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Beekeeping at FiveApple: Daily Summaries Delivered
by Leigh Wilkerson
Talk, tips & how-to on sustainable beekeeping from the North Carolina mountains of Southern Appalachia.
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- 4 days ago36 min
Updated Ep166 Warmer autumns are good for bees right? Turns out, not really.
Found a research article that was food for thought on how warmer autumns may be having effects on our bees that aren't so good: creating smaller late-winter clusters by increased wear and tear on the precious winter bees who should not be as active as the temps drive them to be. But also, it goes into novel solutions (well, not novel in Canada but novel in more Southern climes) to help. Do backyard beekeepers have any options to help? I do some thinking aloud about all that and pondering on an unexpected potential benefit of insulation perhaps? Here is the original study if you take those straight-up-no-chaser (looking at you Susan S! ;-) : https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-024-55327-8 For a reader friendly overview that will help you then dive into the research paper: https://news.wsu.edu/press-release/2024/03/25/honey-bees-at-risk-for-colony-collapse-from-longer-warmer-fall-seasons/ Also: for my past episode on Condensing Hives vs Ventilating Hives see Ep 122 *Ep 122: New Insulation Setup and The "Condensing Hive"* A deeper dive into the why and how of the insulation setup I started using several years ago, the condensing-hive concept. For the patrons, find the links to everything mentioned in the show, and the video I made for . Wishing you all a wonderful week and let me know if there are topics about bees you have been wondering about and it's a great excuse for me to do a geek deep dive into research on it! —kind regards, Leigh Not a patron yet? You are warmly invited to become a Friend of Five Apple on Patreon and join the folks who make the podcasts possible, who keep the archives available and who keep it all advertising-free. https://www.patreon.com/fiveapple In addition to huge gratitude, you get: Detailed show notes with links, tips, comments Access to Patreon blog posts including tips and videos Occasional bonus podcasts and early access episodes Commenting on posts (and DMs) allows me to answer questions Input on the podcast topics Shout-outs on the show because I appreciate you! If you can support the show please sign up today: https://www.patreon.com/fiveapple Beekeeping at Five Apple — talk, tips, and how-to on sustainable beekeeping from the Blue Ridge mountains of Southern Appalachia. Host Leigh Wilkerson brings sixteen years of hands-on experience from her self-sustaining apiary since 2010. The podcast explores colony health, natural bee biology, and organic to chemical-free methods. Episodes go deep on seasonal management, swarm control, queen rearing, hive biology, nutrition, and sustainable genetics. Designed for beekeepers ready to go beyond the basics, with episodes for newer beekeepers too. Leigh is a popular Zoom presenter for bee clubs and associations. Topics include specialty splits so you never buy a package again; requeening approaches; simple frame-based queen rearing; building VSH genetics in your yard; and topics by request.
- 2 weeks ago23 min
Ep165: Bee Radio Reader "Reflections on the Past Seasons"
Ep165: Bee Radio Reader "Reflections on the Past Seasons" by Richard Wahl (Off the Wahl Beekeeping Column, Nov 2025. Read by permission of Bee Culture magazine. ) Today it's a radio reader episode on learning to reflect on the past in a way that makes it useful for the future. As well as a bit of clarification on the last episode. Link to the article: https://beeculture.com/off-the-wahl-beekeeping-46/ Link to another good on in the same issue: https://beeculture.com/minding-your-bees-and-cues-50/ Becky Masterman & Bridget Mendel on the fascinating Nasonov gland in "Come Hither." Both full articles are available free online. And while you are there you can get access to the whole archive with a digital subscription for as low as $24. https://simplecirc.com/subscribe/bee-culture Wishing you all a wonderful week and sure hope I'll get to meet a lot of you at the 2027 North American Honey Bee Expo (Louisville, Kentucky Jan 7-9) where I'm delighted to be a speaker for one of their smaller venue "Community Series" talks. I'll likely be talking about specialty splits (but of course!) ;-) kind regards, Leigh Not a patron yet? You are warmly invited to become a Friend of Five Apple on Patreon and join the folks who make the podcasts possible, who keep the archives available and who keep it all advertising-free. https://www.patreon.com/fiveapple In addition to huge gratitude, you get: Detailed show notes with links, tips, comments Access to Patreon blog posts including tips and videos Occasional bonus podcasts and early access episodes Commenting on posts (and DMs) allows me to answer questions Input on the podcast topics Shout-outs on the show because I appreciate you! If you can support the show please sign up today: https://www.patreon.com/fiveapple Beekeeping at Five Apple — talk, tips, and how-to on sustainable beekeeping from the Blue Ridge mountains of Southern Appalachia. Host Leigh Wilkerson brings sixteen years of hands-on experience from her self-sustaining apiary since 2010. The podcast explores colony health, natural bee biology, and organic to chemical-free methods. Episodes go deep on seasonal management, swarm control, queen rearing, hive biology, nutrition, and sustainable genetics. Designed for beekeepers ready to go beyond the basics, with episodes for newer beekeepers too. Leigh is a popular Zoom presenter for bee clubs and associations. Topics include specialty splits so you never buy a package again; requeening approaches; simple frame-based queen rearing; building VSH genetics in your yard; and topics by request.
- 3 weeks ago29 min
updated Ep164 After 16 years, a shift for me
[Last Thursday Apple podcasts had an outage and the episode didn't show up as a new one in your feed. Here it is again for the Apple folks -- just a duplicate of last weeks episode that was missing for many! --Leigh] Listeners, This has been a test year in my bee yards, to see if my old treatment-free methods that worked so well for 16 years in an isolated bee yard would hold up in areas with more beekeepers. Answer: Nope. [Deep sigh and regroup. ] I now feel so lucky to have learned a hybrid system that still allows me to work on my long term project of stock selection towards mite resistance–while also utilizing organic acids for mite clean up in colonies that don't make the cut, with a requeen afterwards with the better genetics. Back on track! Thank you to queen breeders Ryan Williamson, Ang Roell, Troy Hall , James Lee and YouTube legend Bob Binnie for helping me understand a system that allows for both. Thank you all so much for pioneering a method that gave me resolve to farmer up! I'm happy to have a plan and have put it underway. in gratitude, Leigh Thank you to the supporting Patrons. You make this podcast possible as well as keeping all of us from needing to listen to adverts! Thank you to Lisa N the newest podcast angel and thank you to Bev M, Anderson M, Greg K, Dan G, Donald F, and Kerri A for joining this community this summer! Welcome to you all! And a special shout out to podcast angels Michael C and Will C, plus Jeff T, Deborah P, Chuck J, Bruce H and Blaine N for being with the podcast since it started in 2019! What a huge amount of gratitude I have for your continued support. It's thanks to you this podcast still exists. Not a patron yet? You are warmly invited to become a Friend of Five Apple on Patreon and join the folks who make the podcasts possible, who keep the archives available and who keep it all advertising-free. https://www.patreon.com/fiveapple In addition to huge gratitude, you get: Detailed show notes with links, tips, comments Access to Patreon blog posts including tips and videos Occasional bonus podcasts and early access episodes Commenting on posts (and DMs) allows me to answer questions Input on the podcast topics Shout-outs on the show because I appreciate you! If you can support the show please sign up today: https://www.patreon.com/fiveapple Beekeeping at Five Apple — talk, tips, and how-to on sustainable beekeeping from the Blue Ridge mountains of Southern Appalachia. Host Leigh Wilkerson brings sixteen years of hands-on experience from her self-sustaining apiary since 2010. The podcast explores colony health, natural bee biology, and organic to chemical-free methods. Episodes go deep on seasonal management, swarm control, queen rearing, hive biology, nutrition, and sustainable genetics. Designed for beekeepers ready to go beyond the basics, with episodes for newer beekeepers too. Leigh is a popular Zoom presenter for bee clubs and associations. Topics include specialty splits so you never buy a package again; requeening approaches; simple frame-based queen rearing; building VSH genetics in your yard; and topics by request.
- Aug 20, 202628 min
Ep164 After 16 years, a shift for me
This has been a test year in my bee yards, to see if my old treatment-free methods that worked so well for 16 years in an isolated bee yard would hold up in areas with more beekeepers. Answer: Nope. [Deep sigh and regroup. ] I now feel so lucky to have learned a hybrid system that still allows me to work on my long term project of stock selection towards mite resistance–while also utilizing organic acids for mite clean up in colonies that don't make the cut, with a requeen afterwards with the better genetics. Back on track! Thank you to queen breeders Ryan Williamson, Ang Roell, Troy Hall , James Lee and YouTube legend Bob Binnie for helping me understand a system that allows for both. Thank you all so much for pioneering a method that gave me resolve to farmer up! I'm happy to have a plan and have put it underway. in gratitude, Leigh Thank you to the supporting Patrons. You make this podcast possible as well as keeping all of us from needing to listen to adverts! Thank you to Lisa N the newest podcast angel and thank you to Bev M, Anderson M, Greg K, Dan G, Donald F, and Kerri A for joining this community this summer! Welcome to you all! And a special shout out to podcast angels Michael C and Will C, plus Jeff T, Deborah P, Chuck J, Bruce H and Blaine N for being with the podcast since it started in 2019! What a huge amount of gratitude I have for your continued support. It's thanks to you this podcast still exists. Not a patron yet? You are warmly invited to become a Friend of Five Apple on Patreon and join the folks who make the podcasts possible, who keep the archives available and who keep it all advertising-free. https://www.patreon.com/fiveapple In addition to huge gratitude, you get: Detailed show notes with links, tips, comments Access to Patreon blog posts including tips and videos Occasional bonus podcasts and early access episodes Commenting on posts (and DMs) allows me to answer questions Input on the podcast topics Shout-outs on the show because I appreciate you! If you can support the show please sign up today: https://www.patreon.com/fiveapple Beekeeping at Five Apple — talk, tips, and how-to on sustainable beekeeping from the Blue Ridge mountains of Southern Appalachia. Host Leigh Wilkerson brings sixteen years of hands-on experience from her self-sustaining apiary since 2010. The podcast explores colony health, natural bee biology, and organic to chemical-free methods. Episodes go deep on seasonal management, swarm control, queen rearing, hive biology, nutrition, and sustainable genetics. Designed for beekeepers ready to go beyond the basics, with episodes for newer beekeepers too. Leigh is a popular Zoom presenter for bee clubs and associations. Topics include specialty splits so you never buy a package again; requeening approaches; simple frame-based queen rearing; building VSH genetics in your yard; and topics by request.
- Aug 6, 202625 min
Ep163 Robbing prevention (and a tip I love!)
Today it's about the bee's most awful behavior: ROBBING. I found a tip on reducing robbing while doing inspections and it works great!! The PerfectBee.com website I mentioned. The article was from their email newsletter but here's a link to an article on robbing on their blog. BetterBee's article on robbing and prevention Rusty of HoneyBeeSuite.com on robbing and another post on preventing it. May your season be blessedly free of robbing among your bees! kind regards, Leigh _________________________ You are warmly invited to become a Friend of Five Apple on Patreon and join the folks who make the podcasts possible, who keep the archives available and who keep it all advertising-free. https://www.patreon.com/fiveapple In addition to huge gratitude, you get: Detailed show notes with links, tips, comments Access to Patreon blog posts including tips and videos Occasional bonus podcasts and early access episodes Commenting on posts (and DMs) allows me to answer questions Input on the podcast topics Shout-outs on the show because I appreciate you! If you can support the show please sign up today: https://www.patreon.com/fiveapple Beekeeping at Five Apple — talk, tips, and how-to on sustainable beekeeping from the Blue Ridge mountains of Southern Appalachia. Host Leigh Wilkerson brings sixteen years of hands-on experience from her self-sustaining apiary since 2010. The podcast explores colony health, natural bee biology, and organic to chemical-free approaches. Episodes go deep on seasonal management, swarm control, queen rearing, hive biology, nutrition, and sustainable genetics. Designed for beekeepers ready to go beyond the basics, with episodes for newer beekeepers too. Leigh is a popular Zoom presenter for bee clubs and associations. Topics include specialty splits so you never buy a package again; requeening approaches; simple frame-based queen rearing; building VSH genetics in your yard; and topics by request.
- Jul 23, 202631 min
Ep162 July Ramble–thoughts in the heat, fun letter, invitation for you
Today Episode: July bee yard update William's tips on honey harvest (see Williams letter here) Tip on making bee boxes last longer "painting with glue" — this whole presentation is well worth watching! ( YouTube Link) Invitation to see Julia Mahood present on drones (see below for info) Reminder to take care in the heat with electrolytes Thoughts on "Chasing Sourwood" and the impacts on stationary beekeepers (AR apiary law. See section 3B for the provision I mention.) See LINKS and a copy of Williams letter here! (free and available to everyone) Thank you to the patrons who keep this podcast available to all (and they also get extra goodies as a thank you for the support). Not a patron yet? Please join us at https://www.patreon.com/fiveapple July 28, 2026 July Monthly With Guest Speaker Julia Mahood / ToeCane Beekeepers Julia Mahood is a Georgia Master Crafts Beekeeper who has been keeping bees since 2004. She is currently president of the Georgia Beekeepers Association. She will discuss honey bee drone behavior, drone congregation areas, and why drones matter. Meetings begin at 6:00 p.m. with official business starting at 6:30. Meetings are held at Trinity Episcopal Church, 15 Hemlock Ave., Spruce Pine NC 28777. Beekeeping at Five Apple — talk, tips, and how-to on sustainable beekeeping from the Blue Ridge mountains of Southern Appalachia. Host Leigh Wilkerson brings sixteen years of hands-on experience from her self-sustaining apiary since 2010. The podcast explores colony health, natural bee biology, and organic to chemical-free approaches. Episodes go deep on seasonal management, swarm control, queen rearing, hive biology, nutrition, and sustainable genetics. Designed for beekeepers ready to go beyond the basics, with episodes for newer beekeepers too. Leigh is a popular Zoom presenter for bee clubs and associations. Topics include specialty splits so you never buy a package again; requeening approaches; simple frame-based queen rearing; building VSH genetics in your yard; and topics by request.
- Jul 9, 202643 min
Ep161 Making sense of the assays—with Ang Roell of They Keep Bees
UBO, PKB, FKB, mite washes, Harbo assays... It's an alphabet soup out there of ways to test your bees for hygienic traits and resistance to varroa. You may be testing to find out when to apply mite treatments or a brood break to a colony and in that case a simple mite wash is usually enough. But you may be testing to find out your very best genetics you have to raise next years queens for your yards and in that case, you probably need need more information than a mite wash provides. Or do you? Do these assays work, how reliably do they work and which one is the most reliable, if any? Ang Roell and Bi Kline of They Keep Bees are working to find out with a new NE SARE grant comparison study. Today Ang and I talk about the cornucopia of testing methods that each have their complications and limitations. We'll also find out what Ang and Bi will explore in this ongoing study. Plus, we chat bees, of course. :-) Hope you enjoy this weeks episode! kind regards, Leigh The Study (read the full grant proposal and study design here) In 2025 national honey bee losses exceeded 60% in commercial beekeeping operations. Miticide resistance was discovered in 100% of tested samples, highlighting an urgent need for biology-based strategies that reduce chemical dependence while strengthening colony resilience. This project evaluates the reliability and heritability of four major hygienic behavior assays, in order to determine which methods best predict mite resistance and overwinter survival. We will compare assay performance in twelve breeder colonies (six selected, six controls) and their untreated F1 daughters. Across two seasons, all colonies will undergo standardized rounds of UBO, PKB, and FKB testing, as well as mite washes and Harbo assays. By analyzing correlations among assay scores, mite loads, reproductive mite presence, and overwinter survival, we will identify which tools reliably capture heritable Varroa-resistant traits and which factors influence assay consistency. This project addresses a documented need for effective selection tools that help beekeepers identify and propagate Varroa-resistant stock. Results will be shared through a report, digital outreach, and a presentation at Cornell's Dyce Lab. A hands-on workshop at They Keep Bees will train beekeepers to practice each assay method. By providing evidence-based guidance to at least 100 beekeepers, the project aims to enable measurable improvements such as higher overwinter survival and reduced reliance on miticides. Project objectives from proposal: Primary Research Questions Do pin-killed brood (PKB), freeze-killed brood using liquid nitrogen (FKB), and unhealthy brood odor (UBO) assays provide predictive measures of heritable mite-resistant traits in F1 daughter queens? Are these assays also predictive of overall colony mite loads and winter survival outcomes? Winter survival will be defined as survival from August of year 1 until March of year 2. Thank you to the patrons who keep this podcast available to all (and they also get extra goodies as a thank you for the support). Not a patron yet? Please join us at https://www.patreon.com/fiveapple
- Jun 25, 202644 min
Ep160 Honey Harvesting Process
In this episode I share my own process for getting honey from the hives to the jars. It's quirky but it works for me and I'm hoping you might find ideas for your own process or just enjoy hearing how someone else does it. That's what I did when researching this episode! For supporting patrons, I've also collected a few videos (with video summaries included) you might enjoy and for newer beekeepers, a PDF with a list of tips and links that may help you figure out your own process. If you aren't a supporting patron yet, please join and find that post here: https://www.patreon.com/fiveapple/posts/ep160-honey-162052074 __________________________ Not a patron yet? You are warmly invited to become a Friend of Five Apple on Patreon and join the folks who make the podcasts possible, who keep the archives available and who keep it all advertising-free. https://www.patreon.com/fiveapple In addition to huge gratitude, you get: Detailed show notes with links, tips, comments Access to Patreon blog posts including tips and videos Occasional bonus podcasts and early access episodes Commenting on posts (and DMs) allows me to answer questions Input on the podcast topics Shout-outs on the show because I appreciate you! If you can support the show please sign up today: https://www.patreon.com/fiveapple Beekeeping at Five Apple — talk, tips, and how-to on sustainable beekeeping from the Blue Ridge mountains of Southern Appalachia. Host Leigh Wilkerson brings sixteen years of hands-on experience from her self-sustaining apiary since 2010. The podcast explores colony health, natural bee biology, and organic to chemical-free approaches. Episodes go deep on seasonal management, swarm control, queen rearing, hive biology, nutrition, and sustainable genetics. Designed for beekeepers ready to go beyond the basics, with episodes for newer beekeepers too. Leigh is a popular Zoom presenter for bee clubs and associations. Topics include specialty splits so you never buy a package again; requeening approaches; simple frame-based queen rearing; building VSH genetics in your yard; and topics by request.
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Talk, tips & how-to on sustainable beekeeping from the North Carolina mountains of Southern Appalachia.
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