Homestead in the Hood

Summer Buzzin'

New Product, Learning Opportunity, and Chasing the Honey!

New Product! Heritage Honey
Beekeeping got just a little bit harder in 1987 when an invasive parasite with the name of Varroa Destructor entered into American beekeeping. It's been a race to find a cure, a treatment, or preventative to "save the bees" from the number one killer of honeybees. But we are trying something different... We are turning the task back on to the bees. With guidance, education, and scientific-backed research from world-renowned queen breeders, we are working with the bees to find genetic solutions. No treatments, no chemicals. Just genetic heritage and strong survivor-stock. Your purchase helps funds our travels to research and resources for this crucial work.

Learning Opportunity: Harbo Assay
If you have bees, this will be a great chance to learn about mite resistant genetics. Practice mite washes and the Harbo Assay with us on Sunday, July 26. Meet at Homestead in the Hood Mercantile (1385 Carr Street Lakewood, CO) at 8:00 am and we'll head to the apiary together. Bring a bee suit, a bright headlamp, and a mite wash kit if you have one. We'll be done around 1:00 pm. Please RSVP to [email protected].

Chasing the Honey
You may be aware of the drought we are in here in Colorado (we are sure you are aware, haha!) This is impacting the honey yield as well. Because of this, we decided to chase the nectar and move 26 of our hives from the city to a farm out east of Denver that grows alfalfa and is irrigated. Alfalfa is a major honey producer! After just one week of having the hives there we pulled 15 gallons of honey. Needless to say, we are relieved by this! There should be 1 or 2 more growths of alfalfa, so we are hoping to get a good honey crop this year after all. It was A LOT of back-breaking work to move the hives out there, but it is worth it to feed the bees and our honey lovers out there!

Our latest news Click here for an update from Homestead in the Hood!

We’ll be back, we promise.We do this every year.

You know where to find us. Check out our website for markets and events, join our mailing list (from our website), shoot us an email call or text or stop by the Merc and grab a coffee and chat.

Thankful for our hosts pasts and present who have put up with us and our bees over 8 years and even a few stings here and there. You know who you are.

Incredibly humbled to be welcomed onto the land by Brett Arnusch and the team!

Genetic testing for mite resistance.

We are testing for mite resistance in our experimental “Harbo yard” (named after USDA bee researcher John Harbo. Which we hope will one day dominate the mating areas and flood the genetic gene pool with incredible genetics so that one day, our queens will be able to open-mate in the wild and pick up those genetics and be mite resistant. But there are only 60 allele combinations that expressed varroa sensitive hygiene (VSH) so not all bees carry it. A score of 0 means there is no mite expression and a 4 means the colony carries all the alleles for mite resistance.

But I’m also testing and recording a few more things as an Urban Beekeeper who has unknown apiaries and sketchy neighbor beekeepers who don’t take care of their bees, creating mite pressure and mite bombs on our hives. So I’m testing for Harbo scores every month I can as the season allows, as well as taking mite washes on each colony to assess the amount of mites “walking in the front door.”

1) as mite pressure increases (June-August) does a high scoring VSH colony’s score decrease and then recover once pressure is lowered again?

2) Can a low scoring colony INCREASE their score as mite pressure in the apiary is decreased over time?

4) Do high scoring colonies scores dip down and then recover back to normal during high mite pressure areas, or do they stay consistent as they power through the challenge.

5) Just how quickly does a colony that scores a 4 turn to absolute trash as they requeen themselves and those daughters open-mate? One generation? Two generations? Never?

Maybe THIS should be my Master’s project for the Colorado State Beekeeper’s Master Certification Program?

Follow along as we get super nerdy with it.