We Got Bees
We drove up with our empty hive to the queen-maker on a nearby moshav. He had a nucleus of bees that we had ordered and would transfer five frames containing the queen, brood and bees into our hive. We were all prepared with our newly painted hive, clean white bee suits and smoker ready to fire up. He saw the girls and informed us that he could not in good conscience sell us the bees because even though we had sealed the hive, the hive could pop open if we were involved in an accident. I was happy that our bee breeder would pass up a sale for the good of our kids.
We quickly arranged for a babysitter and returned, fully dressed in our bee suits.
A normal hive in Israel consists of 10 frames in a box. The hive system is designed to be a box without a floor and without a roof/lid. The hive sits on a wooden floor with a small opening that allows the bees to come and go as they please. When the colony starts to grow, the roof is removed and another bottomless, roofless hive is put on top, also containing 10 frames. The roof is then put on top of the 2nd story.
The frames inside the hive are designed to fill the inside of the hive, leaving the bees the exact amount of space they need to make their comb. To help them start their task, each frame has a sheet of beeswax stuck to wires that are strung across the frame. The wax is has a very delicate impression of a cell pattern. The bees recognize this pattern and use this “foundation” to start their own comb.
Alison with a Smoker
When the bees have increased their brood and you are ready to add another layer, you can insert a queen excluder board containing a wire mesh or screen that has openings that are large enough to allow the worker bees to travel back and forth between the two sections but prevents the queen, who is larger, from laying eggs in the upper section. This allows you to have a section that can be accessed by the regular worker bees who will create comb and use it to store their honey but will be off limits to the queen and her eggs.
Living in Rehovot means living close to nature. I walk to work every morning passing through some city streets till I reach the edge of the city. From there I walk through a field where the site of horses, camels andherds of sheep are not uncommon. We had to find a place to put our new hives so a few weeks ago I started contacting people I know who live on moshavim in the area. Two years ago I did an internship at Comverse in Tel Aviv and worked with Sue, who lives on Beit Gamliel, a moshav about 5-7 kilometres away from Rehovot. She and her husband Harry have been planting lots of exotic fruits as well as the standard Israeli crops of pomegranate, grapes and vegetables.
Harry & Sue
Their son is also starting to grow bees and they were kind enough to let us place a hive in their fields. More about beekeeping in Israel later….
Uncategorized | Stephen | 
May 4, 2009 2:23 am
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By Dave, May 5, 2009 @ 4:56 pm
Very cool guys! Can’t wait to taste that honey. Almost as good as maple syrup.
By Pete, May 6, 2009 @ 9:09 am
Even if you don’t produce a lot of honey, you have the best Purim costumes I have ever seen.