Success Secret

[Grant]

Last night at our bee meeting, one of our more successful beekeepers spoke up and said, "Well I had _______, and when I went back and looked at my notes, I recognized I did __________ and it made a big difference in my bees because I later saw them doing ________."

Someone later also said, "I know last year at this time I was experiencing ___________, and that caused me to do _____________________. So this year, as I review my notes from last year, I'm going to try __________________."

I interrupted the discussion to point out to the rest of the group how important it was to keep a notebook of observations. I cannot begin to tell you how the newer beekeepers explain a present situation, and when I ask about circumstances that led up to this situation or what they might have done or not done, they have no idea what preceded it, they cannot remember what they did, and if they tried something different on a different hive, they can't remember when they did it or how the bees responded or why it might have made a difference.

I'm a strong advocate of keeping a notebook, so when asking questions, you can say with confidence, "On this date, I saw _________, and thinking there was something wrong, so I did ___________. Then three weeks later on ______ the bees did ___________, and I later saw them doing __________. So what do you think I should do next?"

Most times we don't know what we're looking for, let alone looking at, but just keeping a notebook of simple observations, recording actions and the bees' response can help understand what makes the difference between success and failure.

Notebooks have been a standard practice in my beekeeping. I take rough, crude notes in one notebook that gets sticky and coated with propolis. This is my field notebook. Then when I get home, I re=write and transcribe these notes adding interpretation into a different notebook that I can review before going back out to that yard the following week. Then the sticky notes get thrown away after I record them.

There are also a host of hive inspection sheets that do the same thing. But if I don't write something down, I won't remember it.

More and more, it seems the most successful beekeepers keep a notebook and review it to learn more about their bees.

Grant
Jackson, MO

[jim lyon]

Amen Grant. I am helpless without mine. From January through May everything we do is dated and recorded in a notebook (June through Dec. everything goes on a large poster board). I tried to use a daily planner but couldnt find one with enough room to write in yet still small enough to carry. I highly recommend a 4x6" spiral notebook like the 11463-W http://www.blueskyimg.com/Catalogue/M/Notes/Notes Its really rugged and slips easily into a back pocket, a pen will store within the spirals and the cover is easily washable. I have experimented with some technology but nothing I have found is as good as just writing it down. If you hear we went out of business it is probably because I lost my planner.

[StevenG]

I take a cheap spiral notebook out to the bees, make my notes re; each hive. When I return home, I transcribe those almost illegible scribbles into a ring binder. I use tabs to separate each numbered hive. Each year I start with a new page in the hive's location in the ring binder. Makes it real easy to go back and check on a particular hive, or discern a trend.

I've also begun doing a year beginning and year end summation of the whole operation. That helps discern general trends or problems.
Regards,
Steven

[honeyshack]

I agree. I would like to add though....colored tacks.
We record notes, yes. And works great. However, tacs work well for the visual when working hives. A problem hive gets a tack at the time of working. When i go back to the yard that visual helps alot, even with the notes

[Matt NY]

This is one thing that I have told myself I'd do this year. I fgured I had so few hives that I could keep track, but those little things can mean alot.

I use a pencil rather than a pen: the writing holds up better if it gets wet.

[Oldbee]

>"Notebooks have been a standard practice in my beekeeping. I take rough, crude notes in one notebook that gets sticky and coated with propolis. This is my field notebook. Then when I get home, I re=write and transcribe these notes adding interpretation into a different notebook that I can review before going back out to that yard the following week."<

A good suggeston and reminder,.Grant!

I thought it was fun and fascinating to record my notes on the computer [rather than old-fashioned boring paper notebooks ] when I got one about 7 years ago. For some strange reason, that information has been lost from some of the earlier years. It is probably still there among the catacombs of data but I'm not really skilled with the computer to find it again,...

[Adam Foster Collins]

I use the Gardener's Journal from Lee Valley.

I actually got mine from a used book store, but I like it. I put in the sparest of notes, but at least I have a sense of what weather was doing, what I did or saw for each hive and when.

I also find I throw other notes in there about planting, harvesting from the garden, and little side notes about other things in life creep in there, and I have reminders about the bigger picture.

What's interesting, is that even with just a few notes - like less than three lines - years later, they're enough to bring a lot back from memory.

Adam

[Roadstar]

What works for me: I take notes while at the yard, then transcribe those notes to my record keeping using Hive Tracks. I have another CPU that backs up all my data from my core machine, and I also save my hive tracks inspections to a .pdf so I have a hard copy. I got into this record keeping habit the day I hived my first package in my first hive, and it works great now that I developed a system and habit from the get go. At the end of last calendar year, I printed my Hive Tracks inspections and put them in a binder. I have no affiliation with Hive Tracks, other than being a satisfied user.

[Tia]

I can't be writing when I'm out in the beeyard. Just won't take the time to do it. And then when I get back to the house, I can't remember whether it was #3 hive or #4 hive that had need of some additional work. So I bought one of those little voice activated tape recorders (about $40) and take it with me to the beeyard. I'm always talking to myself and the girls anyway, so I just make sure I voice everything I see. When I get back to the house, I transcribe my ramblings and have a very thorough report of what's happening in my bee yard!

[tommyt]

Roadstar
In this (Please visit our Beekeeping Blog
http://akhoneybees.blogspot.com/)

I looked at your picture Happy Bee seems to have a mite??

My eyes are old so I can be mistaken

Tommyt

Edited to say I was mistaken on what picture its the one below

She's healthy and shiny, just what you want to see

I hope it not to big to post on BS.com

Bees+oct+22++2011+016_edited-1.jpg

[Roadstar]

Roadstar
In this (Please visit our Beekeeping Blog
http://akhoneybees.blogspot.com/)

I looked at your picture Happy Bee seems to have a mite??

My eyes are old so I can be mistaken

Tommyt

Edited to say I was mistaken on what picture its the one below


I hope it not to big to post on BS.com

Bees+oct+22++2011+016_edited-1.jpg

Thanks for looking at our Blog. What appears to be a mite is actually just part of the thorax on that bee. When I previewed the picture on my camera right after I shot this photo, I saw that too. Must have been something with the lighting angle, because I picked her up and took a close look, and saw nothing. We have seen a few hive beetles, but have never seen any Varroa in our hives. (I know that's rare, but so far, it's the truth.)

Now that I said that.......we'll get infested. Ain't that how that works?

[tefer2]

I gave up taking the notebook with me. I just went out and bought a cheap voice recorder and stick it in my shirt pocket.
It has 40 hour's of recording space and I just turn it on and talk to myself.
When I return home I playback and write info into book or hive tracks.

[Keith Jarrett]

Great Post Grant!

I have the big calenders in my office wall, the ones with the big squares so to make notes of the days events. I have the calenders for the last ten years open on Febuary as we speak, I can look back from my computer chair and see what I did on this date for the last ten years, it really helps to curb the mistakes.
Keith

[toomanyhandles]

Last year I started taking notes of what other insects were out and what they were up to, as well. I figured that would help me with timing by giving me multiple life cycle points to compare to.
We'll see how that works out.

It helps if you can accurately identify a moderate number of insect families... it's a year-round equivalent of 'dandelion time" markers.

I don't know my plants well enough to do much more than "dandelion", "goldenrod", or "attractive to pollinators" : ) though.

[Beeboy01]

I know on bee keeper who call home and leaves messages on the answering system about his bees. I still use a journal and log bloom dates, hive condition, weather and just about anything else that I see around the hives. I also keep a rough track of honey production for each hive and totals for each extraction. I like the idea of keeping track of other insects, just spotted a Giant Sulphur butterfly and some Swallowtails this week.

[Acebird]

I hate writing and it would be the last thing I would do once I dug into the hive and got all stuck up. How about a camcorder, it is date stamped and it doesn't really have to tape any action but you could if you wanted to. It would be great if you could get a blue tooth set up. Maybe some of you folks with smart phones could do it.

[Gypsi]

I will be starting a bee journal soon. My old fish journals included maintenance, disease and treatment for about 10 tanks in one 5 in 1 spiral, tabbed by the tank, in order by size.

Made great research notes I could go back to when writing. I quit keeping them when the business got busier, but I have notes in customer files in quickbooks on some stuff. And bee stuff I've been recording in email and wordpad files, (and on beesource last summer, since that is where I was for about 2 months, several hours a day.)

And yes, pencil survives getting wet much better than ink. Laser printing better than inkjet.

[Michael Bush]

My prefered notebook used to be those small ring binder ones that would fit in a pocket. That way you can write on a page and rearrange the pages later so you can put that note about Queen Rearing in the Queen Rearing section and the one about Feeding in the Feeding section, but you don't have a lot of blank pages between one section and another. You can also put tabs in. But the ones I used to get I can't find anymore. So now I use a Levenger one. Unfortunately it's expensive... but I can move pages around and put them where I want and it fits in my pocket. I have no use for a notebook that doesn't fit in my pocket.

Back to the I saw (A) did (B) and the results were (C)

This does have a problem inherent. The problem with the logic is that (A) maybe have changed to (C) because of (B) or it may be that (A) would have resulted in (C) regardless of (B) or it may be the (C) resulted despite being slowed down by action (B). There is not enough information to make a clear cut logical conclusion. The larger the statistics on when you've tried (B) and (C) happened and the larger the statistics on when you've skipped (B) and (C) did NOT happen then the more likely that (B) was the cause and (C) was the effect. But we often do things for years because we tried (B) and the flow picked up or the bees got motivated to resolve the problem because of other things, or they were already in the process of fixing it and then (C) happened.

[sqkcrk]

I used to take notes on what I did in the yard, not in the individual hive. Though, sometimes I did that too. I used the small note pads w/ the wire ring at the top.

A friend of mine likes the Bee Diary which one can, or could, get from Dadant or Kelley. A thick book w/ each day of the year, one on each page, broken up into four or five segments so you can use it for a number of years and easily see what yopu did the previous years. Bulky, but informative. Also, just a daily log, I guess.

[Acebird]

This does have a problem inherent. The problem with the logic is that (A) maybe have changed to (C) because of (B) or it may be that (A) would have resulted in (C) regardless of (B) or it may be the (C) resulted despite being slowed down by action (B). There is not enough information to make a clear cut logical conclusion. The larger the statistics on when you've tried (B) and (C) happened and the larger the statistics on when you've skipped (B) and (C) did NOT happen then the more likely that (B) was the cause and (C) was the effect. But we often do things for years because we tried (B) and the flow picked up or the bees got motivated to resolve the problem because of other things, or they were already in the process of fixing it and then (C) happened.

Right, how much time is wasted writing and reading when the bees are going to do what they want to do anyways. This is one area where I believe the commercial beekeeper has it all over the backyard beekeeper. There is no way you can do research on two hives and come to any meaningful conclusions when the system you are studying is in constant change.
I think for me all I need to do is write on the hive what I have done and when. Then just paint over the hive every year to make a new slate.