Wednesday, October 9, 2013

Ethiopian Bee-Keeping (Part 1)

This bee colony lives in a families' window. The bees entered on their own and it makes for an excellent observation hive to study bee behavior. We plan to build another one of these in the future.

This is a traditional Ethiopian Apiary site. The hives under the metal are made of hollowed out logs and sometimes sticks and mud.


My first bee-keeping experience: A night-time bee colony transfer from a traditional hive into a top-bar one. Here we are tying the old combs onto the top bars of the new hive. The bees are more docile and less dangerous at night so it is the best time to deal with them.

The inside of a traditional Ethiopian bee-hive. This one is very healthy.

The old hive, an hollowed log split in 1/2.

Dumping hand fulls of bees into the new hive.

Sweeping the bees out of the old hive.

The bees in the new hive after transfer is almost complete.

The new hive in it's final resting place. The bees took to it very well.

Nearby top-bar apiary site. (these hives are mostly empty of bees)




Smoking the new bee-hive to attract the bees. And top bars drying in the sun.


Second bee colony transfer. Here we are cutting out the old combs.

Queen Bee. It took a while to find her in the dark.

Can you spot the Queen?

queen bee in her cage. this cage will be hung in the new hive to attract the worker bees inside.

Inside the new hive. The bright orange in the comb is Pollen stores.

2 comments:

  1. That's impressive- I hope to have bees some day on our family farm!

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  2. It looks Very labor intensive and rewarding too! Do you have to destroy much of the hive when you harvest the top bar hives compared to the conventional box type hives like the ones we have next door? Did Chris, a Ky PCV ever contact you about bee keeping?

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