Michael Mahar: Rethinking Frames, Varroa, and Bourbon Honey (396)

WEBVTT

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Hey there, I'm Kelsey Chapin.

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And I'm Derek Pedaway.

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We're here at the Tri-State Meeting in Fargo, North Dakota.

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We're hobby beekeepers and welcome to Beekeeping Today podcast.

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Wonderful.

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I like it.

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It's like I've heard it a million times.

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Welcome to Beekeeping Today Podcast presented by Betterbee, your source for beekeeping news, information, and entertainment.

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I'm Jeff Ott.

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And I'm Becky Masterman.

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Today's episode is brought to you by the Bee Nutrition.

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com and give your bees the nutrition.

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Hey, a quick shout out to Betterbee and all of our sponsors whose support allows us to bring you this podcast each week without resorting to a fee-based subscription.

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Be sure to check out

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All of our content on the website.

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beekeepingtoday. com.

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Thank you, Kelsey and Derek, for that wonderful opening

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from the Minnesota State Beekeepers Meeting and the Tri-State Conference in Fargo.

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It was in Fargo, yes.

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Yes, I just I just saw you last week.

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That's pretty exciting.

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I loved meeting them so much and especially talking to Derek about how he's got I think he has eleven hives now, but he's he's on to like

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twelve hundred and I bet he's gonna get there in a short period of time.

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And you know what, you know, he said he's heard that opening a thousand times.

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That means he's listened to the show.

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Each episode two or three times.

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That is fantastic.

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No wonder he's such a good beekeeper.

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But it was fun to meet him because he's he's learning and he's and he said he uses the podcast.

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He uses the podcast to learn.

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So

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That just I kind of made my day out of it.

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It did.

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It is very fun and to hear that we're helpful and as a resource for other beekeepers.

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That's great.

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Speaking of resources for beekeepers, we need a couple questions.

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I have a slew of these Haiva IQ tools that need new homes.

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I bet somebody has a question.

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They should be pulling honey now, thinking about getting their bees ready for winter?

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I mean it's August.

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We're thinking about winter bees already and or you should be.

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There's got to be questions out there about that.

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So if you have a question for us, please let us know.

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If we use it on the air, we will send you a hive IQ stainless steel tool.

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It has great beekeeping today podcast logo on it and the hive IQ logo.

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It's a great tool

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Excellent.

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Excellent.

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I look forward to those questions, and then you and I can kind of figure out how to answer them.

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Today's guest is Michael Mahar of 21st Beeee.

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I met him first at North American Honey Bee Expo.

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You met him earlier?

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I did.

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I I met him when I spoke to the Arkansas Beekeepers Association meeting at the

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the meeting and he was he was the only vendor there, which was fantastic, and he was selling his product and and I I first met him there and so but then I followed up when I met him again at NAHBE and boy he's he's

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just a smart beekeeper with uh a really interesting background and management that's different than mine and I think different than yours, but I love to hear his reasoning and science behind

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his strategy.

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So Yeah, and we'll get into this with Michael, I hope, but he has a treatment-free approach that I don't subscribe to, but

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He has a very rational and methodical approach to it, which I think as long as someone approaches it from that angle, I think it's a good thing.

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We're kind of doing a big hint here.

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But I think A tease, is it a tease?

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Yeah, let me I'm just gonna I'm just gonna say it.

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But he he manages Varroa differently in his colonies.

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and and he has different theories.

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And and I think that that's it's such a a hot topic and and we're all quick to judge.

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But I think depending upon where you keep your bees

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your management strategy is going to be different.

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And so I I think that it is something that

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we should all talk about because we can learn from each other and what what Michael does may not work where I am, but what I have to do to keep my bees super healthy, it it might be more than what he needs to do where he is.

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So

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As with all things, beekeeping it depends and location, purpose, and approach.

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And let's be nice to each other.

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Absolutely.

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Kindness is is important.

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We'll talk to Michael right after these words from our sponsor.

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Hey everybody, welcome back, sitting around this great big virtual beekeeping today podcast interview table.

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We have Michael Mahar down in Arkansas and Becky in Minnesota and I'm out in Washington State.

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Hey Michael, welcome to Beekeeping Today.

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Hey, thanks for having me.

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Michael, I've been looking forward to this conversation because after we had a

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a smaller chat at the expo.

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I just knew that our guests would love to hear all your secrets.

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Hopefully it's not too boring or I'm not too boring.

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No, this is great.

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Thank you so much for being here.

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Yeah, and you want to qualify that you're beekeeping secrets, right?

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Oh no, I think we should just keep going.

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No, I and and I think I met your dad too and and he confirmed.

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I said, wow, that was an impressive conversation I had with Michael.

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And he's like, he's a great guy.

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He really is.

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Yeah, he he lies.

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He puts up

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Yeah, that's great to have that validation.

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Well, Michael, for our audience and for those who don't know who you are or who 21st Beeee is, why don't you give us a little bit about your background, how you got started with Bs?

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And um how you got started with 21st Bee?

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I've been beekeeping about 14 years now.

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So I'm I'm kind of the audible beekeeper in the area.

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I I tend to do everything differently from everybody else.

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So don't hate me, but first couple years I was the standard, did everything the standard way, Italian bees, just what they teach you in the clubs.

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The last twelve years I've been breeding Moan Russians and I'm a completely small cell treatment-free beekeeper.

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Oh my gosh, we're gonna have to end this interview.

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I'm sorry, Michael.

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I'm kidding.

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So I so I'm went to school for zoology, so I've always liked

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animals and insects and bugs and things.

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And I'm a bee I used to be a big gardener, s not the time for it any more.

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But I just basically I got tired of getting up every morning and hand pollinating my squash and zucchini plants with a little paintbrush before I go to work in the dark.

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Because I basically had like no bees around me anywhere and went to a um there used to be these things called book and C D stores.

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I went in like a box of TDs and up on a courtboard there's a poster from a local club for a class and went to it and just kinda snowballed from there.

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Boyat brought back Tower Records and all the other uh record and city vinyl Hars was called the Hastings book and C D's

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Now I'm that old, so pretty sure we beat you.

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Yeah, well let's not talk about age.

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Well that sounds really interesting.

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You went all the way from hand pollinating squash and pumpkin you said to raising your own honey bees.

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Do you maintain colonies today?

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So I used to run multiple out yards just, you know, within ten or fifteen minutes worth of driving and friends like farms and places.

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With work here, we're so busy.

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This year I brought everything home so it's nice and convenient in my backyard.

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Clouded my garden under and turned it into a full apiary.

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So right now I think I have

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25, 27.

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I usually I don't go past 30.

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It's just that's kind of the max for my area.

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But I don't twenty to thirty on average, depending on the year and how busy I am and how much I neglect and going outside and looking at them.

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Twenty thirty, it's not so much the area, it's available hours in a day, I think.

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You have to take off work specifically to go home and work to be so there's never actually a day off.

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Plus you're traveling too to get to conferences.

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Yeah, this time of year, so the the 21st bee is part of my family's bigger business, it's more of a product line.

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So this is busy season for the rest of our business.

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And now it's time to go to conferences, so it it's fun juggling everything.

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Let's talk about 21st bee and what you do there.

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Kind of some backstory.

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21st Bee is a product line, kind of a product division.

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of my family's overall business in Mahar Manufacturing.

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We've been manufacturing since 88.

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Parents started it.

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We primarily do like school furniture and some pet stuff.

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So we do everything in-house from injection molding, welding, cutting, powder coating, just the whole everything in-house.

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You know, went off to school for zoology, came back.

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had the itch to play with animals and I accidentally got into bees and you know I've always been somebody who likes to tinker and make things.

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And you know, at home you're making your own things with your saws and your own boxes and frames and that kind of evolved into I hate building frames and I hate fixing frames and wiring frames.

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So I looked into plastic frames and what was available, I just didn't like them for different reasons.

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And I was like, well, hey, you know, we've been molding for all these years.

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I wonder if I could

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figure out how to make a better mousetrap basically.

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And I kind of went down that road experimenting and 3D printing my own samples for years.

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And then I finally came up with this and

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convinced dad that I knew enough about what I was doing to drop a bunch of money into all the equipment, molds.

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And uh so yeah, so now along with doing all the other stuff here, I'm also the only beekeeper who gets

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Every email, every question, every bee related, everything along with everything else.

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Because if you sell bee equipment, you also sell

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Or no, you give away bee knowledge for free, right?

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Yeah, lots of people like to try call and want to talk, and I just can't talk during the day.

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I'm too busy.

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So I I go home at night and answer lots of emails.

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Email me, I'll answer you for sure.

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It just may take a day or two.

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You just asked thousands of beekeepers to email you, Michael.

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What are you doing?

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Well, after they hear me talk for a while, I don't I don't think I'll have to worry about it.

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I don't know.

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I I I know I I really enjoyed your philosophy, so You manufacture frames, plastic frames.

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My version of the better mousetrap was

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I wanted to build a frame that I would never have to fix and assemble.

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And um I went down the rabbit hole of plastics and

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I taught myself CAD, did all my own CAD designs, finally found a design I liked, got all the patent work done.

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Um we do all the injection molding.

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So basically our frame designs are basically made for me what I would prefer in a frame.

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And then I hope enough other people will like it and see the value to eventually pay off all the bills.

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I've I've made process.

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So they're not designed to be um to run the fastest and be the the least expensive they can be.

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They're built for what I want, which is I never ever want to have to replace them for the rest of my life.

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And I just kinda went down that rabbit hole.

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When you were designing your frames and you're comparing them to wooden frames and available plastic frames

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What were the specific design differences that you wanted to incorporate?

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What made a perfect frame for you?

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So first I wanted to mimic what bees would naturally do in my beeswax foundation.

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in terms of the way they like to chew openings and make little tunnels and passageways through the centers.

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So that's how I kind of got into making my openings and my and my designs.

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I'm in Arkansas, so hive beetle country still.

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Nasty, nasty for that.

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So no, I I got rid of all the openings to put that hive beetles can get into.

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I didn't want to have to worry about tabs breaking off, so I kind of reinforced my design.

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And with plastic and even plastic foundations, if you get those hot, they'll warp and twist and bow on you.

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I like myself when I clean frames, I like to take a turkey fryer or boiling water and just dunk them.

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So I design I design my frame where I can just dunk and clean them.

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Solar melter, steam, power wash, you're not going to knock them out of Trove.

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They're going to stay flat.

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You can abuse them.

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I've left them outside in boxes in full sun for six months at a time.

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Pick 'em up or true.

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Intentionally?

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Or is that just by mistake?

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No, just intentionally.

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I've got a I've got a short on my page where I left some comb frames out all through the winter where they got ice and snowed on and I picked 'em up sort of beating on the cinder block with 'em

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They're good, just as good and ready to go.

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So I'm just like I say, they're built for me.

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I don't want to have to baby 'em and touch 'em and fix 'em.

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I just want to be able to slam them around.

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I've had customers tell me they've driven over 'em with their tractor tires by accident.

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Pick 'em up, shake 'em off, throw 'em back in the hive.

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Everything we build, we we kinda over engineer it with the idea that we don't ever want there to be a problem down the road.

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I mean, if you're gonna pay good money for something

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We want it to last as long as it can possibly last.

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No, I would imagine they stand up well to all the mechanized de boxers and uncappers and the whole production line of a big honey house

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Yeah, so that's everything with plastic frames.

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A lot of them, the end bars tend to be a little bit more narrow.

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I modeled mine after a standard wood frame.

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So externally the dimensions are the exact same thing as a wood frame.

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So you can use every piece of equipment you already own.

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You can intermix them with wood and get all the exact same bee space.

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You don't

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You don't have to buy or do anything special.

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Just run them like any all over frame.

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They'll fit in every extractor out there.

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You can really just swap them out over time and not have to do anything to them.

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It's not just the durability though, because you also added different cell sizes to your your inventory.

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Can you talk about that process a little bit?

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Yeah, so I was trying to make

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You know, it's beekeeping.

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We all do everything differently, depending on region and size and style.

00:15:21.180 --> 00:15:27.899
So I wanted to make something flexible enough that no matter how you keep bees, we would have something that would work for you.

00:15:27.839 --> 00:15:35.440
And me being a small cell person, I've always had to hunt down small cell wax foundation because hardly anybody made it.

00:15:35.440 --> 00:15:37.279
There's no plastic version of it really.

00:15:37.560 --> 00:15:39.400
So I did that for those people.

00:15:39.400 --> 00:15:40.840
You know, I did your standard 5.

00:15:40.920 --> 00:15:42.520
4 for the just the everyday beekeeper.

00:15:42.520 --> 00:15:44.680
Just that's what everybody mostly uses.

00:15:44.680 --> 00:15:45.720
And drones.

00:15:45.959 --> 00:15:53.720
And being such an important part of your apiary, you know, incorporating that in, I had to make sure and do a drone, and I do a larger drone

00:15:53.839 --> 00:15:58.240
Because I want the bees and mites to be able to see that cell volume difference.

00:15:58.240 --> 00:15:59.600
So my drones are 6.

00:15:59.600 --> 00:16:00.000
6.

00:16:00.000 --> 00:16:01.680
I mean they're really on the big end.

00:16:01.680 --> 00:16:06.000
And then you know, there's like I've always done little bits of foundation I must be keeping.

00:16:06.259 --> 00:16:10.180
So I have a medium frame that's foundationless slash cut comb.

00:16:10.180 --> 00:16:12.180
And most people use it for cut comb.

00:16:12.180 --> 00:16:13.699
There's nothing to insert into it.

00:16:13.699 --> 00:16:14.899
It's just the frame.

00:16:14.899 --> 00:16:17.860
The wedges, the starter wedges are already built into it.

00:16:18.040 --> 00:16:23.160
So it's as simple as drop it in because everything we send out comes pre-waxed with triple coat.

00:16:23.160 --> 00:16:29.399
You can use it all season, dunk in your boiling water to clean it, and the next year rewax it and pop it back in indefinitely.

00:16:30.040 --> 00:16:32.120
No pieces to lose, nothing to break.

00:16:32.120 --> 00:16:33.640
Just nice and simple.

00:16:33.640 --> 00:16:36.279
Plus you can clean it in the turkey fryer.

00:16:36.279 --> 00:16:37.480
Is that true?

00:16:37.480 --> 00:16:38.040
Yes.

00:16:39.060 --> 00:16:39.780
With water.

00:16:39.780 --> 00:16:40.740
With water.

00:16:40.740 --> 00:16:44.740
Get the water hot enough to melt wax and just dunk it and hold it for a few seconds.

00:16:44.740 --> 00:16:47.620
If you need to drop in and leave it for a minute, it's not gonna hurt it.

00:16:47.860 --> 00:16:51.540
I wouldn't leave it all day long, but yeah, you can just go to town.

00:16:51.540 --> 00:16:56.660
If you have some uh like if you get really pollen bound, you know how pollen's hard to get out sometimes.

00:16:56.759 --> 00:17:04.360
You can dunk them in that boiling water to soften it up and come back for a bristle brush or a sprayer and just blast it right out and it's good to go.

00:17:04.600 --> 00:17:07.319
Slap some wax on it and use it again.

00:17:07.419 --> 00:17:18.140
Looking at your frame at the show, one of the big draws for me was that you already and you mentioned this, you already incorporate the communication holes in the foundation or in the frame itself.

00:17:18.140 --> 00:17:22.059
And that's something that I've always thought was really important to have.

00:17:21.460 --> 00:17:31.060
I mean I've been known to take a 38 inch drill bit and drill through frames and foundation just to make sure that those accesses were available for to the bees.

00:17:31.060 --> 00:17:33.940
I really like the fact that your frames incorporated.

00:17:33.700 --> 00:17:42.980
Yeah, I mean, so you know, I keep Russian bees, so watching mine over all the years, it's amazing how much bees will use those tunnels if you just really pay attention to your frame.

00:17:42.960 --> 00:17:46.480
Like in our in the brood frames, those never get filled in.

00:17:46.480 --> 00:17:51.600
They're constantly going in and out of 'em, which it makes it more fun if you're not very good at spotting queens.

00:17:51.840 --> 00:17:55.039
'Cause that's an extra few spaces for a dip and and dive.

00:17:55.360 --> 00:18:01.200
So you know, especially if you're not marking them too, you you have to get a little better at looking at 'em, but

00:18:01.260 --> 00:18:05.419
You know, it gives them a place to be able to move pheromones and air through the hive.

00:18:05.419 --> 00:18:12.299
And if you're somebody that likes to run um Langstroths, they can move left to right and right through the box without ever having to go around.

00:18:12.299 --> 00:18:14.780
So it makes it a lot more efficient for the way they move

00:18:14.660 --> 00:18:18.820
That's really good and I had put mine in the corners, the lower corners.

00:18:18.820 --> 00:18:25.300
I had never considered putting them in the in the middle of the frame like you have on your frames that I saw on the website.

00:18:25.300 --> 00:18:26.500
Yeah, on the on the deeps.

00:18:26.500 --> 00:18:29.060
So like the mediums we have one in the center just because

00:18:29.519 --> 00:18:37.360
the area to reach to go around the frame isn't as far, but on a deep, we've got the two s the two holes that are offset at about a third and a third.

00:18:37.640 --> 00:18:42.280
So ideally, like in the wintertime, you get a little extra cold snap.

00:18:42.280 --> 00:18:51.080
In theory, that cluster is never more than a third of the way from somewhere to be able to get to the other side without having to go around, whether it's a center hole or a corner.

00:18:51.220 --> 00:18:56.980
So that my thinking was they could stay in cluster and conserve heat as they kind of slowly melt through the hole.

00:18:56.980 --> 00:19:02.820
And as they do that, they're also heating up the plastic under them instead of having to completely break and go around a top or an in-bar.

00:19:03.140 --> 00:19:04.260
Just to try to help us.

00:19:04.260 --> 00:19:08.660
One that might be a little on the small side to just get through that extra little cold snap.

00:19:08.660 --> 00:19:13.860
And it's not going to guarantee they make it, but it sure, you know, gives them a little little extra help there.

00:19:13.740 --> 00:19:16.220
Michael, do you ever see them filling that hole up?

00:19:16.220 --> 00:19:18.620
The times that'll happen, it's more in the supers.

00:19:18.620 --> 00:19:22.380
On the initial draw when they're just laying down wax heavily and fast.

00:19:22.380 --> 00:19:24.220
Sometimes they'll go over it.

00:19:24.220 --> 00:19:25.740
And generally it's when

00:19:26.500 --> 00:19:29.860
You it's time to add another super and you don't get out there in time.

00:19:29.860 --> 00:19:32.260
And then they're looking for every maximum space.

00:19:32.260 --> 00:19:35.539
So what I do is I keep a little mini um hive tool in my sleeve.

00:19:35.539 --> 00:19:35.780
It

00:19:36.060 --> 00:19:39.020
And if I find one, I just poke the center out and kinda ream it.

00:19:39.020 --> 00:19:41.820
And after I do that once, generally they leave it alone.

00:19:41.820 --> 00:19:48.460
But you will come across the hive every now and then that no matter what you do, and after I do that two or three times and they refill it, I just

00:19:48.440 --> 00:19:50.360
That's how they want it and I just let it go.

00:19:50.360 --> 00:19:55.159
So you've got the usually honey frames on the edge and and then pollen and honey.

00:19:55.159 --> 00:19:56.120
They're leaving those open.

00:19:56.360 --> 00:20:00.600
They're moving the I guess they're using them as little passageways to go end to end.

00:20:00.440 --> 00:20:07.720
Um even on the the outer two most frames that are just honey, you know, by the end of summer, most of the time those are left open even in the brood chambers.

00:20:07.720 --> 00:20:09.320
Oh, that's super interesting.

00:20:09.179 --> 00:20:11.500
Or at least um it might it might be as anyway.

00:20:11.500 --> 00:20:18.700
But but still that's th you've got a lot of a lot of data just because you've been using your frames for a while now.

00:20:18.700 --> 00:20:21.020
And so yeah, that's interesting.

00:20:21.020 --> 00:20:23.020
I want you to talk a little bit about

00:20:23.519 --> 00:20:26.159
cell size and varroa.

00:20:26.159 --> 00:20:31.600
I first met you in Arkansas when I was talking at the bee meeting there and

00:20:31.960 --> 00:20:39.640
And then the second time I met you I had to apologize because the first time there was a panel discussion and

00:20:40.040 --> 00:20:44.280
There were three of us, I think, on the panel and somebody asked about cell size.

00:20:44.280 --> 00:20:52.520
I quoted and and we all agreed that the data generally don't support that cell size is helpful for Varroa

00:20:53.160 --> 00:20:59.400
But then when I went to write an article for bee culture, I apologize for this really long introduction, but it there's an apology in there.

00:20:59.400 --> 00:21:07.080
But when I when I when I went to write an article about bee culture, I looked and there was some newer research that was was more of

00:21:07.540 --> 00:21:08.260
You know what?

00:21:08.260 --> 00:21:09.780
We've actually found both.

00:21:09.780 --> 00:21:11.460
We've found that it doesn't make a difference.

00:21:11.460 --> 00:21:13.940
We found over here that it it might make a difference.

00:21:13.940 --> 00:21:19.700
And so it's not as black and white as I think we gave everybody the impression that it was

00:21:20.060 --> 00:21:27.340
And then I I proceeded to have a lovely conversation with you after I apologized for for stating that uh the data

00:21:27.720 --> 00:21:30.680
just don't support it because I think some some data do.

00:21:30.680 --> 00:21:33.800
And I think you and I talked about how it it might just depend.

00:21:33.800 --> 00:21:35.000
But with that

00:21:35.160 --> 00:21:36.520
Apology and question.

00:21:36.520 --> 00:21:43.320
Could you talk a little bit about your understanding of the biology and why you use it and your recommendations?

00:21:43.400 --> 00:21:45.880
So there's not a lot of research out

00:21:46.419 --> 00:21:54.820
good research, you know, and like I say, I'm from a science background, so I like my research papers and my data to a point it really varies.

00:21:54.820 --> 00:21:58.020
And it's hard to t it's a long conversation to really get into.

00:21:58.020 --> 00:22:00.020
I mean you can get into the weeds on it

00:21:59.960 --> 00:22:04.600
But basically the gist of it is I don't like the way a lot of studies are done.

00:22:04.600 --> 00:22:07.720
Just there's so many variables the control for, it's really hard.

00:22:07.720 --> 00:22:09.160
A lot of the ones you see, like

00:22:09.380 --> 00:22:15.220
For instance, you know, I'm a treatment-free person that uses small cell and I use it for that purpose.

00:22:15.220 --> 00:22:20.020
But I can't you can't just drop small cell into a hive and it fix everything.

00:22:20.000 --> 00:22:22.880
It's part of an overall system and it takes time.

00:22:22.880 --> 00:22:24.560
It's a long process.

00:22:24.560 --> 00:22:31.760
And if you're somebody whose entire business pays the bills by making honey, that might not be something that you can afford to do.

00:22:32.080 --> 00:22:34.880
It's all up to your situation.

00:22:34.260 --> 00:22:39.940
Like I say, I don't treat, but anybody that needs to for their situation, you do what you need to do for your bees.

00:22:39.940 --> 00:22:41.220
That's, you know.

00:22:41.220 --> 00:22:41.700
I'm

00:22:42.340 --> 00:22:51.460
Luckily, I don't have to pay bills off honey, so I can afford to have my bees make 10% less honey than the next person because I'm not paying bills.

00:22:51.179 --> 00:22:54.940
So I can play at the genetics and I'm selecting for survivability.

00:22:54.940 --> 00:23:02.299
So I incorporate small cell more based off the host parasite equilibrium kind of concept.

00:23:02.060 --> 00:23:04.700
I think it's called the uh the Red Queen hypothesis.

00:23:04.700 --> 00:23:06.220
It's kind of where I come from.

00:23:06.220 --> 00:23:10.220
Basically the way I I do I go about it is I use small cell.

00:23:10.400 --> 00:23:14.960
And I run 10 to 20% drone frames year round, no freezing.

00:23:14.960 --> 00:23:17.040
I let them hatch constantly.

00:23:17.040 --> 00:23:20.720
So and that's part of why I made my drone cells so much larger.

00:23:21.040 --> 00:23:26.720
So mites can see that cell volume difference to differentiate between worker and drone.

00:23:26.720 --> 00:23:31.280
Because you know, mites are looking for drones because they have the largest food source.

00:23:31.240 --> 00:23:33.640
the longest time in the cell to reproduce.

00:23:33.640 --> 00:23:42.760
Well, and the way I do it, it's small-cell bees, and I've kind of tracked this myself over time, and there have been people who've been doing it for years, like um Bush and Lesby and people

00:23:43.220 --> 00:23:52.980
But my bees hatch about two days faster because the difference in the the body's volume, every stage of developments a little bit quicker, and that all adds up.

00:23:52.940 --> 00:23:59.740
So I just naturally get a couple days less time overall, which means less time for mites to reproduce.

00:23:59.740 --> 00:24:01.419
It doesn't stop mites

00:24:01.300 --> 00:24:06.180
It just kind of shifts that might build up down the road a little bit to give you more time.

00:24:06.180 --> 00:24:10.180
If you're going to do something about it, you can intervene on your own schedule.

00:24:10.180 --> 00:24:12.500
But I also run drones without freezing.

00:24:12.820 --> 00:24:22.420
Because you know, as drones make copies of themselves, the mites that select for drones will naturally go to those drone frames I'm leaving in and reproduce.

00:24:22.640 --> 00:24:32.080
In my thinking, if I keep removing those, all I'm leaving behind are the mites that select for worker brood, and those are what's going to reproduce in the higher numbers.

00:24:32.240 --> 00:24:34.000
I'm trying to put selection pressure

00:24:34.519 --> 00:24:39.559
by running drones that way, which is also part of the reason why I don't do mite counts.

00:24:39.559 --> 00:24:45.240
I don't do harbos because they're not gonna tell me anything because of the way I run bees.

00:24:45.240 --> 00:24:48.840
My best hives have had mite counts and a three hundred count

00:24:48.860 --> 00:24:55.100
I've had mite counts on like the 72s, 74s, not like eight and nine, like seventies.

00:24:55.100 --> 00:25:01.340
Okay, and I because I'm purposely breeding them, but I'm using my drones to take most of that damage.

00:25:01.560 --> 00:25:04.680
I'm assuming I have a high viral load because of that.

00:25:04.680 --> 00:25:06.360
I'm assuming I don't know.

00:25:06.360 --> 00:25:10.360
I don't know if my bees have adapted to it because I do all my own breeding.

00:25:10.360 --> 00:25:12.920
I don't buy queens from anywhere else.

00:25:12.660 --> 00:25:19.220
I open mate, so all my everything I have now is locally mated from my original Russian stock.

00:25:19.220 --> 00:25:22.020
And I don't have uh there's not a lot of beekeepers around me.

00:25:22.020 --> 00:25:24.580
I'm not next to like a big commercial operation.

00:25:24.640 --> 00:25:28.880
So I just happen to be in a nice little spot that I can do this.

00:25:28.880 --> 00:25:36.640
And I do run a few hives of standard bees too, just because I need them for pictures and videos and things for the website.

00:25:36.640 --> 00:25:42.000
I haven't ran standard B's since like 2014 until like this last year.

00:25:42.000 --> 00:25:46.080
And I run them the same way, the same treatment-free with my drones.

00:25:46.519 --> 00:25:51.639
They don't do quite as well this year, the ones I've been looking at, but they still do better.

00:25:51.639 --> 00:25:55.159
They still get that nice shift over to the drone cell

00:25:55.540 --> 00:25:59.460
But they s they aren't doing as well as you know my normal ones.

00:25:59.460 --> 00:26:02.260
But it's about size, uh volume, and it's about numbers.

00:26:02.500 --> 00:26:05.780
You wouldn't think that you could get a lot more bees on a frame being small cells

00:26:06.419 --> 00:26:07.940
My small cell is 4.

00:26:07.940 --> 00:26:09.940
9 and the standard is 5.

00:26:09.940 --> 00:26:10.500
4.

00:26:10.500 --> 00:26:13.700
That equates to about 3,000 cells per deep frame

00:26:14.240 --> 00:26:18.320
So my single deep box has thirty thousand more Bs in it than my standard deep box.

00:26:18.560 --> 00:26:20.800
Three thousand more cells per deep frame.

00:26:20.800 --> 00:26:21.440
Per frame.

00:26:21.440 --> 00:26:24.960
Because okay, because a standard would be about sixty nine hundred, right?

00:26:24.960 --> 00:26:28.320
Well I'm I'm Wait, are you including are you including pollen and

00:26:28.660 --> 00:26:32.500
Honey or no, I'm just saying potential, potential cell opening.

00:26:32.820 --> 00:26:33.300
Total.

00:26:34.500 --> 00:26:34.980
More.

00:26:34.980 --> 00:26:35.460
Yeah.

00:26:35.460 --> 00:26:35.940
Wow.

00:26:35.940 --> 00:26:38.580
So you can have up to you know that much potentially.

00:26:38.580 --> 00:26:41.380
I run a deep plus a medium brew chamber.

00:26:41.340 --> 00:26:43.980
So I'm probably floating up towards that number.

00:26:43.980 --> 00:26:48.700
But I have a lot more B's to be able to take a viral hit or my damage.

00:26:48.700 --> 00:26:51.260
So I can have a higher percentage gear.

00:26:51.240 --> 00:26:57.000
get affected by the mites without seeing such an upfront immediate effect from it.

00:26:57.000 --> 00:27:05.720
If you are kind of on like a land island, the viruses could be settling out to the kind of a less harmful that's possible.

00:27:05.840 --> 00:27:09.679
where I am, there's just constant there are beekeepers all over the place.

00:27:09.679 --> 00:27:18.880
And so it it would be really hard to keep out incoming Varroa because my bees can get into trouble for sure if they

00:27:18.940 --> 00:27:20.539
go and steal anything.

00:27:20.539 --> 00:27:26.620
Y you could also be you know, you could be doing selection on a number of kind of fronts and so it'd be interesting to know.

00:27:26.620 --> 00:27:28.539
Don't you wanna know?

00:27:28.539 --> 00:27:29.980
Yeah, that's part of it.

00:27:29.980 --> 00:27:32.539
So like when all I don't know a lot of the studies are done

00:27:32.080 --> 00:27:35.600
They're not really going to be keepers like me that have been doing it for a decade plus.

00:27:35.600 --> 00:27:39.120
Because like my losses, my average winter loss is five percent.

00:27:39.120 --> 00:27:41.520
What combination is accounting for that?

00:27:41.520 --> 00:27:43.120
I really don't know.

00:27:42.760 --> 00:27:54.120
I tell people if you're just getting into bees and you want to go the small cell and treatment-free and all that route, learn how to keep bees normally for two or three years, learn the basics.

00:27:54.120 --> 00:27:58.440
Learn how to make bees because you're going to lose a lot of bees doing this.

00:27:58.440 --> 00:28:01.400
You've got to weed out the genes that just don't like the program

00:28:01.940 --> 00:28:08.659
So I lost eighty to ninety percent of everything for two or three years until that kind of balanced out.

00:28:08.659 --> 00:28:12.260
So I guess hey, if you're paying bills of bees, you can't afford to do that.

00:28:12.240 --> 00:28:16.400
It's very much a a hobby geared kind of a a fun thing.

00:28:16.400 --> 00:28:24.080
Well and and like a lot of clubs I think that are are trying to impact the genetics, you have to if you've got bees around you, you have to also impact

00:28:24.540 --> 00:28:33.100
their genetics so that it you're not having that I do have beekeepers around me so that's why I run partially why I run so many drones.

00:28:33.260 --> 00:28:38.700
I want to flood their queens with my genetics and hopefully eventually get some of it back to me.

00:28:38.700 --> 00:28:43.340
That's why I'm not buying purebred queens or anything because I'm going to let it get watered down instantly.

00:28:43.560 --> 00:28:49.800
So I've done it enough years that I hope I'm getting some of my own stuff back, but I really have no idea what's in there.

00:28:49.800 --> 00:28:54.840
I just know that I have my origin I'm breeding from my original queen strain.

00:28:54.700 --> 00:28:58.299
And outside of that, there are mutts on who knows?

00:28:58.299 --> 00:28:59.740
Who knows what's in 'em.

00:28:59.740 --> 00:29:05.100
Let's take this opportunity to take a quick break and we'll be right back after these words from our sponsors.

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00:30:38.400 --> 00:30:40.240
Welcome back everybody.

00:30:40.240 --> 00:30:43.840
Michael, thank you so much for sharing your management.

00:30:43.840 --> 00:30:49.600
Thank you for for talking about kind of the different ways that beekeepers use different cell sizes.

00:30:49.800 --> 00:30:54.920
Now I want to get into a topic that is very impressive.

00:30:54.920 --> 00:31:00.440
And if anybody out there likes whiskey, they're gonna kind of love what we're about to talk about.

00:31:00.240 --> 00:31:04.400
But you do something very special with some of your honey, right?

00:31:04.400 --> 00:31:08.160
Could you talk about your bourbon barrel process?

00:31:08.160 --> 00:31:13.040
Don't give away too many secrets, but just give enough away so that people get inspired.

00:31:12.740 --> 00:31:19.780
Yeah, so basically I take my honey, make it taste like liquor, and then people like it and buy it.

00:31:20.420 --> 00:31:22.020
And it's it is amazing.

00:31:22.260 --> 00:31:22.980
It's amazing.

00:31:22.980 --> 00:31:24.020
It is amazing.

00:31:24.020 --> 00:31:25.700
It is so amazing.

00:31:26.160 --> 00:31:30.400
There's so it can be as simple uh or as complicated as you want.

00:31:30.400 --> 00:31:33.920
So most beekeepers I know who do bourbon honey.

00:31:34.360 --> 00:31:37.399
We'll get a a used bourbon barrel, put the honey in.

00:31:37.399 --> 00:31:43.639
Most of them don't fill up a full barrel, so they they make like a little roller so they can go out and rotate the barrel every day.

00:31:43.639 --> 00:31:46.919
They give it about three months and pour it out and that's that's it.

00:31:46.919 --> 00:31:49.080
That's finished product.

00:31:48.260 --> 00:31:52.100
So know some beekeepers that use bourbon like imitation flavoring.

00:31:52.100 --> 00:31:53.940
They call it essence of bourbon.

00:31:53.940 --> 00:31:56.820
Just like vanilla flavoring and add it to it and it's bourbon.

00:31:56.820 --> 00:31:59.299
Like everything else, it has to be complicated.

00:31:59.080 --> 00:32:00.120
And picky.

00:32:00.120 --> 00:32:06.280
So and you or using a barrel if you're not in a really warm climate and that crystallizes inside.

00:32:06.680 --> 00:32:07.400
Have fun.

00:32:07.400 --> 00:32:08.120
Yeah.

00:32:08.440 --> 00:32:09.720
Getting that thing and getting it out.

00:32:10.040 --> 00:32:12.600
They leak, the barrels dry out

00:32:12.480 --> 00:32:14.320
Uh there's honey dripping over the place.

00:32:14.320 --> 00:32:14.880
It's a mess.

00:32:15.600 --> 00:32:19.200
So getting into it, I was like, all right, how do I fix this mouse trap?

00:32:19.200 --> 00:32:20.640
How do I make a better one?

00:32:20.919 --> 00:32:25.960
So trial and error, I kind of developed my own weird way of doing it.

00:32:25.960 --> 00:32:31.960
I make bourbon barrel and I'm actually making rum aged barrel and smoke and some other things right now.

00:32:32.160 --> 00:32:43.280
I do it in five-gallon buckets and I actually use bourbon wood, the oak woods and bourbons to almost infuse into my buckets, so it's a way more controlled process.

00:32:43.580 --> 00:32:47.820
So for instance, if you're not a bourbon snob, bourbon tastes like bourbon.

00:32:47.820 --> 00:32:48.700
I like bourbon.

00:32:48.700 --> 00:32:50.539
I have lots of different kinds of bourbon.

00:32:50.539 --> 00:32:53.340
I mean I it's everywhere in my house, way too much.

00:32:53.740 --> 00:32:55.740
A bottle here and a bottle there.

00:32:57.040 --> 00:33:03.280
Literally in in in my bedroom on the desk, I have a computer monitor and there's like three or four bottles and brown bags behind it.

00:33:03.280 --> 00:33:05.440
There's bottles and drawers that are still wrapped.

00:33:05.440 --> 00:33:06.880
These aren't all open.

00:33:06.600 --> 00:33:09.480
Here's when I go to shows, I find things I can't find here.

00:33:09.480 --> 00:33:09.880
I love it.

00:33:10.039 --> 00:33:12.280
I buy them like that would make good honey later on.

00:33:12.280 --> 00:33:15.240
And I store it and they've been sitting there for two or three years.

00:33:14.860 --> 00:33:16.700
Between the cushions on the sofa.

00:33:16.700 --> 00:33:17.740
I can see it now, Michael.

00:33:17.980 --> 00:33:19.899
In the garage, behind stuff on the shelves.

00:33:20.139 --> 00:33:22.220
Literally, it's everywhere.

00:33:22.220 --> 00:33:26.620
So, you know, it's hard to get access to good urban barrels that are are wet.

00:33:26.700 --> 00:33:29.340
They call them wet because they're freshly dumped.

00:33:28.660 --> 00:33:30.420
The wood hasn't dried out yet.

00:33:30.420 --> 00:33:36.500
Like good Jack Daniels, you know, barrels that were gonna go to their good customers, breweries, higher-end places.

00:33:36.500 --> 00:33:38.900
So a lot of beekeepers, you get what you can get.

00:33:38.900 --> 00:33:42.340
Well, I wanted to do it with good high-end stuff that I like to drink

00:33:42.720 --> 00:33:51.760
So I figured out a way to you can buy um wood oak spirals and staves like for flavoring wines and beers and whatnot.

00:33:52.220 --> 00:33:57.420
So I'm taking really good bourbon because I can buy it by the ball and a premium for it, but I can get it.

00:33:57.420 --> 00:33:58.060
Oh my god.

00:33:58.220 --> 00:34:04.460
And I pour it in the glass mason jars and I soak all my spirals and staves in it for many months at a time.

00:34:04.440 --> 00:34:08.440
That way I can select what charred toast levels I want, really fine-tune it.

00:34:08.440 --> 00:34:12.359
So in the garage I have mason jars full of all these different things.

00:34:12.679 --> 00:34:17.320
And I usually take my bourbon honey in my buckets and I use like a base bourbon.

00:34:17.320 --> 00:34:22.040
Like this is a nice mellow, just normal blank canvas.

00:34:21.960 --> 00:34:24.520
I'll give it three or four months to get a base down.

00:34:24.520 --> 00:34:28.360
And then I taste everyone to my palate and go, what do you need?

00:34:28.360 --> 00:34:29.960
Do I want some more nuttiness?

00:34:29.960 --> 00:34:31.240
Do I want more of this or that?

00:34:31.240 --> 00:34:33.320
And I know what bourbons taste like what?

00:34:33.300 --> 00:34:38.340
And I start pulling spirals and staves, adding to those buckets, give it another muff.

00:34:38.340 --> 00:34:39.540
Taste it again.

00:34:39.940 --> 00:34:41.700
It could use a little bit more toast.

00:34:41.700 --> 00:34:42.740
That's a heavier toast.

00:34:42.900 --> 00:34:44.260
Go pull that one.

00:34:44.420 --> 00:34:53.700
So the last batch I did had like five or six different bourbons in it with different kinds of toaster levels in that one batch just because of me tasting and tweaking.

00:34:53.700 --> 00:34:59.060
And a batch can I think the fastest I've ever made a batch is like seven or eight months.

00:34:58.740 --> 00:35:00.500
I can have that just go for a year.

00:35:00.500 --> 00:35:01.060
Wow.

00:35:01.060 --> 00:35:08.420
Okay, first of all, you're not charging enough after I just heard more about this, but I didn't mean to interrupt you though.

00:35:08.420 --> 00:35:09.300
Keep going.

00:35:09.300 --> 00:35:10.420
Oh you're fine.

00:35:11.059 --> 00:35:13.619
Um, so yes, uh so I'm doing that.

00:35:13.619 --> 00:35:22.420
And then I'm also trying to, if you know anything about bourbon, the way they age it, and Rick Houses it gets hot and cold, so bourbon moves in and out of the wood.

00:35:22.260 --> 00:35:25.620
Well I'm putting a little extra taste in my wood.

00:35:25.620 --> 00:35:36.260
So once it's in my honey, I actually use bucket heaters and I'll heat for multiple days and pull them off for multiple days to get that heat and cold effect so it'll transfer through the wood better.

00:35:36.240 --> 00:35:41.200
I like buckets lined up down the hallway with different stages of things on them.

00:35:41.200 --> 00:35:44.480
And I know people ask, okay, so when you add bourbon

00:35:45.120 --> 00:35:47.600
things into it and it leaches into it, you're adding water.

00:35:47.600 --> 00:35:49.360
So what do you do about water?

00:35:49.360 --> 00:35:54.000
And I want all ages to be able to to consume it too, so I really don't want alcohol in it.

00:35:54.000 --> 00:35:57.600
Where if you're dumping out of a barrel, you're just getting straight alcohol in it.

00:35:57.720 --> 00:36:08.920
In the process of heating and cooling with that those um bucket heaters over time, the water and alcohol vapor condensate on the lid, so I can carefully peel it back and wipe it with a rag.

00:36:08.500 --> 00:36:15.460
And by the time I get it to where I want, I pretty much flash the alcohol out of it and the water levels dag back down to like 17%.

00:36:15.460 --> 00:36:17.620
It's good to bottle and go and anybody can have it.

00:36:17.620 --> 00:36:21.220
So I having the extra time helps me get it all good and dry too

00:36:21.520 --> 00:36:28.000
But it is, it's a process, it's an expensive process because I have all the alcohols and woods and everything into it.

00:36:28.000 --> 00:36:35.119
But I'm I'm basically using the same woods and techniques that you would get out of a barrel, but just in a very controlled process.

00:36:35.140 --> 00:36:39.380
So I have to ask, once you soak the wood, can you still drink the bourbon?

00:36:39.619 --> 00:36:41.380
It's super woody.

00:36:41.380 --> 00:36:45.059
Is it like it's super dark, super woody.

00:36:44.859 --> 00:36:48.300
So I c I can use them for a couple of batches and then it's pretty well done.

00:36:48.300 --> 00:36:48.619
Okay.

00:36:48.619 --> 00:36:49.660
And I gotta pour it out.

00:36:49.660 --> 00:36:49.900
Okay.

00:36:49.900 --> 00:36:55.420
You're really you're transforming the actual alcohol or the the liquor also.

00:36:55.000 --> 00:37:03.000
So what I do after I've done a a few runs of my bourbon honey, I will take those spirals and pieces that have been soaked in bourbon and honey

00:37:03.200 --> 00:37:10.640
I'll pull them out and I'll put them in a separate jar of rum, and then I'll make a bourbon oak rum age that I'll soak and that'll go into honey.

00:37:10.640 --> 00:37:15.040
And I'm using rum that's already been bourbon barrel aged for a couple years on top of it.

00:37:14.960 --> 00:37:21.680
So my rum honey is actually bourbon rum and with all the ever will goodies from multiple batches put into it.

00:37:21.680 --> 00:37:23.200
So it's an experimental

00:37:23.440 --> 00:37:24.880
project I'll probably have done.

00:37:24.880 --> 00:37:26.800
I'll probably have some done for NAHBE this year.

00:37:27.119 --> 00:37:27.839
Oh my gosh.

00:37:27.839 --> 00:37:29.040
Unless it's really awful.

00:37:29.040 --> 00:37:29.839
I don't know.

00:37:29.839 --> 00:37:36.079
Have you ever brought it back to the company that produces the bourbon and said, here taste this

00:37:36.220 --> 00:37:36.859
No.

00:37:36.859 --> 00:37:39.819
Cause don't you think that they would think that was amazing?

00:37:39.819 --> 00:37:43.339
You can buy some honeys that companies would do like that, like blends, makes

00:37:43.760 --> 00:37:53.680
a bourbon honey and I've had other beekeepers who've tried they tell me they've tried lots of different bourbon honeys and they're like I've even had that stuff from the distillers and I like yours better it just tastes so much better.

00:37:53.720 --> 00:37:56.839
I think it's just because I go through all the extra time and steps.

00:37:56.839 --> 00:37:57.799
You figured it out.

00:37:58.279 --> 00:37:59.880
Everything is done to my taste.

00:37:59.880 --> 00:38:01.559
I mean, there is no formula.

00:38:01.559 --> 00:38:02.119
It's

00:38:02.440 --> 00:38:06.040
I think this, so that's gonna go in it and let's see what happens.

00:38:06.040 --> 00:38:12.440
Can you taste the difference between an expensive bourbon and your less expensive bourbon?

00:38:12.440 --> 00:38:13.240
You can.

00:38:13.240 --> 00:38:15.079
It comes down more to the proof

00:38:15.000 --> 00:38:23.480
So originally I thought, okay, if I use a low proof, it's not putting a lot of alcohol in, it won't make it taste too bourbony, and it had a good bourbon kick.

00:38:23.820 --> 00:38:26.860
So then I use some really high end high proof stuff.

00:38:26.860 --> 00:38:31.500
And what happens is there's a in bourbon when you drink it, there's a lot of really minute

00:38:32.040 --> 00:38:39.160
flavors on the back end that you really pick up when you use the higher proof they're oil soluble flavors.

00:38:39.160 --> 00:38:43.880
So when you use that in your honey, your honey picks up all those really fine flavors.

00:38:43.580 --> 00:38:46.380
to where using the low proof just you don't get that.

00:38:46.380 --> 00:38:47.980
It's just bourbon.

00:38:47.980 --> 00:38:54.060
Whereas this last batch I did, you pick up some of the citrus notes on the back end and some of the foils out of the honey.

00:38:54.060 --> 00:38:56.940
And then your honey is different batch to batch too.

00:38:57.120 --> 00:39:04.720
So it's is it my spring white clover and wild blackberry honey or is it my summer everything in the yard honey?

00:39:04.720 --> 00:39:10.160
And you have to take that in consideration with what bourbons I'm using, what notes it's going to add to it

00:39:10.540 --> 00:39:13.500
I mean at worst it's gonna taste not how I want.

00:39:13.500 --> 00:39:16.540
I'll feed it back to the bees, but I'm trying not to do that.

00:39:16.540 --> 00:39:21.020
My other question was whether the honey that you're using makes a difference, but it

00:39:21.340 --> 00:39:22.300
Obviously it does.

00:39:22.300 --> 00:39:25.660
And do you have a preference to which honey you use?

00:39:25.660 --> 00:39:27.740
Um what produces the best result?

00:39:27.740 --> 00:39:29.740
The wildflower, the summer honey.

00:39:30.280 --> 00:39:34.120
stands up to those really higher proofs with all the different flavors in them.

00:39:34.120 --> 00:39:38.520
I have to be really careful on the light stuff because there's not a real strong honey flavor there.

00:39:38.520 --> 00:39:39.640
It's more just sweet.

00:39:39.859 --> 00:39:46.020
So I have to be a lot more delicate with the amounts of toast and chars and things I use, or I'll just overpower it.

00:39:46.020 --> 00:39:50.900
My personal favorite normal honey in general is goldenrod, and it's hard to get

00:39:51.340 --> 00:39:53.660
the bourbon to cut through that goldenrod taste.

00:39:53.660 --> 00:39:55.340
So I try not to use it at all.

00:39:55.340 --> 00:39:58.380
It's it's mainly just a spring summer honey that I that I work with.

00:39:58.780 --> 00:40:04.060
But yeah, I I prefer the summer honey just because I can use the higher end stuff with all the extra little flavors in 'em

00:40:04.260 --> 00:40:06.420
But there's only so much of that to go around.

00:40:06.500 --> 00:40:08.900
So you are sold out on your website right now.

00:40:08.900 --> 00:40:10.420
Do you have a waiting list?

00:40:10.420 --> 00:40:12.180
I haven't even put it on the website.

00:40:12.340 --> 00:40:18.020
People just go and know I have it and they'll just message me and text me and say, Hey, can I get ten bottles shipped to my house?

00:40:18.020 --> 00:40:21.940
And I'll I'll hook them up because I don't have enough to put it on the website yet.

00:40:21.940 --> 00:40:22.980
When I do

00:40:23.460 --> 00:40:27.940
So the plan is to ramp up and do enough to be able to offer it on the website seasonally.

00:40:27.940 --> 00:40:31.540
And yeah, I'll post about it and it's first come, first serve.

00:40:31.520 --> 00:40:33.040
Just dive in there.

00:40:33.040 --> 00:40:38.320
So the I use those little looks like a little liquor bottle, like you would see behind the counter at the gas station.

00:40:38.480 --> 00:40:40.480
Everybody knows what that shape is.

00:40:40.580 --> 00:40:46.340
So I do I say five gallon batches, but I have to have room in them for mixing and moving things around.

00:40:46.340 --> 00:40:50.180
So I get about seventy of those bottles out of a five gallon batch.

00:40:50.120 --> 00:40:51.720
So they go fast.

00:40:51.720 --> 00:40:55.000
I can take a hundred bottles to a conference and come back with nothing.

00:40:55.000 --> 00:40:56.200
Oh, no doubt.

00:40:56.200 --> 00:40:58.760
So who do you have to know to get that?

00:40:59.680 --> 00:41:04.880
Wait, you've been you've been very generous and and full disclosure, you have shared three bottles with me.

00:41:04.880 --> 00:41:06.240
It's amazing.

00:41:06.240 --> 00:41:07.039
So amazing.

00:41:07.039 --> 00:41:07.760
It's one of those.

00:41:07.760 --> 00:41:11.599
If I'm friends with you and I know you want some, I'll hold some back

00:41:11.840 --> 00:41:13.280
I have some held back right now.

00:41:13.280 --> 00:41:15.920
I have some from all my batches held back at home for me.

00:41:15.920 --> 00:41:19.680
Sitting in the cabinet for a rainy day, so somebody's really hard up.

00:41:19.680 --> 00:41:24.720
I just love now your house is full of bottles, buckets, jars

00:41:25.320 --> 00:41:28.440
There are some there's some honey in there too, some bottled honey.

00:41:28.440 --> 00:41:29.480
There there's a cabinet.

00:41:29.480 --> 00:41:38.520
If you open them in my cabinet and you look up the top shelf, it's nothing but honeys, creamed honeys, hot honeys, bourbon honeys, friends of mine's honeys

00:41:38.940 --> 00:41:42.940
On the counter, there's like 30 bottles of friends of mine's honeys from NAHBE.

00:41:42.940 --> 00:41:46.380
From parties, there's and there literally is bourbon

00:41:46.460 --> 00:41:49.260
Everywhere you turn, I'm sure my wife is sick of looking at it.

00:41:49.260 --> 00:41:54.700
Oh, you know, I wasn't gonna ask the question, but I assumed you weren't married after this disclosure.

00:41:54.700 --> 00:41:56.860
Oh no, I weren't married to a saint.

00:41:58.160 --> 00:42:06.000
I'm married to a lady who does not like doesn't touch bees, doesn't drink bourbon, hates the taste of it

00:42:05.859 --> 00:42:11.140
I t I took her to a distillery tour with me and she she was brave and did a tasting with me and that was fun to watch.

00:42:11.140 --> 00:42:13.300
Oh yeah, she just tolerates me.

00:42:13.300 --> 00:42:16.980
I don't think she's been in the backyard since I put bees back there all those years ago.

00:42:17.440 --> 00:42:18.960
She's just it's not her thing.

00:42:18.960 --> 00:42:23.599
The oldest oldest son, uh, he's almost twenty-one, he doesn't do bees.

00:42:23.599 --> 00:42:27.040
My youngest one's almost fourteen, and when he was younger, he helped me out with them.

00:42:27.040 --> 00:42:27.280
But

00:42:27.300 --> 00:42:38.100
He's very much a techie computer kid, so I'm doing all my bee work alone and all my my bottling alone and extracting alone and Your beekeeper friend Jack.

00:42:39.440 --> 00:42:39.920
Yeah.

00:42:42.000 --> 00:42:45.840
What is your favorite bourbon of choice to work with?

00:42:45.840 --> 00:42:46.800
Hmm.

00:42:47.200 --> 00:42:54.960
You know, at the moment, so I like a lot of the the hard to f to find stuff, but just everybody the stuff you can find.

00:42:54.960 --> 00:42:56.640
I'm an old Forester guy.

00:42:56.640 --> 00:42:59.200
I like Brown Foreman company stuff, so

00:42:59.820 --> 00:43:04.060
Old Forester barrel strength type stuff is good for honey.

00:43:04.060 --> 00:43:06.700
There are a lot of local like regional producers.

00:43:06.700 --> 00:43:09.900
I'll pick up stuff from them, small-scale stillers.

00:43:09.600 --> 00:43:14.240
I try to use their stuff when I can, so if it turns out well I can say, hey, this was in it.

00:43:14.480 --> 00:43:18.720
I'm I'm a I like sweeter bourbon, so I'm more of a weeded bourbon guy.

00:43:18.720 --> 00:43:21.360
So that's kind of where I tend to go.

00:43:21.620 --> 00:43:23.620
But really it's hard to pick a favorite.

00:43:23.620 --> 00:43:29.460
I mean, they all lend so many different things to your honey that they're all great in their their own way.

00:43:29.720 --> 00:43:33.319
And really, I don't really eat honey that much.

00:43:33.319 --> 00:43:35.880
You know, it's always around, so I hardly ever touch it.

00:43:35.880 --> 00:43:40.279
So when I do, you know, I'll try different kinds of my bourbons on things, but really

00:43:40.740 --> 00:43:44.260
I can have a bottle of honey open in my cabinet, it'll last two years.

00:43:44.260 --> 00:43:49.540
I look at it, it's you look at it so much, it's just you just get tired of seeing it sometimes.

00:43:49.100 --> 00:43:51.500
That's why I had to do something to figure out how to get rid of some of it.

00:43:51.500 --> 00:43:55.180
That's why I got into playing with a bourbon, just to get it out of my house to to get it gone.

00:43:55.180 --> 00:43:58.300
I'm there I'm there with the play of the bees, not so much to make the honey.

00:43:57.800 --> 00:44:04.520
Well, I I'll tell you I like honey a lot more when it tastes like bourbon, so I can't say enough good things.

00:44:04.520 --> 00:44:06.920
This has been really educational and interesting.

00:44:06.920 --> 00:44:10.920
I mean, not only I I think this has been one of the most widely diverse

00:44:11.160 --> 00:44:19.960
discussions we've had, Becky, we've gone from cell size and plastic frames to bourbon flavored honey in the span of the last

00:44:20.359 --> 00:44:21.800
Just under an hour.

00:44:21.800 --> 00:44:23.720
Yeah, it's it's pretty fun.

00:44:23.720 --> 00:44:25.320
So thank you so much.

00:44:25.320 --> 00:44:31.079
I'll tell you for people that are just starting out doing little farm stands and little shops with their honey.

00:44:30.760 --> 00:44:34.840
If you can get good at making bourbon honey, that that's a good way to move it.

00:44:34.840 --> 00:44:37.400
There's there's a good premium for it.

00:44:37.400 --> 00:44:39.240
More so than even comb honey.

00:44:39.540 --> 00:44:44.180
So if you're on that small scale, it's something fun to play with to try to maybe see if you can get into that market.

00:44:44.180 --> 00:44:51.940
If you can leave us on one thought, what would be the standard retail price of bourbon honey?

00:44:51.500 --> 00:44:57.500
I sell mine, some of my little liquor bottles, I think they're a like oh they hold like a eleven point eight ounces.

00:44:57.500 --> 00:44:59.500
No, ten point eight ounces.

00:44:59.500 --> 00:45:04.380
I sell those for twenty dollars a bottle and I can make seventy bottles out of my buckets

00:45:04.359 --> 00:45:09.560
So that's you're talking fourteen hundred dollars a bucket before your costs come out.

00:45:09.560 --> 00:45:13.960
And I'm buying no high-end lakers and things, so it probably cost me a couple

00:45:14.420 --> 00:45:18.100
Hundred at least a minimum of a hundred plus dollars a bucket to make it.

00:45:18.260 --> 00:45:19.620
There's there are good margins that make it.

00:45:20.900 --> 00:45:25.700
And you've basically figured out how to make your bourbon purchases tax deductible.

00:45:25.520 --> 00:45:26.560
No.

00:45:28.320 --> 00:45:36.720
Just when I was at this this recent show, I I look at the local uh liquor stores and go, they might have something regional and I just go hunt and I pay full price and taxes and

00:45:36.760 --> 00:45:38.040
Drag it back home in the suitcase.

00:45:38.040 --> 00:45:39.880
And you don't give the receipts to your accountant?

00:45:40.040 --> 00:45:40.520
Accountant.

00:45:40.840 --> 00:45:41.560
Family business.

00:45:41.560 --> 00:45:44.520
We're the everything, so who you're gonna give it to yourself?

00:45:45.460 --> 00:45:46.660
Oh very good.

00:45:46.660 --> 00:45:56.740
Well Michael, it's been a great pleasure having you on the show today to talk about 21st Bee, the frames as we were talking about, which I think are really exciting.

00:45:56.359 --> 00:46:01.880
And the bourbon honey, which is I know what I'm getting for Christmas presents this year, I think.

00:46:03.480 --> 00:46:04.280
Thank you.

00:46:04.280 --> 00:46:05.560
Yeah, thanks for having me here.

00:46:05.640 --> 00:46:06.839
Really appreciate it, Michael.

00:46:06.839 --> 00:46:07.960
Thank you.

00:46:09.320 --> 00:46:10.760
I'm gonna have to try to

00:46:11.440 --> 00:46:16.000
Find some of his bourbon flavored honey next time we see Michael.

00:46:16.480 --> 00:46:21.359
Yes, I can tell you from experience that it's quite amazing and

00:46:22.020 --> 00:46:25.700
I haven't met anybody who's tried it because I share it a lot.

00:46:25.700 --> 00:46:30.020
I haven't met anybody who's tried it who who doesn't think it's it's pretty special.

00:46:30.020 --> 00:46:30.339
So

00:46:30.400 --> 00:46:36.559
Well the process of making it was a lot more involved than I even imagined.

00:46:36.559 --> 00:46:38.079
It's definitely

00:46:38.620 --> 00:46:39.740
Intense, right?

00:46:39.740 --> 00:46:40.940
But I like that about Michael.

00:46:40.940 --> 00:46:46.380
He's very he might have different management techniques, but he's he's got a biology background

00:46:46.780 --> 00:46:52.220
And he uses his biology for both his bees and for his his honey making.

00:46:52.220 --> 00:46:54.060
So it's it's pretty fun.

00:46:54.060 --> 00:46:56.860
And also the the manufacture of the frames.

00:46:56.860 --> 00:46:58.140
Oh yeah, that too.

00:46:58.140 --> 00:46:59.260
That too.

00:47:01.200 --> 00:47:05.360
And that about wraps it up for this episode of Beekeeping Today.

00:47:05.360 --> 00:47:12.880
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00:47:29.160 --> 00:47:38.520
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00:47:42.440 --> 00:47:43.960
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00:47:44.400 --> 00:47:46.800
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00:47:48.160 --> 00:47:50.240
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