inside and out with a latex paint. Also paint the entire bottom board, and the lid, but only the parts exposed to the outside elements. Do not paint the inside of the lid, do not paint the inner cover, and do not paint the frames. Most people paint their hives white so that the bees are able to keep the inside temp regulated. I paint mine different colors. Some white, some yellow, some blue and so on. Make sure you don't paint them black. If you do your bees may not be able to keep the hive cool enough in the summer. 

When you come to purchase your bees you will need to only bring the hive and your beesuit. I'll provide the smoke and bees.

One last thing. Buy this book before you ever buy your bees! That's all I'm going to say....Just buy this book!

**NOTE** The links provided here are affiliate links. All that means is that Amazon gives me a small monetary bonus for referring you to their website. It does not effect your price for the items in any way. You can buy these items anywhere you choose. I only provide the links for your convenience and as a reference if you choose to purchase them elsewhere.

Farm Innovators Pro Series Digital Incubator Review

I know, this isn't exactly bee related, but it is farm related and this is a farm. So here goes!

I purchased this incubator a couple of years ago despite a tone of bad reviews. One thing I've learned to recognize is that 2/3 of bad reviews come from two kinds of people. People who don't have a lot of ability to figure things out beyond the instructions in the box, and people who are just negative about everything. The other 33% of negative comments come from legitimate complaints. I am sick of wading through negative comments from people only to find out that they belong to the first 66% i mentioned. So when i do have a great experience with a product that has a bunch of negative reviews I'm gonna shout its praises. Thats why this post is happening today!

The biggest complaint I see about this incubator is the low hatch rate. To this I want to ask, "did you read the entire set of instructions? And did you actually follow them??" 

When I purchased this incubator I also purchased an external probe style thermometer. This way i can verify the accuracy of the inside temp. Granted, the temp is off by 1 degree on my incubator, and this could vary from individual incubators. So yes, this may be some of the reasons for the bad reviews. Simple fix: buy a second thermometer. 

You also need to keep it in a room with a steady temp. I keep mine in my shop where I leave the ac running at about 74 degrees. This seems to help. 

Humidity is not a problem here in Louisiana where I live. Ive even let my incubator dry out the first week and not replaced the water until I hear peeping inside. It worked out fine. 

I guess the most important thing to mention is that with my Farm Innovators incubator I get about a 75-80% hatch rate on average. I have gotten a 100% hatch rate once with 18 eggs. 

Which brings me to today's post. In the picture above you see 8 eggs. Some of the  green eggs are a little over a week old. Today is Wednesday August 6, 2020, and I am starting my first hatch in over a year. Thats right, its been sitting in my shed for over a year. Last night I plugged it in and let it run all night to make sure it was heating properly. In roughly 23 days I'll give you an update. Thanks for reading!!

UPATE #1 Aug 24, 2020

UPDATE #2

August 25

Officially up to a 50% hatchrate....and its only day 20!

FINAL UPDATE:

I'm sorry to be so long in doing the final update. Hurricane Laura did a direct hit on us. We lost power for 11 days and I simply had other priorities. I ended up with a 50% hatch rate overall. 4 out of 8 eggs hatched and they survived 120 mph winds without a heat lamp. Yes, they were outside for the entire storm. I was shocked that they survived. I'll post a picture later today.

I'll do another run of eggs soon and post it right here, so stay tuned.