Did I Make a BIG MISTAKE Getting BEES?!

like they're trying I think they're trying to find a way in they're bloody ah oh no but they don't know me that's the problem so they could depending on the food feed that's around they can fill a box pretty quickly I've pulled boxes within a week what yeah so that's just an egg carton is it yeah just straight a curtain that's the queen is it the queen wow g'day I'm Mark from self-sufficient B I mean me and in this video I'm going to explain why I finally got bees even though I honestly didn't want to let's buzz into it [Music] yeah I'm telling the truth it's true that I really didn't want bees and even now I'm kind of skeptical of my decision to get these little fellas it's kind of buzzing around in my head at the moment have I made the right decision or not um I'm thinking I probably have because so many years you guys out there have been telling me Mark you're into self-sufficiency and you're doing all these different projects and DIY jobs and that you've got this big veggie and fruit Garden it makes sense to keep bees and it's always been in the back of my mind keeping bees would be great for the garden for pollination and all that but I couldn't justify getting honeybees just for the sake of pollination and the real reason I didn't want to keep bees is because as these cockies fly over morning [Music] was because I just thought they would be too much hassle and too much trouble for me I'm already really busy doing everything else around here and I didn't want to bring in a little animal like this that I had to spend a lot of time looking after that's my big worry is this going to be really time consuming am I going to find that it's taken me away from these other things that I'm doing and even YouTube well time will tell so how did I get these bees well I made of mine guy ex-army ex-bandy actually played in the band in the military for 23 years he is retired now and he helps out in the men's shed and so long story short I thought that I would sponsor a project in the man's shed about building some beehive stands and anyway at the end of the day he convinced me to buy one of these stands and then when it was dark Peter the bee man delivered the bees and we put them into their new home and now what we're doing today is we're checking after a couple of weeks to see have they settled in is there any problems we're basically doing the first bee inspection it sounds like the guys are here now to do the inspection I don't even have any bee kit but I haven't had time to to buy this stuff yet so I'll be borrowing all that gear so I hope it fits me and I don't get stung good to see you again we're blessed with a better Sunshine yeah there's a bit of smoke around does that pacify bees if there's smoke in the air already well not really I wouldn't think so it sort of has to be right blowing into there yeah okay so that's just an egg carton is it yeah just straight a carton and you're squishing that in yep and then all you do is you make sure that you feel it like when you're you know feeding babies for the first time it's nice and cool and you're done get my fencing suit on so this is all new to me this is the first time I've ever worn a BC yep so this flap goes up and you'll get used to this how do you put this on yourself you'll get very used to it right you get these little rings around you can pull around so you just do it like so I suppose you'll find out if it's not sealed you'll know pretty quickly yeah I'm feeling a little bit nervous don't be nervous so what can do with this is a little velcro through here I look like some horrible Hollywood monster okay let's do this your hive tool uh highest pool um yep got it smoker check check all right so Peter first of all what's your business called again so I I run a business of uh oh Behave honey oh behave behave yeah oh Behave very much um yeah so that's that's what I I run yeah as a secondary gig to my full-time job so oh cool oh lovely and you're based here at morayfield yeah yeah yeah oh nice all right let's get into it then all right so normally just a couple of Puffs at the front yeah I know you're coming in uh-huh and it's right for the smoker just to keep yep smoking keep it close and that way because any pheromone in the area or being released so it helps with pheromone as well yeah yeah because of you know your killer bee accidentally the pheromone comes out and it masks it masks okay and then you know you can do a bit on their hands as well that's always a handy thing if you've got no gloves on yeah it'll just give me a bit of a puff thank you yo you can't be too safe so I'm keeping the queen excluded down at the moment okay yeah okay that's a queen excluder yep and we just pull straight off here we go I like to normally eat a pool of a second or third frame out only because sometimes in a 10 frame box which is what you're running yeah um you'll have I run what they call nine frames well so that's that's actually got nine in it yeah it's a ten frame box but it's got more space yeah it gives you a bit more flexibility a bit more room to work yeah so if you run 10 you basically end up having a very tight uh Gap yes and then you struggle with trying a lot of people tend to struggle with it that would be me I'd be struggling I tend to run nine yeah so yeah it's just a case of using a bit of Leverage you can break through and in summertime this wax will be very very soft okay whereas it's a bit harder now yep and all we do is we just give it a bit of a Leverage I'll take the first frame out for you okay so see how the bees are up here a lot of people want to smoke more I just go out the way give them a bit of a wiggle and it's a case of just these extra teeth that I mentioned yeah so you're straight up I normally just grab this here there you go yep underneath here and I just hang it literally on the edge without pushing it all the way yes whether you put that down or not it's up to you and the idea is just nice and slow straight up oh hell all right look at that that is a squillian bees there's a few yeah well so what are we looking for now generally we're looking for eggs number one to make sure you've got your your Queens healthy and happy yep in here you see brood what they call capped brood yes so that's all brewed it's been capped off um a bit of Honey up here and if you look carefully in this area all these bees are sitting their heads down bum up they're either eating honey or you're depositing nectar okay all right yes and you can see the the shininess of it basically I don't think we can see them but little white larvae so they're just so they've been newly laid and now they've got to be capped are they yeah correct pardon my ignorance but like bees drink water so we've got a dam near us which you said was a good thing which is good that's not our dam but it's a neighbor's Dam yeah yeah um and but what do bees eat then to sustain them for what 40 days they live for do they well yeah about six weeks yeah yep so um generally available they eat obviously nectar okay right yep that's their main diet and their carbohydrate is like pollen so they actually mix nectar and Poland inside and we'll see some see a bit of Pollocks they saw some pollen being brought in before yeah I'll show you what that looks like so that's like their carbohydrate like their storages okay so they get thirsty and they get hungry yeah exactly just like us that's exactly right yeah well a busy bee needs something to keep them busy yeah so see how that's very fresh yeah there's no eggs left on there that's a bee emerging right there it's a brand new baby bee so it's that one yeah look carefully here yes there's I oh there's a spot on there that's the queen is it the queen wow did you put that on it yeah that's just just to make life a bit easier yeah oh this is going in so what's she doing oh she's just looking around trying to find somewhere to lay he's always on the move she never stops oh my God only stops to lay and how many eggs a day uh winter time probably slows right down to under a thousand even probably less so you can measure it from your side and just go straight up nice and easy you'll get used to it you'll start feeling how the how the weight of it comes out and what's in there and you'll get a feel but they don't know me that's the problem or did you introduce yourself like hi I'm Mark from self-sufficient bee okay now you put yours you did this thing yeah yes you can put them on an edge just yeah I mean I'm not a professional here this will probably slip and right so swarm everywhere okay you're right well there's okay I can see a bit of Honey top left yep um and I don't know what else to look at so we're looking for eggs now you know oh okay well that's right so we'll yeah that's the main thing isn't it yeah for a healthy Hive yep they've got to be laying eggs in there and capping it yeah try to get their light from the side I see yeah now if you look carefully through here yeah you'll see there's eggs in there see there's a little white very tight yeah it looks like rice oh yeah yeah yeah yeah so you can see the rice grains pointing up yep when they're pointing straight up means that it was laid within one to two days when they're on a 45 degree angle probably two to three four days okay well I'm probably not going to remember that it's you but you'll you'll get used okay yeah yeah yeah and and once they're lying down flat then you've only got a bit of royal jelly on them already okay so that means they've been there for about four to five days sort of yeah so here's an indication of when your queen was there last yep so don't fret if you can't find your queen as long as you can see eggs yes and they're upright yeah you know they're looking clean there at least two days ago okay yeah so it's likely she's in here correct well we've already spotted her obviously well we have now yeah yeah right but yeah we'll see you later then oh yeah thanks man and if you're not seeing eggs you've got to think where's the queen well you've got to wonder what happened to the queen yep um and and if you think of the life cycle of the bee yeah they they live three weeks inside yeah three weeks outside roughly okay yeah so for the first three weeks their lives they become nurse bees inside right and they change and then after that at three three weeks and one day who knows around that time yeah they'll orientate Outside The Hive one day and they'll go and start flying and become a worker be a furry can be oh cool so they kind of get maybe get trained up in the nest and I think they'll find what they're doing it they do a course for that first three weeks and then off they go well that's it yeah so what do we do now you can put that one back in oh here we go and we try to orientate the same way yeah well I'm pretty sure it was like exactly how it was yeah yeah because that was my right I didn't move my right so that's a good way of knowing isn't it you could do it exactly the same way as you pull it out you could lower that it's nice and steady you can lower that one in and this is where this dexterity comes in yeah if you gloves because you'll find you'll almost bounce them when you drop it in yeah and just drop it in Nice and Slow oh my goodness you're doing well mate just take your time and the worst thing you can do is you'll kill a couple of Queens but as long as the Queen's not on that frame you're fine oh right you've done well okay all right I can't get my fat finger this is where the gloves to me are a hindrance right yeah oh that's okay did you hear the noise yeah the bees look don't like that they don't of course the vibration so you can leave that hang in there reach around here grab your have I got that on there properly Peter yeah it looks okay to me yep yep okay grab your tool again got my tool hold the same way you can literally just hook it under that and you can then gently this is my bung arm oh is it yeah I can't turn yeah I can do it like like that I I yeah you could if you want to but what we're going to do is basically put it underneath and just use that to help lower that's all you're going to do yep and that's it just lower that end down and then you can go the other side whether you want to use a tool again that way okay yeah got it well that was good yeah and they're here you can do exactly the same thing and that's it surgery was a success yeah I think I got a few bees on you are they trying to get me or they're just looking well have a look they're they're not doing anything at all okay they don't want to hurt you they're just having a sniff you want to get them off they're trying I think they're trying to find a way in they're bloody ah so they can tell Peter that none of them are on you they're swarming on me because I'm an outsider here no and I'm and I killed one of them no they don't they don't want to hurt you yeah I don't want to roll like like term that's a terminology isn't it roll a bee you're doing good that's good and what this is where you find we'll open that up as well how much Honey's in there yeah see it feels pretty heavy or is that normal for the wood it might end up sliding this further here because I'm trying to yeah adding to lift you know not great for the lower back not great for anything in the long run all right you can crack the lid in there so you've given me a pretty nice hive it's already had a heap of honey in it you could Harvest this one you could yeah yeah do you typically harvest in spring and summer and not really winter predominantly yeah I I have harvested through winter I mean we don't have a super cold winter you can Harvest a couple of frames through winter without any dramas at all but if they've got honey stir yeah let them be it so they could depending on the food feed that's around they can fill a box pretty quickly I've I've pulled boxes within a week what yeah I didn't know that I thought this would take months I don't know oh it's so light right not cat there's nothing in there no and if you have it if you look straight into it well what you can do is you can give it a shake down like this yeah yeah it's all nectar right so there is some in there the darker areas is nectar that's all nectar in there yeah oh yeah yeah yeah and that's just got nothing in there nothing in there yet it's already starting to feel on the outside frames well appreciate Peter you coming and helping me out and doing our first inspection there's a heck of a lot of information you've given me already it's it is pretty amazing that you can have such a a colony of little insects creating such a wonderful product that we all love as humans it's almost like I don't know could you call it a symbiotic relationship between humans and bees do we help them out and they help us out or we just Captivate them like we don't do much for them no the bees do a lot more good for us than what we do for them yeah well of course isn't it and not just not just from a food point of view the the healing properties and the Mississippi properties of honey honey bee venom it's it's B Venom yeah yeah B Venom's a massive industry wow all right well thank you very much Peter I'll make sure I've got no these on my gloves you're most welcome thank you very much and unbelievable well what do you think of that personally I'm a little bit beside myself but yeah it's amazing I'm still I don't know a little bit apprehensive about keeping bees there was a lot of information in that first beer inspection with Peter and I'm thinking like this is going to be a fair amount of work but you know so is filling up a garden bed or weeding those things feel like chores at the time but really you're getting out into nature you're learning new things and it's only good for the soul and the brain and the spirit and your health I I'm going to give this my best shot and I'm going to be looking very much forward to having some of our own honey from nectar collected through our own plants fruit and veggies that's even cooler and just one other thing we haven't named Our Queen you know the one with a little dot on it so I'd be interested to know what we should call our queen bee if you've got an idea we've got a name whack it down in the comments section below and that's Neymar all right well I hope you like this video if you did make sure you give it a big b thumbs up share the video around subscribe if you haven't already thanks a lot for watching bye for now cheers foreign I didn't want to say anything before Oh imagine if I got stunned you were hoping they'd crawl in there

Channel: Self Sufficient Me

Views: 140,010

Keywords: first bee hive, first bee hive inspection, setting up your first bee hive, 1st bee hive, setting up first bee hive, queen bee, honey bees, beekeeping for beginners, beekeeping basics, beekeeping tips, backyard beekeeping, self sufficient bee, self sufficient beehive, self sufficient me bees, why I got bees, why keep bees, bee keeping, beekeeping

Id: G-98yuMyAHo

Length: 19min 10sec (1150 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 05 2023