In south Texas there are some flowering plants nearly all year around, but between the frost killing them and being unable to go outside for so long the honeybees are desperate for food.
This past weekend on Super Bee Sunday, we got to have our first real check for our over-wintered hives. It is always a bit nerve wracking going into the new bee season because it is less of matter of “did I lose hives?” and more of “how many did I lose?” and that question is the most frightening one.
If you’ve had to hire a beekeeper to remove a colony from your home, you already know how troublesome the whole process is! The best way to remove bees from your home is to simply prevent them from getting there in the first place. Bees are wonderful animals to own, so long as they are in a managed hive box. Preparing for swarm season during the winter can help prevent bees from establishing a colony on your property.
Today was a textbook case in Africanized defensive procedures. If it wasn’t for the fact that this house had a decent amount of greenery and we were working inside of a shed, it would have been possible that people or animals in the area could have also been attacked.