Rock guitar virtuoso Steve Vai was living in Hollywood when he first became interested in beekeeping. His wife had a garden and his neighbors had bees -- a natural combination. When Vai moved his family to Encino, he decided to study up on bees by going online. Then he found a mentor -- David Saraf, the Bee Man -- and jumped in with both feet. Vai now has five bee colonies on his Encino property and one in Hollywood -- he says that at any time he's had about 100,000 bees. Once a year the honey gets harvested ; at this point, the hives yield nearly a thousand pounds! Here Vai shares a few of his beekeeping secrets. - Visually check the hive and the bees to be sure they're healthy.
- Smoke the bees (figure A)) -- this process confuses them so they can't communicate; in addition, they gorge on honey when they think there's a fire, so they can't bow up to sting.
- Check honey frames and remove any that are completely filled with honey.
Beekeeping trivia: Capping is the process by which the bees cover the individual cells of the honeycomb with wax.
RESOURCES :
Practical Beekeeping
Model: 1861260490
Author: Clive De Bruyn
Discovering Beekeeping
Model: 0747803188
Author: Daphne More
Hooray for Beekeeping
Model: 0613079833
Author: Bobby Kalman
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