Bee Remover

[mark williams]

greeting's all: just thinking,Has anyone ever used a leaf blower to remove bees from honey super's? I've got one that is gas power that the air flow is adjustable,I could not see any thing diff-from it than the bee blower's you buy.surer is alot cheaper>>>>Mark

[Michael Bush]

I have heard of it. I haven't used it. I would think if it's adjustable it should work. I use the triagular bee escapes to get 98% of them out and then brush the stragglers.

[odfrank]

I have used a leaf blower to remove supers for 32 years. They are noisy but do the job. Kind of hard to juggle the hose, supers and throttle. Buy a two inch vacuum hose and clevis nozzle for a shop vac and connect it to the blower with a hose clamp. I made a lazy susan board so that I can spin the supers to easily get to both sides. Pull your honey early before there is too much robbing. If the robbing gets bad the robbers fly into the supers about half as fast as you blow the resident bees out. Two strong men can pull a ton of honey in about two hours.

[John Seets]

Hi, Mark;

Blowing bees does not upset them and eliminates the use of chemicals which I believe ALWAYS leaves a residue, especially in the uncapped honey.

I have been blowing the bees out of the supers for years now. Put the super on a flat surface preferably near the hive that it came off of, oriented such that the super is on its side so that the frame tops are veritical and facing you. I use a Toro Super Blower/Vac (Lowes for about $50 and one of the better rated electric ones in Consumer Reports) to blow the bees out of the supers when I first remove them and again at the end after bee clean-up before storage.

It goes quickly and I rarely have to blow from the frame bottoms direction as well. Yes, it is noisy but works great.

Thanx.

John

[John Seets]

ODfrank;

I usually stack the supers on a hand truck after blowing. The handtruck incorporates a screwed on piece of aluminum larger that the supers length and width. It is screwed (or bolted) on the support base plate that is part of the hand cart. A lip around the aluminum prevents the supers from sliding off.

I use the metal from a telescopic cover to cover the top super on the dolly while blowing out another super to keep out the robbers. It seems to work well.

Thanx.

John

[GAbee]

I used my electric leafblower to empty supers. This was my first time emptying supers and with my neighboor's help it was easy.

I recommend that you get someone to help you. I also recommed you get yourself a large rubbermaid container with a top to place the cleared supers and cover them to eliminate the robbing issue.