Beelightful Bee Company

Could be cozy and intimate? Bees are so used to being constantly surrounded and touched by their hivemates. It must be absolutely amazing the first time they fly away from the nest. It’s the first time they use their wings to fly, the first time they experience the big, wide world, and the first time they act as solo beings. Of course every action they take is for the collective so “hive mind” is always with them from pre-hatching to end of life. Amazing creatures.

☺️My new handyman Jaime came yesterday and made seven holes in the wall for seven hives. This is an amazing project for me in Miami as I’m making my honey house into a Bee Immersive Experience! More updates and details to come but just know I’m working hard and absolutely buzzing with the excitement of it all 🐝🤺🐝🤺🐝🤺🐝

THIS QUEEN IS NEARLY IMPOSSIBLE TO SEE! 😳If you are a newer beekeeper don’t feel bad if you can’t find her. It definitely helps to mark her with a dot of color. This one is fast, hides, is smaller and is dark with stripes, so it’s hard to see her 😣. If you see upright eggs that’s enough to know she’s fine and she’s there somewhere 😘🐝. Everything is practice, patience and repetition in learning the fine art of beekeeping and queen handling so try that 🤪 oh! And BTW if you are in south florida this weekend Hillary Kearny of Hilary Kearney is a speaker and workshop presenter in Palm Beach Palm Beach County Beekeepers. If you don’t follow Hillary you should. She’s the author of the book Queenspotting and her one woman bee business in San Diego kicks butt on quality, innovation, creativity and success. Yes, I’m a fan-girl for years! 😘😘😘

I am not paid for this promo, so it comes straight from experience. I met Jenna Jeometry Beewear | Women’s Beekeeping Suits last year at Apimondia in Denmark and I had already pre-ordered her suit! She’s amazing and I love supporting her efforts to make a superior bee suit designed for women. I have extreme heat and humidity to beekeep in six months of the year in Miami and this is my solution. It’s the best available bee suit in my opinion. For a discount use MEL10, which is a 20% off right now.

Another bee removal successfully accomplished last evening. I don’t know about you but a Saturday night spent removing bees is one well spent to me. I got home tired and happy. And today when I checked them I did get the queen. Yayyyy!

These bees are from a rescue nearby and now in the good hands of Stefano, daddy bee with his new yellow Primal Bee. He’s learning so much in how to read the combs and find the queen on his own. It’s not easy and takes practice and time, but with a great attitude of love and not fear or intimidation, bees quickly become so fascinating and friendly. I’m proud of Stefano. He’s only a beekeeper since May!

I got up there thinking I could take this massive fresh beehive out of the attic which means sliding myself back and forth across the ceiling beams, rolling in insulation, squeezing myself and equipment into the corner, using a bee vacuum awkwardly while bearing some unholy heat, and pulling them out comb by comb. I decided against it, went outside to their entrance hole, climbed a very tall ladder, and set up a funnel for a trap out. Sometimes it’s ok to just force a good old do-over for bees. They do it themselves every time they abscond or swarm so it’s not radical for them to adjust quickly. Homeowners don’t want to break open their roofs which is totally understandable. This is a option I’ve done over 40 times over the years and it works.

Went to do a bee removal and this is what had just happened to them and been left there. I cleaned it up because 30k dead bees does not smell good. Smells like a dead animal, which collectively they are. Had to throw it all away for the homeowner as it was chemically contaminated with who knows what. The homeowner had told her guy not to do this, and she hired me, but this had happened anyway. This is what happens way more often in Miami to the feral bee colonies and why it’s great when people find me and other actual beekeepers who do honest live removals. Some guys (won’t name names to be nice but you might have experienced them) say they do live removals to get that business and then come out with excuses to exterminate anyway all the time. I tell you true, it’s work to take them home alive, and it’s work and responsibility to care for them after the removal. It’s worth it to pay for someone like me and my beekeeping friends to save the bees. It really is.

Queens can fall out the hive and get eaten by a toad. Not likely but anything can happen. I check my inner covers when I open up a hive just in case because that takes a few seconds and I tell you, every few years I do actually find a queen there. She can be anywhere and then nowhere 😅🐝

My god I love the PBH ❤️❤️❤️ I love them for the bees and for the fun of beekeeping. It’s not that we don’t have the challenges I’d love to be rid of, like varroa, hive beetles, weird weather patterns and frickin toads that eat bees, but with these hives I have confidence that the bees have much more energy to meet challenges. I took a long journey go find this solution and I’m glad for the results already. Primal Bee