Bee tutorial (sorta)

[SageFire]

1. This is greater agility. Its like food for the bees. One well up the production and two will max the production of beeswax and honey. Add everyday.
2. If there is a yellow hyphen (or minus sign) add one greater poison potion. If there is a red hyphen (or minus sign) add two greater poison potions.
3. If there is a yellow hyphen (or minus sign) add one greater cure potion, if there is a red hyphen (or minus sign) add two greater cure potions.
4. If the bee hive is “thriving” skip this potion. If it is “Healthy” add one greater heal potion. (the orange one.) If the hive is sickly or dying add two greater heal potions.
5. If the bee hive is “thriving” skip this potion. If it is “healthy” skip this potion. If the bee hive is sickly or dying, Add two greater strength (the white potion).

Bees need plants to pollinate to make their honey and flourish, they also need water. This is the information I offer you, Some people do their bees differently but this is the way it works for me, its never failed. Have fun, and good luck.

[Efanchenko_MM]

Thanks for the really usefull information SageFire, when I'm finaly satisfied with my house might give it a go

[Llexa]

Bravo Sage, bravo...

[Rote]

Excellent Mini-Tutorial

[Highroller]

Also while it may take more plants to get the hives started, once established I do very well with 1 plant per beehive. I use only decorative plants so I don't have to treat them as well as the hives.

I get best results from campion plants and good results with lillies and other leafy plants. Cactus only in moderation. If you start 5 hives all with cactus they WILL die. Already happened to me. ( On the other hand I got a double row where the 2nd row are all cactus and they did fine feeding off the plants in the other row to supplement what they got from the cactus.

Water I just spread around pitchers of water. Water Trough at least when just starting is wayyyyy too much water for the hives. Once established and needing more water I have seen people use water troughs.

You will need massive amounts of bottles eventually. I have a couple rune books with all the mageshops/reg shops/ provisoners in them. If you buy all the bottles and come back in approx 1/2 hr they will be be restocked with double. so 20,40,80,160,320,640,999 . A few hours and you can buy as many bottles as you need for a long time. Bottles will go on your spellcaster keys as many as 60,000 total. If you buy 999 at a time they WILL fall on the ground as being too heavy to hold.

Almost all my hives have yellow + signs for food and water. Slight over watering and over feeding at worst increase insect and fungus occurrences. You fairly quickly have to add greater cure and greater poison to each hive every day just due to age of hive anyways. Where too little food or water can kill your hive especially when just starting it.

The new bee epidemic will cut into profits but I expect beehives will still be a decent source of income.

Remember the main key is daily care. If you miss a day it takes a LOT of extra care to get the hives back into top form. Not only will all hives need 2 greater cure and 2 greater poison potions the 2nd day but almost all will need the greater heal potions also. You effectively lose a days production and have to use MORE potions so remember to treat theme every day. I typically harvest wax and honey 1 time a week but it can be done every day if you want. A razor script will help a lot harvesting the honey. If honey gets to 255 in a hive its maxed and loses any honey produced. So harvest the honey before it gets to 255 or you lose profit.

Now you can maximize your slumgum production by rendering 10 raw wax at a time. At least 1 out of 10 will be slumgum sometimes 2 out of 10. You use up your rendering tool faster of course. I usually render 200 raw wax at a time. Its faster and I got enough slumgum that I would rather get more purified wax I can sell.

Thats where the money maker comes in. You can sell purified beeswax and bottles of honey for 410 gold each at npc beekeeper. With a thriving beehive at 100k bees on the days the epidemic doesn't negate production, it will produce 6 raw beeswax and 20 honey. With 2 greater agility potions it will produce 13 raw wax and 40 honey. The honey takes 3 honey to fill a bottle so the wax and bottles of honey is almost equal production. But the honey gets to 255 3 times as fast.

And if you have high alchemy and tailoring you can make royal hive clothing. Robe and boots. Tool to make these is on gold stone in town center. Rest of the tools including beehive deeds you buy from npc beekeepers. One is on way out south gate in Britan.

While there are sure to be other ways that work for other people, I decided to share my experience to make life a bit easier for fledging beekeepers.

Anyone wants to take a look at my hives, pvt message me in game and if I am not too busy, I will be happy to show you my beehive setup.

[Kile Morgan]

I've looked around and read on the beehives, I've started plants and almost maxed alchemy to support both. Have a hive started and is now producing honey and raw beeswax. Nothing I have read as of yet says what to use on the raw beeswax. The pots won't work with it. Clicking the wax itself is nothing. I think it's the only basic part I can't find anything on.

[Undertaker]

the raw beeswax is also used for ointments for Cold Resists

[Kile Morgan]

Ok, for some reason I had to get another small pot, as it gave the same message as the big when I tried to use it on the raw. Sold the one and bought another and at least this one is working, just need more beeswax. This is just another annoying thing.....

[KnitePrince]

Just to verify what I read above.. you "can" use decorative plants?
And on the water troughs? is this too much water that will harm the bees? or simply too big and a waste of space when pitchers work fine? Asking because water troughs were what i had planned. Thx!

[Undertaker]

yes, deco plants are great, for starting out i recommend using atleast 2, then you can take one away when its at 100k...

i would rec. pitchers... the water troughs arent bad, but they just poison the bees faster.. an by faster i mean youll need poison potions everyday..

[KnitePrince]

TY Undertaker

[everwolf]

Great Info here but I could use more Beekeeping Info such as what peoples experiances are with how many hives per house, does spacing affect health and or growth. Is the bee epidemic still going on or what has it caused.

[Llexa]

This is my fail proof set up. There might be an occasional hive that's just stubborn and needs an extra flower placed in front of it, but other then that this plan works great. You don't have to have your room built just like this example but just pay attention to the spacing in the diagram. And yeah the epidemic still exists if you have more then 30 hives.

love,
Llexa

[BlaZe]

Wow, its like SudUOku!

Those hives in the middle (top, bottom, left and right 3x3s), could you use just one pitcher instead of two?

[Llexa]

You can try if you like. I just find that keeping it spaced like this is just simple. Technically it seems plausible though. The water pitcher needs to be directly in front of a hive OR located diagonally from the hive but never both.

love,
Llexa