Cathy Isom remains with her series on bees by giving you a few great tips about how to help defend your bees against bee predators. That’s coming up on This Land of Ours.
The way bees defend themselves is impressive, however, sometimes, they need our help against bee predators. Here are some ways to help give him a helping hand.
Fence Your Hive In. Using anything from chicken wire to hot fencing can help keep paws off your precious honey stores.
Keep Your Hive Off The Ground. Raising your hive a few feet off the ground will discourage skunks from stretching out and reaching up into your hive.
Live Traps. Live traps are ok for smaller bee-seeking critters, but live traps work best for predators like raccoons; however, they are more like band-aids rather than solutions to the problem.
Spike Strips. Make a board with nails or tacks poking upward to keep mammals away from the hive.
Robbing Screens. Robbing screens and garden screens will keep unwanted wasps, robbing bees, or beewolves, out of the hive while allowing resident bees to come and go. The screen confuses insects that do not live in the hive because they can smell the honey, and try to enter where they can smell it.
I’m Cathy Isom…