Bee Talks with Bill Hesbach •  May 2025

00:00:00 - Welcome & honoring Peter Loring Borst (continued at 28:27) 00:01:50 - New 2025 Bloom Tracker Observations for Connecticut Beekeepers (link in blog post below) 00:08:30 - Bloom Calendar 00:13:40 - Installing New Package with Queen Substitution, Virgin Queens and Requeening (continued at 48:40) 00:16:48 - Are this year’s packages really defensive than usual? What can I do with a defensive colony? 00:20:10 - What is the status of the Spotted Lanternfly? Do we still need to be reporting sightings? (continued at 48:44) 00:22:18 - I did a Demaree split and now have capped queen cells at the bottom of the frames in the top box. Does that mean that the bees in the bottom box are going to swarm…or are the bees in the top box going to swarm? 00:26:02 - What are intercaste queens? 00:29:08 - Each year my colonies fill the lower brood boxes with nectar, ignoring the honey supers and regardless of my use of queen excluders. What am I doing wrong? 00:34:16 - Discussion about the current Bee Die-off and what is causing it 00:36:22 - How can my bees swarm without an adult queen in the top box? Did I miss the swarm? Could my queen excluder have failed? 00:42:38 - Can you take the frame of queen capped cell and some capped brood into a nuc box to start another hive? 00:48:40 - Discussion of swarm cells, swarming, and various ways to watch for signs of swarming 00:59:10 - Tips on feeding your bees right now More about the episode at https://www.ctbees.org/bee-talks-recap-may-2025 __________________________________________________________ Connecticut Beekeepers Association promotes and supports beekeepers and their local organizations. Our goal is to provide a common forum for the beekeepers of Connecticut to come together to share information and ideas. #beekeeping #bees #beelife #beetalks MORE BEEKEEPING INFO - https://www.ctbees.org #beekeeping #bees #beelife MORE BEEKEEPING INFO - https://www.ctbees.org