Brushing away the bees for inspection.
By far, the bee brush is one of the most useful pieces of equipment a beekeeper can carry in their toolbox next to the hive tool. It’s sole purpose is to gently brush the bees off of the comb to better aid inspection or to remove frames for harvesting honey. When purchasing your equipment this is the one case where I recommend buying actual beekeeping equipment and not cheaping out with a horse brush or your Goody brush from high school when you had hair. The horse brush or hair brush’s bristle is much too stiff for the delicate work of sweeping away bees. To you the bristle may seem soft but to a bee it is like having a wired brush passed over your body at 100 mph.
A surgeon must have good implements and so should you. The bristle of your average bee brush is so soft it should feel like a silk leisure suit over your entire body. It will conform more to the shape of what you are sweeping providing less resistant or friction on the bodies of our little friends. This will result in calmer bees as their limbs and heads will not be ripped from their body.
The brush is good for inspections but when it comes to the honey harvest I like to move with a little more speed. The quicker I can get them off the comb the quicker I can let them settle back into their routine. So in addition to the bee brush I also carry the Stihl model BG “Big Gun” 55 Handheld Blower in my car.
The BG 55 At Work.
I am sure my old mentor would cringe if she saw me use this thing on the honeybees as it just seems to run counter to the bucolic quietness of harvesting honey on a late summer day. True. However I firmly believe I kill less honeybees in the process. Gale force winds may rip the roof off of your house but when directed right through the heart of a hive of bees it makes quick work of the evacuation process. As an added benefit usually no bees die in the process. They are simply blown out.
When I use a brush I have to lift each frame out. Every-time I do this there is a real chance that a few bees will be crushed in the process. The BG 55 eliminates this problem. After a good 30 second blow, I inspect the super. If I hear a few more bees, I BG 55 the hive for a few more seconds. I rarely have to do this more than twice.
The BG55 is not for everyone but consider it as an option.
P.S. Before you pull out the BG make sure you know where your queen is. I use a queen excluder and also verify there are no eggs being laid in the super I am extracting from.
