Why Smoking Soothes the Stressed-Out Bee Hive by Meredith Swett Walker

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art, bee smoker, beekeeping equipment, defensive behavior, honey bee behavior

Smoke has long been the beekeeper’s secret weapon to avoid getting stung. Ancient Egyptian art dating back over 2,500 years ago depicts beekeepers blowing smoke into hives. But despite the age of this practice and human’s enduring fascination with honey bees, we still haven’t figured out exactly why smoke soothes bees.

Meredith Swett Walker

In research published in August in the Journal of Insect Science, Stephanie Gage, Ph.D., with colleagues at the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Carl Hayden Bee Research Center and at BetaTec Hop Products, presents a scientific evaluation of smoke on the honey bee’s defensive behavior. The researchers focused on the “sting extension response” and evaluated the effects of two different types of smoke: burlap, which is commonly used by beekeepers, and spent hop pellets—a recycled material made from hop flowers after they have been used to make beer.

Because a honey bee (Apis mellifera) hive contains valuable treasure—sweet honey and protein packed larvae—bees must mount a coordinated defense to protect the hive from the many predators that would love to plunder it. A small number of worker bees serve as “guard bees” that patrol the entrance to the hive and watch for intruders. If a threat is detected, the guard will raise her abdomen and extend her stinger into the air. This behavior is called the sting extension response, and it releases an alarm pheromone, or a chemical signal, to the rest of the colony, mobilizing other workers to prepare to attack an intruder. If the intruder provokes the bees further, stinging commences.

Read the full article here on Entomology Today Why Smoking Soothes the Stressed-Out Bee Hive — Entomology Today

My Favorite Smoker Fuel by Local Honey from Happy Bees

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bee smoker, burlap

Mine too! ~ SassafrasBeeFarm

As a beekeeper you have many choices when it comes to smoker fuel. Some of it is free and widely available and some of it can be ordered with several bee supply houses. During my first two years of beekeeping I was testing several fuel sources. The free fuel I found around the house ranged from dry grass to pine needles. I also purchased some smoker fuel from Brushy Mountain and picked up some small burlap bags at the local farmer store. Good news is – everything works! However, my favorite by far is burlap.

Read full article here: My Favorite Smoker Fuel — Local Honey from Happy Bees

Smoking The Bees

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bee smoker, beekeeping, beekeeping equipment

Source: World of Beekeeping – Smoking the Bees

April 6, 2012

When I first started beekeeping I never smoked my hives.  Somehow, somewhere I had learned that it was terribly difficult to smoke your hives correctly without burning the bees or some other weird idea.  I had some strange fear that it would be a little like operating a hand held dragon.  I’m not sure how that got into my head but it caused a ton of issues for me and thankfully I eventually started smoking my hives when doing inspections.

While you certainly can operate without smoking your hives it means putting new boxes, lids and other items onto the hives very slowly, pushing each little bee out of the way.  If you don’t you’ll squish a lot of bees and while unlikely, one of those could be the queen.

Eventually I fired up the smoker and realized that it really isn’t difficult to use.  The trick?  Let the fire die down before you start pumping the bellows.  You don’t want burning dragon fire coming from your smoker but it’s easy enough to avoid.

That’s really all there is to it.  If you’re at all paranoid you can simply blow the smoke over your bare hand… if it only feels mildly warm to you it’ll be just fine.

But why do we smoke our bees?

There are several thoughts as to what a smoker causes bees to do.  First many think that bees respond to smoke as they would a forest fire, gorging themselves on honey so they can fly off to a new home should they need to flee the hive.  Second the smoke is said to mask the warning pheromones given off by guard bees, keeping the troops from hearing the battle cry.

So how do you best use the smoke in your hives?

Well first you can use smoke to push bees where you want them to go.  When I first used the smoker this was really helpful when it came to adding new boxes to the tops of my hives… pushing them away from the top of the box meant very few if any were squished when I put on the new box.  The same idea holds true when it comes time to put on the inner cover.

But don’t smoke them too much!

Pushing them around a bit is fine but if you use too much smoke it won’t work for you.  Why?  Because if they are surrounded by smoke they won’t be able to “move away” from the smoke but will instead simply walk around disoriented.  Not what you were hoping for when you lit up the smoker!  So use smoke sparingly and both you and the bees will be happy.

Final thought.  If your beehives aren’t at your home (or even if they are) you have a burning thing you need to transport and/or store.  Make sure the fire is out before you put it anywhere and as an extra added precaution get a metal box with a lid if you need to put your smoker in your car.  We don’t want to see you on the news with a smoking car!

Source: World of Beekeeping – Smoking the Bees

Beekeeping Vocabulary – “S” is for…

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bee smoker, beekeeping, equipment, honey bees

Photo by Robert Engelhardt, CC BY-SA 3.0

Today’s beekeeping vocabulary word is, “Smoker.”

From Wikipedia:

A bee smoker (usually called simply a smoker) is a device used in beekeeping to calm honey bees. It is designed to generate smoke from the smouldering of various fuels, hence the name.

The fact that smoke calms bees has been known since ancient times; however, the scientific explanation was unknown until the 20th century and is still not fully understood. Smoke masks alarm pheromones^[1] which include various chemicals, e.g., isopentyl acetate^[2] that are released by guard bees or bees that are injured during a beekeeper’s inspection. The smoke creates an opportunity for the beekeeper to open the beehive and work while the colony’s defensive response is interrupted. In addition, smoke initiates a feeding response in anticipation of possible hive abandonment due to fire.^[3][4][5] When a bee consumes honey the bee’s abdomen distends, making it difficult to make the necessary flexes to sting.^{[citation needed]} (The latter has always been the primary explanation of the smoker’s effect, since this behavior of bees is easily observable.)

Smoke is of limited use with a swarm, partly because swarms have no honey stores to feed on. It is usually not needed, either, since swarms tend to be less defensive as they have no home to defend, and a fresh swarm will have fed well at the hive it left behind.

Source and to read more: Wikipedia