Dear Beekeepers,

Beautiful weather this week - definitely inspect your hive and enjoy your bees! For tips on inspecting, take my hive inspection class. Read on for classes & what to do in your hive!

RANDY OLIVER NUCS​
Urban Farm Oasis still has gentle Randy Oliver nucs available. The queens are daughters of hives that did not need treatment in 2024 as they kept their mites at 0 or 1 mite. Here is a photo of one to the right with all zeros for all five mite washes. I highly recommend these nucs for their gentleness, their possible mite resistance (2/3rd of them show some signs of mite resistance, 1/3 a lot of mite resistance), and their strength/quality.

​HIVE INSPECTION 2-Part Class​
​Sundays, April 13th & 27th, 6:30pm-8pm, $45​
​This is for beginning & experienced beekeepers alike. Learning more tips & tricks around inspecting & what you are looking for will make you a better beekeeper. Plus it will make you understand what you are doing and what your bees are doing. Inspecting is complicated, because it involves reading bee behavior & what's in the combs, making a plan before you go in with goals of what you will do, and knowing different techniques of how to use the tools from hive tool to smoker.
Enrolling in this class gives you access to taking live in-person inspection sessions where we'll demonstrate the topics of the online class.
​BONUS: you not only get access to the recordings if you can't make it live, but also access to the self-study course in my online school.
​Register Here!​

VARROA MITE MANAGEMENT CLASS​
​Saturdays, May 17th & 31st, 9am - 10:30am, $45​
Learn what to do each season to keep mite levels low and your bees thriving. It is each beekeeper’s responsibility to keep their mites low, as it means lower mite & virus levels for all the surrounding hives (mites/viruses transfer easily between hives). We focus on methods that have worked in the East Bay for my hives and the hives of students in my mentorship.
​Register here! ​

SWARM SEASON HAS ARRIVED!​
Lots of hive will likely swarm this week with the hot weather! Keep up with your swarm prevention tactics through end of May on overwintered hives. If your hive swarmed on Friday, look out for another swarm this Friday(a week later). The first swarm will be with the original mated queen. A week later, the virgin queens hatch out and the hive sends off 1-2 more swarms. You can add a box in the middle of the brood nest and/or make a split from the hive to discourage these later swarms from happening. For more information on what to do if your hive swarms, take my self-study class "My Hive Swarmed! Now What?"

WHAT TO DO IN YOUR HIVE​
We're past the cooler and longer nights of February & March. It's safer to do more dramatic things to the hive, because the bees can overcome them. Even if you kill the queen, the bees will likely be able to mate a new one successfully with 70 degree afternoon temperatures. Here's what to focus on:

• Test for varroa mites (& treat)
  ​Lots of beekeepers have seen high mite levels (20-30 mites/300 bees) in the last two weeks. Do test for mites if it's been 4 weeks since your last test. Mites can go up from zero to 25 in 4 weeks at this time of year. If you get 20-30 mites on a big hive, I'd recommend treating with 2 strips of Formic/MiteAway. The brood is spread out so much throughout the hive, that a lesser treatment won't work. 2 strips can kill your queen, but at this time of year, it's highly likely a new queen will mate successfully, so it'll be all good.
• Look for eggs/larvae & queen cells​
  Look for eggs/larvae to verify you have a laying queen. The bees will build lots of queen cups at this time of year, but they are likely empty. Look into them and see if there are larvae. Also, look for capped queen cells. If a lot of capped queen cells, your hive liked swarmed already or is in a queen transition.
• Make 1-2 nucs from a big hive​
  This allows the hive to reproduce but in a calmer, more predictable way than swarming.
  Take my self-study class on How to Split Your Hive Successfully for details.
• Add 1 box to the hive lower down between the brood & honey boxes or even between two boxes of brood (if hive is really packed with bees)
  This lowers bee density or congestion in the broodnest, which leads to swarming.
• Put undrawn comb or new frames on the hive​
  It will be warm enough this week for the bees to build wax. Hold back your drawn comb & get frames drawn out in April. This is also a good form of swarm prevention.
• Put extra boxes on​
  I like to put an extra box on at this time of year so there are 1.5 or 2 boxes extra. The hive is taller, but I can spread out the honey between boxes, so the high boxes are less heavy. The bees usually won't cap honey in April, so there is a lot of uncapped honey in the hive now. In May, they'll usually cap some & we can harvest/remove it from the hive.

HIVE CONSULTATION​
If you have a lot of questions about your hive, email me to set up a phone or Zoom hive consult. $20-$50 sliding scale & depending on how long and involved. I love answering questions about bees!

BAY AREA BEEKEEPING GUIDE FOR URBAN BACKYARD BEEKEEPERS​
My 80+ page online guide gives you clear guidance each month about what's important to do in the hive.
​Click here to read more about it & buy!
​If you've bought my guide in the past, go here & click login in the upper right corner. You can click Forgot Password to reset your password & gain access. I've updated the guide a lot this year, so do read!​

May you and your bees thrive! -Jennifer

Jennifer Radtke, Learn from the Bees​
​Mentorships, Education, & Advice for Urban Beekeeping in the Unique SF Bay Area Climate

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