Unlocking the Secrets of Beekeeping with Bill Kaufman

Ready to unlock the secrets of beekeeping and transform your understanding of these incredible insects? Join us as we sit down with Bill Kaufman, a seasoned beekeeper, instructor, and honey bee rescuer. He started his journey with a childhood fear of bees and has since become an expert in the field. Bill shares his extensive knowledge on topics ranging from bee behavior to the importance of hive management, while also debunking common misconceptions about bees. You’ll discover the difference between bearding and swarming and learn why responsible hive management is crucial for both the bees and the environment.

Bill takes us through the amazing process of honey production and the intricate lifecycle of honeybees. His stories are both educational and entertaining, shedding light on his early beekeeping missteps and his daring antics like having bees in his mouth. We also touch on the broader implications of bee conservation and the pivotal role bees play in pollination. Bill’s passion for educating others is evident as he discusses his online classes and hands-on experiences, providing a rich resource for anyone interested in beekeeping or bee conservation.

We wrap up with practical advice on how to safely handle bee swarms and the importance of calling a professional for bee removal instead of using poison. Bill explains the dangers of secondary poisoning and emphasizes the need for responsible bee handling. He also clarifies the distinctions between honeybees, carpenter bees, hornets, and yellow jackets, offering tips on how to maintain calm around these insects. This episode is a treasure trove of information, perfect for aspiring beekeepers, bee enthusiasts, or anyone curious about the vital role bees play in our ecosystem.

Transcript

The World of Beekeeping

Speaker 1 0:00

Hello everybody and welcome to the Skip Clark pod zone and home of Skip. Happens, happens, happens, whatever you want to call it. Conversation with those making a difference in our lives, music to everyday situations, including tonight. It's a situation that I had recently. I came home, walked in the house, my wife says we've got a bee problem. There were bees bearding I guess they call it bearding on the corner of my home and I made several mistakes and I wish I knew then what I know now.

Speaker 1 0:37

But this podcast is going to be called Bee Mentality and Beekeeping, being a rewarding profession that requires a deep understanding of bee behavior, hive management, honey production. I got some right here. I don't know which camera we're on, but there it is right. There we're going to be talking about that. I want you to say hello to my new friend. He's a beekeeper, a beekeeper instructor, honey Bee Rescue, mr Bill Kaufman. By the way, just kind of forgive my ignorance here a little bit, because I don't know much about the bees, I don't know what's going on and you've been kind of helping me out here. Uh, just a little bit. But hey, welcome to the pod zone hey, thanks for having me.

Speaker 1 1:16

Yeah, absolutely, it's my it's like it's like my little, uh, my little hideaway in the house oh this is amazing.

Speaker 1 1:23

I come down here, I come down here and I hide. But you know, you and I got to know each other. We had this big time bee problem here at the house and it's like I panicked when I came home from work that day and my wife, nancy comes out and says honey, we got a bee problem. I said what are you talking about? And she goes it's right there. And she pointed I go honey, we got a bee problem. I said what are you talking about? And she goes it's right there. And she pointed I go holy crap, there had to be thousands. You saw the pictures right, there had to be. So your guesstimation how many do you think?

Speaker 1 1:55

there were thousands of bees, tens of thousands maybe really 15 or 20 000 in that and and they, they were what you call. It was bearding.

Speaker 2 2:05

Yes. Swarming, swarming, bearding is on a beehive. Swarming is when they're on some place that is not their own place.

Speaker 1 2:13

See, I'm learning. I call it bearding because somebody said it was bearding, but you're all right. So that would be on a hive. This was actually on the corner of the house and I thought there was a hive there, but there was no hive, it was a swarm, correct?

Speaker 2 2:27

Correct.

Speaker 1 2:28

And we're talking honeybees. Yes, all right. So just before we take this Tens of thousands, there was a whole lot. I know that and immediately, being a homeowner not knowing much about bees not like you you're the expert then I go go. Holy crap, what are we going to do? I run in the garage and I grab the spray, the bee and wasp hornet killer, and what do I do?

Speaker 2 2:51

I spray it, that's right, and that's a scary thing, yeah and tens of thousands fell to the ground.

Speaker 1 2:57

Then I got on facebook and I like jennifer savastino again and I'm like something. You know, I tagged her so she would see it and then it was like don't kill them, don't do this call a beekeeper. I'm going something. You know, I tagged her so she would see it and then it was like don't kill him, don't do this call a beekeeper. I'm going oh my god, I think I just really did something bad yeah.

Speaker 2 3:12

So yeah, you went and you protected your family.

Speaker 1 3:15

I did, but it taking charge so I mean, first of all, you being a beekeeper, let's, let's back it up now, now that you know my, my everybody knows my situation here a little bit. Why did you become a beekeeper? What, what got you interested in doing this?

Speaker 2 3:30

uh, fear, I think. Fear, yeah, why? Why 2k came around, you know, when everything was supposed to go to zero and nobody's going to have anything any ever again.

Speaker 2 3:39

I got this idea of homesteading and so bees were part of it. Because I couldn't raise sugar cane, I had to feed my sweet tooth somehow. So that was the thought anyway, and it took me a few years before I got the bees, and then it was just a hobby. For many years I was still terrified Actually I was terrified of honeybees, tens of thousands of them flying around. Let's every one of them's got a stinger. Yeah, yeah, duct tape was not enough to to calm my nerves. You know, around my wrists, around my neck, around my waist, so.

Speaker 1 4:18

But then so you get interested and you start researching it a little bit and we find out. You find out how important honeybees are to to our everyday living, correct, I mean?

Speaker 2 4:32

not really no, okay, no no, I was just doing it, I think, you know, just because it was a fear that I had and I was trying to overcome it and I got, I started it, and when I start something, I like to keep going until it's done a fear of bees a fear of like a official fear of swarming insects when I was like three or four I get that, I got I.

Speaker 2 4:53

I was up on this stump right, this rotting stump, in front of my neighbors and everybody's waving to me. I'm like, I'm thinking, I'm like this greatest kid I'm on top of the world, you know, and they're all waving at me and they're like, you know. I thought I thought they were encouraging me. No, they were trying to get me away from that, because they knew there were, uh, yellow jackets, ground bees in that stump. Those things came out and got me.

Speaker 1 5:15

They got me pretty good, and so I've had this fear terrified of flying insects for well, not anymore no, and we're going to talk about that here in just a little bit, but I think maybe I could relate with that just a little. Walking across the grass on my bare feet once many years ago and I think I stepped on a might have been an underground hive or there was a hole there and there were bees coming out and I got stung in my foot, not just once, it was a lot and it hurt. But now honeybees, it's a whole different ballgame.

Speaker 2 5:48

Correct, it is. It is they are a completely different community as far as bees go. Tell us about honeybees. They are a community, they're a group, they live together and they work together and you never see individual bees living or sustaining life. Excuse me, you have to have a colony, you have to have all of them working together. It's a super organism, kind of like we are.

Speaker 2 6:25

We are made out of all these cells right right, and we've got a liver and we've got lungs and we've got you know well, and uh, the bees are the same way in a colony. They've got bees that ventilate the hive, the lungs. They've got bees that clean it out, the liver. They've got bees that got bees that process the food, which would be the intestinal tract. There's all these things that you can relate to an actual super organism like ourselves.

Speaker 1 6:54

You say it's a colony, so you've got bees doing different jobs.

Speaker 2 6:57

Right, right, every bee has a job.

Speaker 1 7:00

Every bee has a job. One is to protect the colony as well.

Speaker 2 7:04

Guard bees, guard bees as well.

Speaker 1 7:06

Guard bees, guard bees, guard bees, guard bees. What are the?

Speaker 2 7:08

drone bees. Are they drone bees? The drones are the penis of the colony.

Speaker 1 7:13

Ah, okay.

Speaker 2 7:14

That's their job. That's what they do. They find the queens and they mate with the queens, and that's it Now how many queens?

Speaker 1 7:23

Would it be? Just one queen?

Speaker 2 7:25

One queen per colony. Wow, so a colony is that super organism.

Speaker 1 7:31

This is amazing. This is amazing.

Speaker 2 7:33

If we look at the yellow jackets or the wasps or the hornets, they are what are called solitary bees. You might see them in groups. You see that great big. You know the paper nests yeah, yeah, yeah from the trees.

Speaker 1 7:45

Yep, you know, I used to throw apples at, yeah I think we all did growing up try to run as fast as if I could get the hell out of there yeah so, but I didn't go on to be a beekeeper, but they uh yeah, they um like right now this is the time of year they send out queens.

Speaker 2 8:03

The queens go out, or actually queens. They're sent out in the fall to hibernate, and now they are out building their nest a single queen building the nest, laying eggs, bringing back food, doing it all by themselves and eventually their offspring will accumulate and then it'll grow exponentially. So we've got a little paper nest out there all over the place right now and eventually in August they're going to be this big, and then a few weeks later they're going to be this big, because the number is just so what does one person do, or what do you do when you come home and you find that Let it be, let it go.

Speaker 1 8:41

Call somebody like you A wasp nest, a wasp nest or oh, yeah, call jennifer. That's it, and call jennifer for the wasp.

Speaker 2 8:50

But not for the honeybee, the honeybees you call a beekeeper right, which you know call a beekeeper.

Speaker 1 8:55

And then, of course, bill kaufman is a beekeeper and he did come over and he pretty much took care of my problem. I know it took a few days to get him out of here, but eventually they were all gone and I would have sworn that they were actually building something there and he kept saying, nope, nope, they're not, they're just resting, they're part of a swarm. So if we have a homeowner that comes home and they see all these bees on the corner of the house or corner of the garage, call a beekeeper.

Speaker 2 9:23

Absolutely. And how do you know if they're honeybees? Because there's thousands of them piled up on top of each other. Okay, all right, those are when you see them piling up like that yeah, yep, that's definitely a swarm and if they're living in there, you're gonna see. It's like an airport air traffic control. These things come in and go and they, they, they don't run into each other, they're just constantly going back and forth out of a little hole like this and it's almost like you got.

Speaker 2 9:47

You got a, a runway or like a waiting pattern up here and then that's amazing space they go in and they're pretty smart huh, they're amazing.

Speaker 2 9:55

I mean part of that whole deal about being a super organism, all the bees, that, all those different jobs, they just seem to know what they're supposed to do, when they're supposed to do it. If there's a need, bees will switch their jobs and go do take care of that. And without talking, without being physically connected, they, they, just they communicate their, their needs amazing it is amazing, this little, little, little bee. I think it's all through sense of smell. Actually they smell and they operate by pheromones.

Speaker 1 10:31

So how do you know which one's the queen?

Speaker 2 10:36

She's wearing a crown.

Speaker 1 10:40

That's where the beekeeper comes in handy. All right, Bill, which one's the queen.

Speaker 2 10:44

She's a little bit bigger. Okay, her abdomen is pointy. It sticks past the ends of her wingtips. She's got a big butt. Yep, she's got a big butt, I like to say, as she's walking across the honeycomb, because we've got to open it up and see the honeycomb.

Speaker 2 10:58

What you're going to see is kind of like if you imagine being up in a plane looking at a parking lot where the trucker pulled into the car lot and is trying to back in and out and trying to get around, that she's just awkward Doing her thing and having a hard time moving around because all the other bees look efficient and she seems to go back and forth differently than the rest.

Speaker 1 11:21

She travels differently.

Speaker 2 11:26

And then she also has a big. It's not the head, it's the thorax. There's three parts to a bee there's head, thorax and abdomen, and the center of it is really big on her. So she's a bigger bee. Now why don't?

Speaker 1 11:36

you? Why is it you do not get stung? When you? I've seen your videos, I've watched you reach in, grab a handful of, are you not getting stung?

Speaker 2 11:52

in that, in that spot right there, it's because bees hang on each other all the time. You know, when you saw that swarm of bees, thousands of them hanging on each other's back, one is up here and holding, holding onto the wall, with, you know, 30 or 40 hanging from its back.

Speaker 1 12:11

You know that weight of it.

Speaker 2 12:12

So if I go in there and I don't push harder than the weight of the bee and just slowly and let the bees move out of my way and just be patient, and it looks pretty quick, you know, you go in and just grab, but they, you know, and then pull away and they, they let go of the others and they'll sit in my hand, wow, so it's just, but I do get stuck.

Speaker 1 12:35

But you do. You don't get stung, but not as much as we would think you would get stuck right, not not every time.

Speaker 2 12:43

Basically, what happens is you'll offend personally 1b.

Speaker 1 12:46

You squeeze them a little, some off, squeeze them a little too hard, yeah, and they'll sting. But once they sting, they can only do that once and they'll sting. But once they sting, they can only do that once and they die, correct.

Speaker 2 12:56

Correct, Because they have a barbed stinger. Wow. So if you ever hear that thing, you get stung. You gotta get the stinger out. It's only the honeybee that leaves the stinger. In the wasps, the hornets, the other bees, it's only the honeybee that has a barbed stinger that leaves the stinger.

Speaker 1 13:12

And you only deal with the honeybees.

Speaker 2 13:15

Yeah, basically yeah.

Speaker 1 13:17

Everything else. We have to call Gannon and call Jennifer. I don't know if Jennifer's watching this or not, but it'd be like I did. I was in a panic. I was in panic mode. I'm like Jennifer, please help if you read my post. But you came over, you looked and went wow, pretty cool, Okay, Yep, Got your box out. Little hole in the box, how do you do that? You said what's in the box?

Speaker 2 13:41

Old honeycomb.

Speaker 1 13:42

Okay, it smells like home.

Speaker 2 13:50

So when they're in that swarm state, when they're just sitting there, it's called a bivouac. A bivouac is basically a military term that says we are, uh, in a temporary encampment without shelter. Okay, so that's what they do. They come out of the hive and they rest and they're looking for a new place, and as soon as they get a new place, they're gonna all go for it. This is it, let's go and take.

Speaker 2 14:14

They can just smell it and they go and they smell it and because the old comb works, the old honeycomb works it's been another hive. Because it smells like it, because they prefer a fixer-upper versus building new.

Speaker 1 14:25

So as we sit here and chat with Bill Kaufman, who's my new friend, beekeeper Bill, he's a professional in what he does. Everything I did in the beginning, I mean, which probably just about anybody would have done was entirely wrong to do, because honeybees are so very important to to life, to the pollination of the plants and and all that correct oh yeah so I mean, that's that's something need.

Speaker 1 14:54

And so I went and killed the bees, which was not a good thing to do, but yes, they fell. I'm thinking about this as we go along, but the next morning they were coming to life. You know there was a pile of them on the ground, but they started to come back. They were moving around and trying to find their way, but I imagine they were quite disoriented.

Speaker 1 15:14

Yeah, they were a little a little messed up because of me, god you know, and I will be honest with you. After not not only talking to you, but all the comments that were on my Facebook, it was just like I felt like crap. I'm like oh my God, I didn't realize, did not realize and that's one of the reasons I wanted to have you over. So many people don't realize. Yeah, on my skip happens podcast, that skip happens every day. You know if you know what I mean. But do not kill the honeybees. Call somebody, get them out of there. They're not going to hurt you If you leave them alone. Am I correct by saying if you leave them alone, they will not hurt you?

Speaker 2 15:49

Right, they don't want to be bothered.

Speaker 1 15:52

All right, you know what I think you're a little crazy and I'll tell you why. I watched a video of you, bill, just recently, and did you have bees coming out?

Speaker 2 16:02

of your mouth.

Speaker 1 16:03

I did All right, all right. And, by the way, if you're watching this with Bill and myself here on Skip Happens, you have a question, you can feel free to post it and I think Bill would answer. Uh, while he's here in the pod, zone.

Speaker 2 16:24

But uh, yeah, so that was tell me about that. Why were you so crazy to do that? Somebody dared me, I was. I was eating some of the grubs in a different video, the the, the larvae of the bees okay they you call them grubs.

Speaker 2 16:35

See, I'm getting an education well, I don't even know if that's the right term they're larvae. So they're maggots, they're grubs, they're I don't know. They're that white, slimy, wormy looking thing. Before they become adult bees, before they go, they they're an egg, they're a larvae, they go, uh, pupate through and they go through metamorphosis and then they emerge as an adult bee.

Speaker 1 16:56

And what is the time frame for that? Do you know how long it takes?

Speaker 2 17:00

21 days from egg to adult Really.

Speaker 1 17:03

And then what is the expected life? 45 days Of a honeybee.

Speaker 2 17:08

Of honeybees.

Speaker 1 17:10

And they're so smart Right.

Speaker 2 17:11

They'll live in the hive for most of their life, and then they only leave for the last two weeks of their life.

Speaker 1 17:20

This is amazing. Nobody you know. It's just something, and this is why you have classes. You've been online telling you know, instructing individuals. I know during the pandemic you were talking before you went out with the lights and the cameras the fact that you sat down with a microphone and you're doing a lot of zoom stuff with with other people and instructing them what you know all about bees and honeybees, and so here we are. Here we are Just amazing. What you do you brought over. Explain what you got here. I'm going to what you do you brought over. Explain what you got here. I'm going to hold this up. This is actually the bee friendly cold extracted honey 100% pure, 100% raw.

Speaker 2 18:04

Wow, is that on that?

Speaker 1 18:05

label yes, I didn't, I didn't make that up.

Speaker 2 18:09

You wrote that on there. This is so you sell this? I do. That's the honey I produce in my own yard, that's awesome.

Speaker 1 18:17

I don't know if you can see it on the camera, but where can somebody get this On my front porch?

Speaker 2 18:24

That's pretty much it.

Speaker 1 18:25

Yeah, yeah. So they have to come by, and they actually Right, you have a stand set up there, yep, you do.

Speaker 2 18:30

Self-serve and there's a little cash box. No way, I make sure it's stocked every day.

Speaker 1 18:35

Yeah, Will you throw an address out there? Sure, Just make sure you know if you go there to get this honey, which looks absolutely wonderful, I've got garden bees.

Speaker 2 18:47

Yeah, you probably do. There's a hive set up in front of the garage. There's a hive set up in the backyard.

Speaker 1 18:54

I was going to probably do. There's a hive set up in front of my, in front of the garage. There's a hive set up in the backyard. I was gonna get, I was gonna get to that. Anyways, if you're gonna go, you know, stop by and get some of this honey and explain this. That's the honeycomb, this I was gonna say, it looks like a honeycomb.

Speaker 2 19:04

So that that's the, that's the pure wax. Oh wow, that's a brand new wax that they make and then they fill it with nectar that they collect from the flowers and then that nectar has to be uh processed in order to turn it to honey. So they add enzymes, they add uh and then they they dehydrate it. Basically, the bees they've got to remove the water content so it doesn't ferment. Damn, and the the enzymes will change the nectar to honey.

Speaker 1 19:36

This is amazing.

Speaker 2 19:38

And it's done. All basically, on good Bees with good gut health produce quality honey.

Speaker 1 19:46

So they go to the gut doctor and make sure they're all good, right.

Speaker 2 19:50

So you got to have healthy bees? No, you got to have healthy bees.

Speaker 1 19:59

And when you say healthy bees, what?

Speaker 2 20:00

is it that you exactly mean oh well, I like I keep them 100. Well, I can't say 100 because there's all this environmental stuff well, that's why I was going to go.

Speaker 1 20:09

How do you, but I?

Speaker 2 20:10

don't put in. They've got a parasite in the hive. All bees have this parasite called a varroa mite.

Speaker 2 20:17

And it's a vector of diseases. Just like mosquitoes vector diseases to us, the varroa mite will vector diseases to the bees, and so if you've got to overrun with these varroa mites, it will kill a hive, it will reduce the lifespan of the bee, and so you won't get honey produced. You need to have a long-living bee in order to produce an abundance of honey, in order to leave enough for them to survive and take enough for yourself.

Speaker 1 20:46

But a long-living bee.

Speaker 2 20:49

So what most beekeepers do and I'm at the other end of this, I'm at the wrong end of the spectrum, according to most beekeepers do, and I'm at the other end. I'm at the wrong end of the spectrum, according to most beekeepers is they all treat for mites, which puts pesticides in the little beehive. You got to put just enough pesticide to kill the little bug, but not enough that it's going to kill the big bug, but how?

Speaker 1 21:08

do you know that? How do you know what? What you put in?

Speaker 2 21:10

you just guess yeah, well, you got disordered directions on the back of the box of the medication. Okay, I have no idea medications for bees they've got treatments for bees and I don't add that stuff. So everything's natural everything's natural and so adding that stuff destroys the gut health of the bee because you're, you're slowly poisoning them.

Speaker 2 21:34

Well, it's the same thing if we eat something bad or we start ingesting it right, so now it gets kind of probiotics for bees so okay, so you got people out there you know, poisoning them and then trying to bring them back to health probiotics and then they feed sugar syrups and and and uh, corn syrup to the bees and it's just like you're hurting them in every way and I I don't like that. I'm at the, I'm at the other end and I I kill a lot of bees. A lot of bees die in my area because sometimes not treating for mites, they can be overrun oh yeah every year it gets better and better and do get strong.

Speaker 2 22:14

I get stronger bees and weaker mites in my area.

Speaker 1 22:16

Do the bees know you? You know what I mean. Do you have like a scent? Do they know it's you approaching the hive? They go. Here comes Bill.

Speaker 2 22:28

I don't think I go out enough for them to notice me, but they do know my attitude. Which is soothing and calm so part of remember I I said I was terrified of bees yes and I would yes I would duct tape and protect myself as much as possible to keep the bees from stinging me. I'd go out to the hive, I'd be all anxietic. Well, I don't know, maybe I don't know if it was eight, 10 years ago now my wife and my parents got together for my birthday and bought me this amazing bee suit.

Speaker 2 23:01

All right, it was full body bee suit, the gloves, they kind of bulky and yeah, and I knew the bees couldn't get me. And who I found out? The bees knew they couldn't get me too. So it was great because I used to go out to the hive and the bees would get all upset and try to sting me and like run into my face while you're on their property.

Speaker 1 23:19

It's like get off my lawn.

Speaker 2 23:21

I mean, what would happen if somebody pulled your roof off?

Speaker 1 23:23

No, but I see, now you're hanging around in there, you talk about that. I see that in a lot of videos because, like I said, going, because, like I said, going back to when we met a lot a month ago, whenever it was, and it kind of sparked a little bit of interest in myself. So I was going online looking at YouTube videos and there's other beekeepers actually lifting up the roof, so to speak, and reaching right in there and doing a lot of what you do.

Speaker 2 23:49

So what I realized was it wasn't the bees knowing they couldn't sting me so they didn't try. It was the fact that I was calm for the first time in this bee suit. It took me about a year to figure that out, but now I know bees can smell 200 times better than people.

Speaker 1 24:08

Really See, I was kind of curious.

Speaker 2 24:10

They can pick up on the amount of CO2 coming out of your breath and when you're all anxious and hyper and excited you know, your metabolism picks up, so you have more carbon dioxide coming out On top of being ecstatic. You then have cortisol, you have adrenaline and all those things come out, you know, in your bloodstream. So it comes out your breath.

Speaker 1 24:35

It's like certain pets will know when you're either upset or you're anxious or there's something going on. They can sense that, and that must be almost the same sense of smell. Yeah, wow, this is. You definitely know a lot about this and you definitely did your homework, but you just do this on the side, or is this your like your full-time thing?

Speaker 2 24:57

Oh, it's full-time now.

Speaker 1 24:58

Yeah.

Speaker 2 24:59

Yeah Cool, I used to do construction.

Speaker 1 25:02

Okay.

Speaker 2 25:02

And I was remodeling someone's bathroom and talking about my hobby of keeping bees and it was just after, you know, I started realizing that the bees were calm because I was calm. So I'm like I think I can get into that, I'm like bees live in people's houses. I can get that out for you. And I haven't looked. That was like seven years ago. I haven't looked back.

Speaker 1 25:22

No, that's pretty cool. It's pretty cool. So if somebody comes home, they see the swarm, we call it a swarm. What you told wasn't bearding, it was swarming. Yeah, right there on the side. You come home, don't panic, don't do what I did. Uh, if they're on, correct me if I'm wrong, but if they're on top of each other and they just keep building up like that, those are honeybees. Now, if it's a yellow jacket, obviously you know what a yellow jacket looks like. Or there's those bees that drill into wood. Um, that's obviously some little different. Those are carpenter that drill into wood.

Speaker 1 25:55

Um, that's obviously something a little different those are carpenter bees, carpenter bees, and that's a jennifer call oh yeah, absolutely yeah yeah, we keep mentioning jennifer.

Speaker 1 26:03

I know you come highly recommended from jennifer, which is pretty cool. I should have. I should have gotten a hold of her tonight and said hey, come on over, bill's coming over. We're gonna go down the pod zone and talk about bees. But she was like Nope, nope, can't do anything with that, you need to call a beekeeper. So but when we start talking about the Hornets and the wasp, the carpenter bees, that side of things, that's when we need to call a professional to get rid of them.

Speaker 2 26:28

They do a lot of damage to a house to a house. Yeah, honeybees really don't. And the first thing, once you know my, my main thing, is to remove honeybees from walls, from structures, from roofs, and usually I get a call because the roofers there, the siding guys there, the painters, there and they're like they won't work unless the bees are gone, so that's when they call me in.

Speaker 2 26:48

But and you come over with your little box with a little hole in it and you it's a little more complicated when they've actually built, got into the house.

Speaker 1 26:56

Yeah, we had something in the ceiling in one at one time, but I don't know if there were honey.

Speaker 2 27:00

Those were probably yellow jackets, yeah, and there's a lot there's. Everybody says, oh, I've got honey dripping through my ceiling.

Speaker 1 27:08

It's not honey, right, it's not honey. What is it it is? What is it?

Speaker 2 27:11

Yellow jacket saliva.

Speaker 1 27:15

Well, that sounds.

Speaker 2 27:15

They chew through sheetrock, they chew through wires, they chew through whatever is in their way and they get it out of the way and eventually, if you see that wet spot in the ceiling or wall, they're coming through.

Speaker 1 27:26

See, we had discoloring in the ceiling. Through, see, we had discoloring in the ceiling.

Speaker 2 27:31

And I'm like, oh you know it must be the honey's coming through. We gotta get. I had no idea. See the honey's like that it's. It is encased in individual cells and if it breaks open there is enough bees to clean up the mess before it has a chance to seep through a paper towel. Wow, it will never come through sheetrock.

Speaker 1 27:47

Really, yeah, wow. Well, that's good to know, and if you're watching this, that's good for you to know as well. So the honeybees, don't panic. Call a beekeeper, they'll take care of that. Everything else you need to call a professional exterminator to get rid of them, not the honeybees. Don't do what I did. I got blamed for killing the queen and now I do.

Speaker 2 28:12

I feel bad because when you read about it yeah, your, your colony, got a new queen.

Speaker 1 28:16

Oh, yeah, yeah, okay so you know, when you came over, we we talked about the swarm and maybe you'll come home from work and you're going to see it on your house as well but you said that was a part of a swarm or there was another one close by. How did it? So? What is it?

Speaker 2 28:30

we don't know what the way that works is. Bees don't reproduce. I think I talked a little while ago about wasps, hornets. They'll send out the queen to start building a new sure new hive in the spring bees don't reproduce that way. Bees reproduce by dividing almost. There's other things like sponges in the ocean. They're like butt off.

Speaker 1 28:52

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 28:55

But bees have to reproduce by colony size because they need tens of thousands as a group in order to rebuild and survive, to gather food, to raise their young, to stay warm enough because they're cold-blooded as individuals but warm-blooded as a group so in the spring usually about this time of year, usually the first week of june is is prime swarm season, although this year is it seems a little bit earlier.

Speaker 1 29:25

A little bit earlier because our temperatures were a lot warmer yeah, so I think I think we're.

Speaker 2 29:30

We're on a downhill side of that and we're going to see it again the first week of August. But what happens is the flowers start to come in bloom, the bees go out in the nice weather and they bring back all this food. The queen starts producing. The cavity that they live in is going to fill up and become overpopulated, so when the queen runs out of room to lay eggs, she will lay eggs in what are special areas where they're going to raise queens new queens, wow. And so when those new queens start to develop, they take the, the worker bees.

Speaker 2 30:06

They will run the queen, put her on a diet so she can thin out and fly and push her out the front, and then all the bees that can fly will go with her. You know, and then she has a hard time flying. So she'll fly as far as she can and then she'll land and they need that queen at that point, so they will come and gather around her.

Speaker 1 30:28

So the queen left someplace out there came over your house and said man, that looks like a great spot to hang out it normally is a good spot to hang anybody that wants to come over, but I do not. You know I didn't exactly invite the bees yeah, so they'll.

Speaker 2 30:45

so they all gathered around her and what they were doing was sending off scout bees. Those scout bees were looking for a new place to live and when they find a new place they'll come. They'll report back to that group, and there's usually about a hundred scout bees in a in a swarm of tens of thousands. That's amazing.

Speaker 1 31:02

Those scout bees will lead.

Speaker 2 31:04

We'll get together, decide that this is a great place to be. They will come back and lead that whole group to that new place.

Speaker 1 31:12

And they did. They eventually left. I know you took a lot away, as I mentioned earlier as well, but then the next day I think you had texted me and said are they still there? And I said, yeah, there's still a few hanging around. It looks like they're coming back. But then they got smaller and smaller and smaller.

Speaker 2 31:25

Then they were all gone then they were all gone.

Speaker 1 31:31

Yeah, so it's just amazing, amazing. So we have the uh, we've got your beef finally cold extracted honey, as I mentioned before 100 pure, 100 raw. But how long does it take to make a jar of this size? What is it?

Speaker 2 31:43

it's a good size jar I forget the number I want to say it's like 4 000, the lives of 4 000 bees, really, or something to make a so maybe 12 000.

Speaker 1 31:54

What is a lot. What is that process, though, of getting the honey? You go in, you pull out the honeycomb.

Speaker 2 32:00

I wish I brought one, the. The honeycomb in a in a man-made hive is designed such that the bees will make the honeycomb in these wooden frames.

Speaker 2 32:13

So you can take this wooden frame out and it it's got that in it, the honeycomb there, and it's just, it's perfectly in the wooden frame. And so you take your slice off. There's, there's cells this way and there's cells this way on both sides. So you slice off the wax coating on both sides and you put it in the centrifuge, spin it real fast. All the honey comes out and drains out the bottom, wow. And then you take that wax, that dry wax that is now empty.

Speaker 2 32:42

Give it back to the bees and they'll refill it see, this is just totally amazing.

Speaker 1 32:47

But it doesn't happen overnight. It takes a lot of time. How many beehives do you have? Uh, I know you took our, our tens of thousands of bees over to your place and you're kind of rehomed them yeah, I think I've got around 40, 45 hives right now yeah, the neighbors love you they always got more bees, really I totally get it.

Speaker 1 33:11

I totally get it. Well, it's interesting. Um, what are the big? I know we've talked about so much, but, uh, for anybody that's watching this, somebody that's going to watch it down the road, uh, it's always going to be up, it's posted on your skip happens. But, um, the big do's and don'ts if you see honeybees, let's, let's start from the big. What, what, what should you do first of all? No, what, what should you not do? Let's start there, well and don'ts. If you see honeybees, let's, let's start from the beginning. What, what, what should you do first of all? No, what, what should you not do?

Speaker 2 33:33

let's start there, well, you don't want to spray them that's not, I did right so it was okay where you did it, because they weren't protecting anything, I mean you just try to make me feel better what I'm about to describe is kind of scary, which is why, please do people like pesticide companies.

Speaker 2 33:53

Pest control companies will tell you to call a beekeeper. Also, they don't spray honeybees. What happens is, like I said, if, if honey spills in their beehive, there's enough hands in the beehives or feet or whatever they got to um, clean up that mess before it has a chance to get away. They will take care of that honey, they will keep it locked away and they will keep it neat and good. A bee, a beehive, is one of the cleanest places on the planet.

Speaker 1 34:19

Wow.

Speaker 2 34:20

It's amazing. And no, I just forgot where I was going.

Speaker 1 34:28

We're talking about the things that, uh, what should you not do? In other words, you shouldn't kill them like I did or where I was going. But we're talking about the things that what should you not do? In other words, you shouldn't kill them like I did or attempt to kill them. Oh yes, yes yes, let them be, and then we call a beekeeper.

Speaker 2 34:38

So if you've got bees living in your wall, and they have honeycombs set up. They're protecting that honey. If you kill the bees, there's nobody there to protect the honey anymore. Oh, so what happens is we've got robber bees. Robber bees steal the honey from other hives so they're actually called robber bees.

Speaker 2 34:56

Yes, they are, and there's actually a robbing season. There's a robbing season in late july, there's a robbing season in in uh, september. So because there's more, there's less flowers and there's more bees, and so these bees still want to get food. So they get it from wherever they can and they'll rob other hives. But if you kill a bee with poison, that will um leave that honey open for other bees to come in and steal. They're going to steal that honey. They're going to track through the poison. They're going to bring that poison back to their hive and then in and steal.

Speaker 1 35:33

They're going to steal that honey. They're going to track through the poison.

Speaker 2 35:35

They're going to bring that poison back to their hive and then now that hive is going to get sick, yeah, and potentially that secondary hive, that secondary poisoning might be in my backyard. Right, you know yeah, and then I'm going to take that honey out and feed it to my kids. Not good, so we do not want to poison honeybees, all right.

Speaker 1 35:49

So don't do what I did. Don't do what I did at all. What should you do? You know, don't? I was going to say call the beekeeper and the beekeeper, hopefully, will come over and get the bees and take them out of your hands and put them in a safe location. So, very important, it's all about honeybees and not to be confused with every other bee that we talked about, or wasp, or you know. I just I think there's so many people that do not know I'd had no clue to me. A bee was a bee. Yeah, there's some yellow jackets and you know some really ugly looking wasp and this and there, but it's still. It's like okay, I had no idea, I just thought it was a whole mess of bees and we got to get them out of here or we're gonna have a lot of trouble and they all got stingers and they are ready great good thing I didn't.

Speaker 1 36:36

Well, I think I pissed them off, but still, um, you know some great information. I love this bill. Uh, bill kaufman. Uh, he's the beekeeper. He's my new beekeeper. If I have a problem, I'm gonna be calling, calling him and you can check him out too. He's got his own website and you got the classes going. Why don't you tell everybody about that? Well, I don't really have any classes right now out right now, but you do, you have done that I do beekeeper experiences really so explain what's a beekeeper experience I let people come over you

Speaker 2 37:05

know, and depending on how much of experience they want they just want to walk around while I'm working on the hives and they catch me out there they can just come on in and check it out. If they really want a true experience, it will charge for them by the hour, you know. As long as they want, and I will dress them up in beekeeper suit, I will put bees in their hands, we will open hives and taste honey and do the whole thing Raw honey, raw honey, this is raw honey yeah, and we can bring a spoon out to the beehives and take it directly from the hive.

Speaker 2 37:36

Now you, you eat an apple or a peach that's been ripe on the tree and warmed by the sun. Oh my god, how much better it is than you do when you get the same thing from the grocery store. It's just amazing. Same thing with the honey. You get it off the grocery store shelf versus getting warm right there, right out of the hive it is just, it is the most it's.

Speaker 1 37:58

It's divine let me ask. Somebody asked me this question a while ago and they said can bees be trained to attack individuals asking for a friend? Is there? Obviously you say they know you, but if I walked up they would not know me and they probably would they be more aggressive towards me than they would you.

Speaker 2 38:22

They would, because you'd be more nervous than me. That's right, as you talked before they could feel it. Probably Mike's just Right the anxiety, the anxiety coming out just Right, the anxiety, the anxiety Coming out on your breath, it happens.

Speaker 1 38:34

And what does it when you have a handful of bees? What does it feel like? Does it tickle?

Speaker 2 38:39

It does Almost like electric.

Speaker 1 38:41

Really.

Speaker 2 38:41

Because they hold on tight and they'll actually use. They've got mandibles like this. You might have seen in like honey I shrunk.

Speaker 1 38:48

The kids remember that yes, yes, yes, they have these big things in the front.

Speaker 2 38:52

They do this. Yes, most, most insects have those things. They're mandibles and they will they really hard and they hang on with those things that's when you get nervous.

Speaker 1 39:01

So when they're hanging out before they sting you. I've actually had like a bee like hang on. It's like oh, and you start panicking. Then you piss him off and he stings. If you were just to let him go, you'd probably just fly off.

Speaker 2 39:18

The first rule when you come into my apiary is you don't swat. It's hard to do. It took me years not to want to just get away.

Speaker 1 39:31

How many times have you been stung?

Speaker 2 39:33

I have no idea.

Speaker 1 39:35

Thousands upon thousands.

Speaker 2 39:37

Probably this year, probably this year, probably pushing 1,000 already.

Speaker 1 39:42

Well, it's because they're more active and there's a lot more going on.

Speaker 2 39:45

That and because I'm taking them out of people's houses, I'm ripping apart their house and hurting their you know, yeah, you're. They have a reason to sting me.

Speaker 1 39:54

You said I mean you were a contractor, so you've got some knowledge of going into the walls and being able to do all that and you can probably do the whole job, get rid of bees and rebuild the wall right, it's better than when I I leave, better than uh, when showed up. I love it. So you have a website. What's your website?

Speaker 2 40:13

It'sallbettercom, wwwit'sallbettercom, it's all better.

Speaker 1 40:18

Nothing, I mean it'sallbettercom. I love it. And then we're going to find out about Bill Kaufman on there, about all your honey. Probably a little bit, yeah, probably.

Speaker 2 40:31

Just like when you read this label.

Speaker 1 40:32

I'm like man, I haven't I made that label, but I don't remember it. I haven't looked at it even though it's in my hand every day yeah, I haven't updated my website in forever too.

Speaker 2 40:40

Just well, I don't know if you really have to.

Speaker 1 40:42

When you think about it, it's always going to be. You know, with bees it's kind of more or less the same routine all along. Once you get to know it and know what you're doing, and unless there's something drastic going on in the world that's going to change that, then I don't know why you would have to update it. But at least your information is on there, unless you move or something and people don't know how to get a hold of you. But they can get a hold of your phone numbers on there and all that. And if they've got a problem with bees they can call you. You're going to return the call, you're going to find out what the situation is and you know, like my situation, it just you know. I'm glad we got to know each other and, uh, just, I learned a lot and it's really kind of ignited my um, I want to know more about these bees.

Speaker 2 41:23

This is fascinating yeah, so I think my address is on there too, so you can find me. You can go to the front porch, knock on my door.

Speaker 1 41:32

Well, you don't want them knocking. They'll come knocking on your door at 3 in the morning. You got any more honey.

Speaker 1 41:37

Bill Kaufman it's great to see you, my friend, and thanks for coming by. Great, great, great information about honeybees and who would have thought that Skip Happens would be going down the road of honeybees? Normally I have country stars on here. We have a lot of country artists, I have, well, a lot of people that make a difference in the community and now, of course, beekeeping, and you being a beekeeper. It's just so interesting, so interesting. I loved every minute of this. Thank you for coming over. We had a lot of fun today.

Speaker 2 42:08

Yeah, it was great yeah, thank you.

Speaker 1 42:12

Have a good night everybody. Bill, you gotta wave, I know you don't all right yeah, I forget the camera's over. Yeah, the camera's, one of these, one of these here. All right, good night everybody. Thanks for watching. Remember bill kaufman the beekeeper. Pretty cool, he's the best. He'll take care of it. See ya, bye.