THIS CLASS WILL BE HELD ONLINE and split into two parts:
Sunday, May 17th, noon-2pm
Sunday, May 24th, noon-2pm

Learn how to work with the bees as they expand in the spring by making successful splits. Splitting your hive is the number one thing you can do to reduce the varroa mite population. It also enables you to have 2-3 hives so you have more flexibility in helping out a weak hive. We will cover how bees make new queens, the timeline of queen mating, and how to make a basic split. This class will go into more details of making splits and nucs, including specific splits that work well, what can go wrong and how to fix it, and which months/timing works best. We will go into detail on a specific split that reduces varroa mites on both sides of the split. In order to make certain splits, you will need to be able to spot your queen, so we will go over tips for learning how to see your queen and how to find her.

This class is for beginners who haven’t made a split yet – we’ll cover simple splits to start out with.  This class is also aimed at beekeepers who have split before and who need tips, tricks, and advice.

Instructor: Jennifer Radtke has been keeping bees in her backyard for 13 years, and has developed the beekeeping education program at the Oasis. She keeps up with her bees’ growth in early spring and splits her hives every year around April 1st (& sometimes a second time at the end of May).