I knew Loloku was in trouble, but I had hope for her survival with the plan Ted and I came up with! We were going to cage her, add two frames of bees and brood from my strongest hive and then bring her to Ted’s, which is more than five miles away (so they don’t fly back home).
When we opened up her hive to take a look, we discovered it empty, not a single bee to be found on any of the frames. Upon further inspection, we found one lone bee wandering on the bottom and then, low and behold, Ted found the queen! She was in rough shape, barely moving, but alive.
I was mourning my loss when I looked over to see Ted breathing on her. At first I had no idea what he was doing, it looked like he was kissing or smelling her. I realized quickly that he was heating her up to see if he could bring her back to life!
He asked for a queen cage which I brought over immediately! He took off his hat, put Loloku in it and popped it back on his head to keep her warm while we opened my strong hive to steal a few bees and food to add them in the cage. When all was ready, he took her back out of her hat and put her in.
He had me follow him out to his truck and said we could discuss things in there – I still had no idea what he was up to! He started it up, turned the heat on high and placed the queen cage in front of the vents while explaining that the heat might revive her.
We watched and talked bees for almost an hour. A few times, we thought we saw her come to life, but alas, it seemed she must have been previously stung and the venom overtook her. If she was just cold, this would have worked.
R.I.P. Loloku – we tried our best. You were with us for less than a week, but I’ll always have a soft spot for my Hawaiian queen.
September 5, 2019
Ted is a dear friend of mine also. My daughter & I have a couple hives that he had been coaching us on and we’ve extracted about 150 lbs of honey so far this year. I was wondering where you get your clear stickon labels for your jars. If you could help us out with that, we would greatly appreciate it. We are in the Birds Hill area.
Thank You,
Sincerely
R. Lehmann
December 6, 2019
Hi R. Lehmann!!
Apologies for not replying earlier! I don’t check these messages very often and just came across this now. I get my labels printed at City Press in Winnipeg — best printer in town. It is a lot of work the way I do it though, I design them to fit as many as possible on a page and then cut them out myself :). They are not super cheap, but last and don’t wash off. Happy to provide more details if you are interested.
Did you hear that Ted recently passed away. Very sad day for the bees and all whose lives he impacted by sharing his amazing wealth of knowledge :). I miss him greatly and there is a big whole in my heart.
If you want to connect further, please email me at prairiesweethearthoney@gmail.com.
Rebecca