Purpose of the IEBA Bee yard:

• Provide beekeeper field training
• Provide mating yard for IEBA members
• Active members who assist in keeping up yard
• Member brings nucs ready for queen cell
• IEBA provide queen cells and drone supply
• Selected queens from WSU for queen mothers

A .pdf version of this schedule can be here .

• Provide beekeeper field training
• Provide mating yard for IEBA members
• Active members who assist in keeping up yard
• Member brings nucs ready for queen cell
• IEBA provide queen cells and drone supply
• Selected queens from WSU for queen mothers

Field Day 1
When:  Afternoon of April 18, 2009
Where: WSU Extension Office on Havana
What:  Demonstration on Hiving a Package
Who should attend?  Beginning beekeepers or those interested in how to hive a package of bees

Field Day 2
When: April 25 11 AM
Where: IEBA Field Yard, Prufer Crosscut Rd
What: Beginner training for the following:
How to open and inspect colonies
How to find a queen
Identifying colony food status
Feeding Colony sugar syrup and pollen substitute
Evaluating Queen function and colony strength
Colony package evaluations
Who should attend?  All beginning beekeepers.  Training will be lead by experience beekeepers.

Field Day 3
When: May 2 11 AM
Where:     IEBA Field Yard, Prufer Crosscut Rd
What: Hive manipulations
Learn how to evaluate and equalize strength of colonies
Learn how to find queens and introduce new ones
Perform swarm control measures
Demonstrate how to make splits and nucs
Demonstration how to set up a double queen hive
Who should attend?  All beginners and intermediate skill levels.  Experienced beekeepers will lead small groups

Field Day 4
When: May 16 11 AM
Where: IEBA Field Yard, Prufer Crosscut Rd
What: Hive Manipulations
Evaluating performance of nucs and splits
Swarm control measures
Queen performance evaluations, replace poor queens
Strengthening weak hives, equalizing hives
Evaluation of whether to feed or not
Who should attend?  All beginners and intermediate skill levels.  Experienced beekeepers will lead small groups

Field Day 5
When: June 13 11AM
Where: IEBA Field Yard, Prufer Crosscut Rd
What: Supering, Swarm Control and Queen Rearing
Putting supers on colonies
What to do with colonies ready to swarm
Use of swarm board
Grafting cells for queen cells
Demonstration of small scale queen rearing
Who should attend?  All beginners and intermediate skill levels.  Experienced beekeepers will lead small groups

Field Day 5a
When: June 9 6:00 PM
Where: IEBA Field Yard, Prufer Crosscut Rd
What: Learn how to set up swarm box for rearing large number of queen cells.
Who: All who are interested.

Field Day 6
When:August 8
Where: IEBA Field Yard, Prufer Crosscut Rd
What: Mite Check and Treatment
Learn how to determine varroa mite infestation levels with various techniques
Demonstration on how to treat using commercial materials
Evaluate colonies to treat, treat colonies
Evaluate queen performance
Who should attend? Everyone interested in learning how to evaluate and treat for varroa mites

Field Day 7
When: September 12
Where: IEBA Field Yard, Prufer Crosscut Rd
What: Preparations for Wintering
Selection of colonies to be wintered
Combining those not to be wintered
Preparation of colonies
Final feeding
Who should attend: All beginners and intermediate skill levels.  Experienced beekeepers will lead small groups

Work Days
Spring cleanup April 18 with Field Day 1
Feeding: Several days in May TBA
Putting cells into nucs: June 22 6 PM
Honey super checks: June 20, 27 11 AM
Pull honey: August 1
Powder sugar treatment: August 7
Feed sugar: September