Bob wrote:
My question involves the recent discussion on Mexican hives. You list
> Northern and southern New Mexico ( an area I am very familiar with) as your
> nuc areas. Southern is basically on the Old Mexico border.
> My question is:
> Please share with a few on the list your experience with AHB and how you
> manage to raise queens in an area of total Africanized bees?
> I think they need hearing from those which keep bees in those areas.
Hi Bob- thanks for your question, it is a good one.
We do keep some bees in southern NM- mainly for overwintering and for earlier spring build-up. We actually do not rear any queens in southern NM. Our rearing zones are 6 hours north of Las Cruces and a good 50 miles north of Santa Fe- starting at 5000 foot elevation up to 9000 foot elevation.
We have, in the past, reared some early season queens in southern NM- to see how it was and honestly, they were fine. We still retrieve swarms from the southern end of the state and only two out of over 60 "feral" swarms retrieved over the past 5 years in early spring were hot. Early spring temp swings are still extreme so AHB's "seasonal appearance" is more of a summertime issue.
I first learned to keep bees in South America- with AHB. I'm familiar with them and in managing them in sub-trop conditions. I can surely tell when a colony is hot. They are awesome to work with- much more timely management needed. However, I never had them in large numbers so not sure how long-term management works and in the US. Though I "liked" the challenge of learning to keep AHB, I much prefer my EHB.
I think NM gets lumped in with AZ and TX though we are more like Colorado in terms of landscape. The Rocky Mountains run through the state- north to south and since we are arid, everyone congregates around the same water holes, humans and animals. We have sincere temperature swings- AHB don't like that. We also have real hit and miss flows- all depends on the moisture. They have made appearances over the years in the lower elevations- but have not permanently established themselves. I guess I can't totally claim that, but they are not rampant like in AZ. There was a recent issue in Albuquerque proper with an AHB situation (next door to a beekeeper a couple of dogs were stung and put down). Bees were collected from a nearby bush and tested + for AHB. However, there was no real confirmation as to if they were indeed the neighbor's bees or? Neighbor beekeeper said he got his bees from Texas. Go figure......
I know southern AZ gets a double mesquite bloom/year. We only get one in southern NM- our mesquite actually loses all its leaves come Nov/Dec and doesn't leaf out again until April. We usually- and this is if we had good moisture over the winter, will get mesquite flow starting around Cinco de Mayo. By the end of May- it is roasting in the southern desert valleys so we pull everyone (except for a few batches that we leave for summer cotton and pollination) up to the northern valleys and mountains where our home farm is and where we have isolated pockets in the Sangre de Cristo Mountain Range for rearing.
We used to try to start rearing early- to accomodate the market demand, but I can readily admit these days- I cannot beat Mother Nature and I am no fool to keep trying to. So, we wait for spring winds to abate (another deciding factor against early spring mating), and for the volatile spring temp swings to steady. We miss the early season demand but when our queens are ready in May- they are healthy and strong. We rear through most of September- we have drones through Oct. but we can get snow early (last year we got thundersnow on our peaks on Aug. 22nd with sincere drop at home on Sept. 26th). This fall so far has been warm. Last rounds of queens were ready by end of Sept. and we kept them all to overwinter.
We used to wait 21 days post emergence for catching and this past season we bumped it up to 28 days. That worked fine for the 5-framers but was too long for the 3-framers which got plugged out. We had an awesome summer flow this year even though spring was real chilly to start. Shoot- the past 3 springs have been brutal.
We keep track of all hives- everyone gets a colored plaque screwed on bottom box in front (color for queen). We write on the lid of every hive so if I or my partner check them next, we can read the previous revision. If a hive is "mean" they get a frown on the lid. If they acquire 3 frowns, the queen is hashed, drone comb culled, and the colony busted down to nucs and each nuc requeened. This rarely happens. We do buy queens from other producers and we look to share and swap stock with neighboring beekeepers. Everyone's queens are monitored. If they make it two years and after review of their records they show to maintain gentleness, productivity and pest/disease resistance, we deem them breeders.
I could go on but this is long already- and the turkey is calling my attention-
I appreciate everyone's posts. Took me a while to start posting- I am shy on occasion :) Of course now that we have snow and most all our girls are where they are supposed to be, I can participate. Still gotta finish extracting though......
Melanie Kirby
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