# Using excel to estimate yearly income



## Arpolis (Aug 26, 2013)

Hello everyone.

I am just a minor beek with ambitions of a small apiary to help supplement my income and eventually take over as my main job. I currently have a 5 year plan to expand up to about 200+ hives with the goal of having a constant supply of 200 minimum 1+ year old hives ready for harvesting through the year. 

Yesterday I wanted to use excel to figure up some random probabilities on what yearly income could look like. This was all assuming I package and sell the honey myself either through online sales or from local events/farmers markets. I used the RANDBETWEEN function to set up ranges (best and worst case scenario) with lots of different variables and then ran 10,000 scenarios and came up with the averages.

Here are the variables:

Profit per lb of honey: 
Profit per lb of wax: 
Production of honey per hive: 
Production of wax per hive: 
Number of nucs for sale: 
Profit per nuc sale: 
Hive death rate per year:
Cost per dead hive replacement:
Price per hive medication/feeding: 
Percent of stock sold: 

I used a constant of 200 hives being harvested over the year. 

The lowest/highest profit range for each section was entered as follows:

Profit per lb of honey: $3.48/5.22
Profit per lb of wax: $5.22/18.26
Production of honey per hive: 8.70lb/69.57lb
Production of wax per hive: 1.74lb/13.04lb
Number of nucs for sale: 0/43
Profit per nuc sale: $60.87/113.04
Hive death rate per year: 43.48%/8.7%
Cost per dead hive replacement: $156.52/69.57
Price per hive medication/feeding: $34.78/17.39
Percent of stock sold: 43.48%/104.35%

After the 10,000 scenario runs the lowest profit range is in debt by $11,312.50. So could be first year I tank and in some real debt on costs and lack of sales. But highest profit rate on these ranges is $96,945.94. So there is money to be had if things go right. But the average of all 10,000 simulations was $28,289.49. 

The average of each variable looks like:

Profit per lb of honey: $4.35
Profit per lb of wax: $11.78
Production of honey per hive: 39.09lb
Production of wax per hive: 7.40lb
Number of nucs for sale: 21.68 nucs
Profit per nuc sale: $86.99
Hive death rate per year: 26.16%
Cost per dead hive replacement: $113.13
Price per hive medication/feeding: $25.98
Percent of stock sold: 73.87%

So I can sell less than 75% of what the 200 hives could produce at the above rates and make nearly $30,000 a year. I would have to have a running 75ish hives a year I am gaining from swarm calls, cut outs, purchases & splits just to jeep up with nuc sales and mortality rate. But once you have that many hives that does not sound that hard. Well who am I kidding. It is hard work but feasible is I guess what I mean. 

Anyone have any comments on the ranges. Does anything here seam remotely real world?


----------



## JRG13 (May 11, 2012)

Where did you get the max and minimum ranges from? Were these just your best estimates?


----------



## Arpolis (Aug 26, 2013)

Some are educated guesses, others I pulled from other discussions.


----------



## babybee (Mar 23, 2012)

I think the most recent info from bee informed partnership shows that us beekeepers lose 45 percent annually. So I would guess you will lose more than the 43.48 percent on your high side as far as the bee hive mortality goes.


----------



## johnbeejohn (Jun 30, 2013)

opcorn:opcorn:


----------



## hex0rz (Jan 14, 2014)

I dunno if i could really believe in the idea that commercial operations lose that many hives annually...


----------



## liljake83 (Jul 2, 2013)

How does your projections account for a draught year or the opposite heavy rains washing away all the necter remember this is agriculture those carefully laid out projections can prove useless with the wrong weather patterns


----------



## babybee (Mar 23, 2012)

Well, I didn't say I was losing that many, but yes most do. Huge queen failure issues, pesticide, diseases, poor forage, parasites are among the reasons it tough to keep them alive and thriving. There is plenty of money in bees. But it starts and ends with keeping them alive.


----------



## Keith Jarrett (Dec 10, 2006)

babybee said:


> But it starts and ends with keeping them alive.


Well said, Andy.


----------



## Polarbees (Jun 22, 2014)

Arpolis said:


> Cost per dead hive replacement: $156.52/69.57


How did you get these numbers? Are you replacing your stock with purchased packages or nucs, and queens? If so, then it seems that you'd be selling your nucs at a loss, since the cost of replacing a dead hive is greater than the profits on your nuc sales.


----------



## Arpolis (Aug 26, 2013)

Polarbees said:


> How did you get these numbers? Are you replacing your stock with purchased packages or nucs, and queens? If so, then it seems that you'd be selling your nucs at a loss, since the cost of replacing a dead hive is greater than the profits on your nuc sales.


I am just putting in worst case scenarios into the mix. I mean if all I have to do is catch a swarm of do a split using exists ting equipment it is near free for the Replacement but if there is a disease that requires burning wooden ware then building that from scraps to new wood or event pre-made may as costs. Or if I find I can't do splits and have to buy bees locally or have them shipped in for some of the replacements. Plus it is all averages of all lost hives replaced. I wanted to go into the more expensive rather than optimistic hoping that it would account for anything I am missing.


----------



## Arpolis (Aug 26, 2013)

babybee said:


> I think the most recent info from bee informed partnership shows that us beekeepers lose 45 percent annually. So I would guess you will lose more than the 43.48 percent on your high side as far as the bee hive mortality goes.


I based my mortality rates on local nuc breeders here in Oklahoma and talking with them about the years past. So I think my averages are consistent to practices around here.


----------



## babybee (Mar 23, 2012)

Often I find beekeepers to be like fishermen.


----------



## yousowise (Apr 14, 2011)

I'll bite, how babybee?


----------



## m0dem (May 14, 2016)

Now all you have to do is raise the cost by 50% and lower the profit by 50%!


----------



## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

Ever hear a fisherman tell about the "one that got away". They are always the biggest fish ever seen since the world began.

The significant issues I did not see addressed was fixed costs and yearly expenses.

$20,000 to build 200 colonies of bees presuming a LOT of sweat equity
$25,000 to set up honey handling facilities presuming you already own a building
$15,000 to purchase a truck and trailer to haul things around
Amortized over 10 years, I make it $10,000 per year in fixed cost expenses

$3,000 per year to pay insurance, gas, maintenance, etc
1000 hours of your time per year managing the bees = $20,000
500 hours of hired help time per year because you can't do all of it = $5000

Yearly payout is $28,000 which means the $10,000 of fixed expenses has to come out of your $20,000 management time. At the end of the year, your average profit is $10,000 which is less than $1000 per month. Yep, sounds like beekeeping to me.


----------



## ethanhogan (Jun 1, 2016)

^^^ that sounds a lot more accurate than excel to me. I like real life numbers! Computers don't account for life or real world.


----------



## m0dem (May 14, 2016)

Fusion_power said:


> $20,000 to build 200 colonies of bees presuming a LOT of sweat equity


I want to know where I can get 200 at only $100 each!


----------



## m0dem (May 14, 2016)

Fusion_power said:


> $20,000 to build 200 colonies of bees presuming a LOT of sweat equity


I want to know where I can get 200 colonies at only $100 each!  
Equipment per hive costs more than that!
Pretty soon you're making $0 (or negative) each year. Until year 11! When you can make a wopping couple thousand bucks!


----------



## clyderoad (Jun 10, 2012)

Fusion_power said:


> Ever hear a fisherman tell about the "one that got away". They are always the biggest fish ever seen since the world began.
> 
> 
> 1000 hours of your time per year managing the bees = $20,000



so how can 1 person manage 2000 colonies? very fishy. 



Fusion_power said:


> Re the question whether a beekeeper can run 2000 colonies, I know it can be done because I know someone who does it. He is a honey producer, not a pollinator and all of his bees are on fixed locations. He is getting older and slowing down a bit so the last couple of years he has hired help to pull supers and get them to the honey house for extraction. He is a dawn to dark go getter. No, I won't give out names, I like my privacy and he likes his. But he is in the southeast U.S.


----------



## m0dem (May 14, 2016)

He said 200 colonies in this post...


----------



## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

200 hives of bees will take about the same amount of time for a non-mechanized beekeeper as 1000 colonies for a fully palletized and mechanized setup. You can't pay for that kind of setup with 200 hives of bees.

I can build a Langstroth hive with frames and foundation and supers for about $100. Splitting and catching swarms and cutouts can fill those hives with bees. Would I want to do it? No way on earth, I've put in nearly 1000 hours of "sweat equity" just getting 28 new Square Dadant depth hives with supers this spring.


----------



## m0dem (May 14, 2016)

In other words, you might think Fusion_power is being a party pooper, but *he's being optimistic!*


----------



## RichardsonTX (Jul 3, 2011)

Arpolis, rather than run scenarios based on variables, I'd recommend you build some actual proforma financial statements to develop a plan for your business. 

Create a year's worth of monthly proforma balance sheets where at that point you can decide on what your investment would be in the business, how it would be broken up into debt and equity (or just equity), and what the asset side would look like depending on how you are investing your cash. Do the same with creating a year's worth of monthly income statements as you create the monthly balance sheets. I'd recommend being very realistic with yourself and continue using probability scenarios like you seem to be trying to do already, just not with variables only. As you work through each month's proforma statements you will be forced to create an action plan since each month coming up will be impacted by your actions for the month before. Then, keep doing this as far into the future as you'd like to develop your plan using retained earning's, additional equity investments, and additional debt (if you want to go that route) to finance future growth. You should also create proforma cash flow statements if you can or at least some way to analyze your cash flow over the time period you are projecting. Lots of profitable businesses go out of business each year because they run out of cash or depend to much on debt for financing and the business cycle swings too far one way. Also, a lot of people who don't even know what a balance sheet, income statement, or cash flow statement is will be successful because they understand the importance of cash flow and having a solid plan. 

Be honest and realistic with yourself on how much you can do yourself. Take into account where your time is being used effectively and where certain things are better left being hired out or purchased as a finished product, rather than trying to do everything yourself. Make sure to consider all expenses too, like vehicle expenses. Also, try to come up with realistic market values for the different types of assets you'd hold in your beekeeping business and adjust your balance sheets to reflect the market values. That isn't typical accounting but it's a good way keep a realistic view of your business's market value if you ever needed to liquidate all or a part of the assets. And, it helps you to understand where your "sweat" equity is adding to your profit dollars along with changes in the value of certain assets typical to the industry, like honey you may be holding as inventory. I think planning this way will also cause you to make better long term decisions when building/purchasing equipment, or how you manage the health of your bees. 

Having said all that, for me, beekeeping has always been a hobby. I do keep records though and from time to time, for fun, even develop some proforma financials for a sideline beekeeping business like I've suggested you do. But, in reality, my professional occupation is how I feed my family and I don't in any way ever depend on generating any income from my beekeeping efforts................giving away honey and hives, and taking off from caring for my bees for long periods of time, isn't too good for business, lol.


----------



## Arpolis (Aug 26, 2013)

Thank you all for the thoughts. Of course all of this is very loose estimates and there are other things to account for. I plan on slowly building over the next 5 years and when things get bigger I will slowly get a better understanding of actual cost of running the business and expanding. Just the first post was a crude attempt at showing that it is possible to make money with these numbers. It all still seems feasible. Only time will tell for sure though as I gain more practice experience.


----------



## babybee (Mar 23, 2012)

It's just that I talk to all of my neighboring bee friends and I also get to drive by their yards. I would take the numbers from bee informed partnership and go with their mortality numbers versus what the local boys are telling you at the coffee shop. Who brags about their high death rate except maybe someone trying to make the news?? To be optimistic is good, but you are new to this so it makes more sense to be realistic. I have been plugging away at bees for most of 20 years, and have had great successes. We are running lots of bees and I generally love it. But this year has thrown us for a loop. Our bees got nailed in the almonds and it's been a struggle to right the ship so to speak.


----------



## JRG13 (May 11, 2012)

baby, what was it that hit the bees, IGR's or fungicides?


----------



## Arpolis (Aug 26, 2013)

Oh I understand being realistic. My projections show being in the hole $10,000+ some years and I figure it may be that way many years. That is why I don't skip my day job and I only figure 200 hives to manage rather than investing in loans and try and get 1000 hives. I am near 5 years into the hobby and have many more ahead of me. We will see.


----------



## stasn (Apr 7, 2015)

Here is the 'spreadsheet' in reality 

My second year in beekeeping (I work full time, M-F, 9am-6pm):

1st year 2015 (the goal was to learn):
Invested (paid, no debt): $6,000 on 20 hives (that includes everything; equipment and keeping them alive - NOT including management hours)
Profit: ZERO

2nd Year 2016 (the goal was to expand, NOT gain profit):
Invested (paid, no debt): $60,000+ on 100 hives (that induces; $85/NUC, $24k truck, $11k trailer, $10k boxes/frames/pallets for this year and future, $1.5+k feeding, etc. NOT including management hours). The year is not over, will probably spend couple more thousands ($)..
Profit: so far ZERO, and I expect it to stay that way for next year or two..

3rd Year 2017: 
Goal: Expand to 300 hives, do almond ($160/hive) and blueberry ($30/hive) pollination (with 100 hives), sell honey (4,000lb - 40 from each hive - $3.50/lb), buy new HummerBee forklift ($40k).

IF all goes well, here is the simplified "spreadsheet" for end of 2017:
2015-2016: $0 (profit) - $70,000 (spent) = -$70,000
2017: $33,000 (profit) - $50,000 (spent) = -$17,000
End of 2017: $87k in "debt"

2018 - If pollinating and honey selling with 300 hives:
$100,000 profit - $20,000 (estimated 2018 spending) - $87,000 (2017 'debt') = -$7,000

2019 - Only this year I expect to gain profit (but I plan to to expend to 600 hive)...


----------



## babybee (Mar 23, 2012)

JRG13, most likely a combo of both. We sent a few frames in with Megan from bee informed partnership but haven't heard anything back. If I ever get hit this hard again I will really have to change my strategy.


----------



## JRG13 (May 11, 2012)

I recall the earlier threads, most I talked to, I don't know why IGR's would be applied so early when the bees are around but perhaps tank mixes were going on to cut costs and amount of sprays to be done.


----------



## jean-marc (Jan 13, 2005)

Or some tanks were not washed out properly, or...

Jean-Marc


----------



## JRG13 (May 11, 2012)

Stasn, what interested you about honeybees to invest so much? Do you think it will be a good return on the investment, or is it just something you want to do? I can see if you're playing the long game the bees should eventually pay off and if you can get/find good honey yards for the expansions it can work.


----------



## stasn (Apr 7, 2015)

There was a point were I started liking beekeeping more than my current day job (IT). Also, being single at 25 and living rent free, I'm using the opportunity to invest in something I really like and something that will pay same if not more than my day job.. If I don't find good yards, I will have to rely on syrup.


----------



## ethanhogan (Jun 1, 2016)

I think some of the debt may have been a little aggressive. I think their are plenty of way to expand to 300 hives without so much debt. You may not get much honey, but you could excessively split until you reach that number, and it may take a little longer, but I rather be patient and have 0 debt and make money selling nucs and queens then pollinating. Only time will tell, that much debt just makes me nervous hahaha... For exampl, you could take your 20 hives from year 1, if they where double deeps and split into 4 nucs and over winter, account for some losses and hope you come out with 70 hives. Year 2, you let them all expand into double deeps with some feeding, then split them all again to 4 nucs, you are now going into winter with 280 nucs, we will assume it was a bad winter or mites and you lose 30 nucs, you are now to 250 nucs coming out of spring #2, we now let these bees go into deeps and expand into 2 double deeps again, and get ready for 3rd year of summer splitting, now we are going to let the strongest 200 nucs expand to production colonies, and we split the rest of the 50 double deeps 4 times to another 200 nucs for losses of production colonies bring our 3 year total to 400 colonies.


----------



## ethanhogan (Jun 1, 2016)

Now this is only bees, it doesn't account for all the thousands of frames, foundation, boxes, pallets, sugar, medications if you use them which is ALOT of money hahaha, but if you had no job or side job and made all of your own boxes and equipment and knew someone with an endless supply of free pallets you may be able to send some money. And you could supplement your money loss with nuc sells and queen rearing if you had time to fit that in into your schedule with all those thousands of splits hahaha... This all theoretical I will let you all know how it goes lol


----------



## m0dem (May 14, 2016)

ethanhogan said:


> account for some losses and hope you come out with 70 hives.


You should count on higher winter losses.


----------



## stasn (Apr 7, 2015)

By 'debt' I meant to say getting a 'loan' from my pocket.
I pay everything out of pocket. This privilege comes with being able to use 90% of your paycheck for the last 2 years and have a brother that gives 50%+ of his.
I'm planning to have 100 double deeps on pollination next sprint and make 2 NUC's from each afterwards. We'll see how it goes. 

Also, I keep the following words of Solomon in perspective:
"Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain." Psalm 127:1
"Blessed is everyone who fears the Lord, who walks in his ways! You shall eat the fruit of the labor of your hands; you shall be blessed, and it shall be well with you." Psalm 128:1-2


----------



## ethanhogan (Jun 1, 2016)

Modem, I was being positive/optimistic for the first year hahaha.. The 2nd year I accounted for 30 losses which is a quite a few imho. STASN I apologize for misunderstanding! I thought you were taking out loans for all that which I thought was aggressive. I am simile to you I work a FT job that pays for my hobby that will hopefully, allow me to quite my day job. I'm just going a much slower route then you hahaha


----------



## babybee (Mar 23, 2012)

Syrup doesn't fix poor territory. To have great bees remember pollen!!!


----------



## Keith Jarrett (Dec 10, 2006)

babybee said:


> To have great bees remember pollen!!!


Or, a great pollen sub.


----------



## jean-marc (Jan 13, 2005)

Remember alsotokeep your pollinatio prices in line with the current market. It is my understanding that $160 on almonds is a bit low. I heard a lot of $180's. I suppose it all depends. I am hearing $50, some 60's... so at $30, you are leaving a lot of money on the table.

Generally speaking I see nothing wrong with debt. It allows growth on someones else's nickel. I could have gotten to where I am sooner had I taken on more debt earlier. I was prudent with the little money we had and did grow on a cash basis only. Just recently I took on some debt, to allow further growth. I had to get an extraction facility together and a bunch of boxes to go through that facility. I had to take advantage of the bees, the crew that we have. I think it was the right decision. I did not see the catastrophic drop in honey prices that we as an industry have suffered in the last year coming. I am prettysure we can weather that storm.

I think I would be inclined to take on more debt if I operated on the other side of the border. Firstly there seems to be a lot of pollination opportunities, in particuar on almonds. Blueberries as well just south of us. The second factor and probably the most impotant one is the ability to replace deadouts with relatively cheap bees. I am talking about a frame of capped brood with adhering bees for $16 after almonds in California. Assuming you have good yards you can build back up in a short order of time, if you have some money. In Canada it takes a whole bunch more money to replace the dead colonies. Pricing on bulk honey by the truckload seems to be 15-30 % more on the other side of the border, depending on whom you speak with. Generally we get larger crops in Canada. There is a larger population base in the USA so the market to sell your products is easier. Queens, nucs, honey, pollen etc.. For these reasons I would be less hesitant to borrow money from another source than the pocket if I were operating in the USA.

Jean-Marc


----------



## ethanhogan (Jun 1, 2016)

Great info Jean! Thank you


----------



## stasn (Apr 7, 2015)

I came to realize that you can have bees and everything set up (the easy part) but finding a place for honey source is one of the most critical points in beekeeping (the hard part).

Jean, do you know of any other good honey sources besides blueberry and blackberry in NW (Oregon, Washington, Idaho, west Montana)? I need to find couple places for next year.. I know clover (open wild fields I'm assuming?) and Alfalfa (farm fields?) are good sources, but do we have them (especially Alfalfa) here in the NW?


----------



## HarryVanderpool (Apr 11, 2005)

stasn said:


> I came to realize that you can have bees and everything set up (the easy part) but finding a place for honey source is one of the most critical points in beekeeping (the hard part).


Also, it is very important to realize that when you find one these (wide open fields) or (farm fields), they are owned by someone.
That someone almost certainly has a long standing relationship with a beekeeper in place.
That is the first question that I ask.

There is nothing wrong with talking with land owners and looking for new spots.
We all do it.
But in your (our) region, your relationship and position within the beekeeping agricultural community is at least equally valuable.
Good luck.


----------



## jean-marc (Jan 13, 2005)

Stasn: In the NW maples are a great source of nectar and pollen. This year was exceptionally good in that regard. Firewood can also be good. It is however extremely fickle. One valley can produce one year and the next valley over hardly produces. No rhyme or reason. Contact the logging companies about setting up yards. The good thing about firewood is that it flowers late in the season after the blackberries.

Jean-Marc


----------



## stasn (Apr 7, 2015)

Is firewood a tree breed or general forest?


----------



## grozzie2 (Jun 3, 2011)

I think he meant fireweed, but auto-correct changed it for him.


----------



## HarryVanderpool (Apr 11, 2005)

grozzie2 said:


> I think he meant fireweed, but auto-correct changed it for him.


Dang it! :doh:

And just when I was getting all excited about taking bees wood cutting......


----------



## grozzie2 (Jun 3, 2011)

HarryVanderpool said:


> And just when I was getting all excited about taking bees wood cutting......


If you are going to take your bees out cutting, you can increase the yield a bit by following in these folks footsteps.


----------



## stasn (Apr 7, 2015)

Arpolis, I don't intend to overtake your thread. But I think its related (when you'll start hauling bees).

I have a 28' GN that I need to buy a net for (will be pulling my bees down to AZ for overwintering).

I submitted quotes to the below manufacturers for the following:
28' (length) x 8' (wide) x 9' (drop)
Frond: boxed, Rear: Flap-(for later use on semi)
3 rows of D-rings

1) $900 + $50 shipping (many folks on other threads recommended this)
http://www.meyerhoneyfarms.com/nets.html

2) $750 - $900.00 (Depending on weight of material, shelterite fabric) + $90 shipping
http://trsindustries.com/portfolio/custom-bee-nets/

3) $730 + unknown shipping (McFarland Tent & Awning)
http://bit.ly/29p691n
http://bit.ly/29CMXmz

What would you guys recommend? Should I go with Meyer? (they only offer in orange color)
What details should I pay attention to when ordering?
Is it worth ordering the two extra strips (see this video https://youtu.be/NEbBZjrUTnY?t=4m36s)?


----------



## m0dem (May 14, 2016)

stasn said:


> *$750 - $900.00* (Depending on weight of material, shelterite fabric) *+ $90* shipping


For a moment there that didn't make sense.
That's a good deal!


----------



## Thedwall (Jul 9, 2016)

Going way back to the beginning, your wax production estimate seems really high to me. I have always estimated about 1.5 lbs of wax per 100 lbs of honey. Last year I got about half that which is definitely on the low end- about 1/3 lb per hive on a below average honey year. Your numbers give you around $16,000 just from wax which is about half your estimated profit.


----------



## stasn (Apr 7, 2015)

What kind of plant is this? 
I'm assuming it's NOT the Fireweed you guys are talking about or is it?


----------



## m0dem (May 14, 2016)

Google Images for Fireweed.


----------



## stasn (Apr 7, 2015)

Looks like that plant is called "Spiraea douglasii". A lot of it grows next to my bee yard and I was just curious if bees get any nectar or pollen from it..


----------



## m0dem (May 14, 2016)

That looks like the same plant. Common names: hardhack and steeplebush.
http://pnwplants.wsu.edu/PlantDisplay.aspx?PlantID=25 says:


> The beautiful flowers of this plant attract butterflies, bees and other insects.


----------



## jean-marc (Jan 13, 2005)

stasn:

That is not fireweed. If you ever produce it, there is a high demand for this honey. There is a big demand for it locally... in the PNW. Water white and very slow to granulate.

Jean-Marc


----------



## Adrian Quiney WI (Sep 14, 2007)

Arpolis, one thing that interests me is your mechanical ability? From what I see on this forum a prerequisite skill for beekeepers, like farmers, is the ability to fix machines yourself. When one is operating on a larger scale, mechanization becomes a must for moving bees and extracting honey.
The lack of mechanical ability has been a natural constraint on my beekeeping ambitions - my wife is the maintenance person in our house and she has her limits.


----------



## grozzie2 (Jun 3, 2011)

This is what the fireweed in a logged area looks like 3 years after they log. Depending on how fast the trees grow back, the site will be good for a few years, the fireweed starts to die off when the trees get high enough to choke the sunlight off the weeds. The photo was taken a couple years ago, and this spot will do us at least two more years, the trees grow back fast in our part of the world. Depending on weather, the bloom can run from 4 to 6 weeks around here. But the weeds are fickle from year to year, the year I took this photo we got 100lb per hive out of this location. Last summer was hot and dusty, so much so, forestry closed all the roads for fire hazard in the area the day after we dropped the hives. We didn't extract fireweed last summer, when the hives came home there wasn't enough in them to bother. Bees are up there now, but weather has been cold, windy and raining since we brought them up so they haven't done much yet. But, one week of warm weather with all this moisture in the ground, they will fill 2 supers.


----------



## stasn (Apr 7, 2015)

Guys I'm at cross roads as to what route to take to feed for winter. Here are my options:

Dadant (Portland, OR - pickup)
1) *HFCS* 55%: $28.35/100lb (≈$3.26/gal)
2) *Sucrose* (66% sugar): $27.41/100lb (≈$3.16/gal)

Mann Lake (Woodland, CA - pickup)
3) *Pro-Sweet 77*: $29.13/100lb (≈$3.36/gal)

Cash&Carry (Local FoodService store)
4) *Granulated Sugar*: $19.99/50lb


What would you recommend?


----------



## HarryVanderpool (Apr 11, 2005)

Yes.


----------

