Bears

[rbunch]

Bear population in Guilford county is growing. When we first moved to Colfax in 2017 there were bear rumors. Now most people have seen or seen evidence. I drug my feet in building an electric fence and paid the price Thursday:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders ... szlrMqFHqr

Take fools advice protect your bees!

[Wally]

Thanks for the post. It really needs to be heeded.

[MadItalian]

Heads up, a bear got into one of my hives last night. I'm in Colfax near Oak Ridge border (Bunker Hill and Ballard).

I'm ratchet strapping the two hives tonight to their stand.

Any other options besides electric fence?

P.S. Bear must have been close to 6 ft tall, it almost pulled down a bird house that was nailed to a tree near the hives.

[Wally]

30 ought 6

[MadItalian]

Does anyone have solid experience with electric fencing? So far my straps have discouraged more investigations / damage by the bear, but I'm going to want something better when the honey supers go on.

I've been looking around, and I'm interested in good / bad reviews of energizers, electrified wire, post types, etc.

[Jacobs]

On 6/19/23, a neighbor texted me a warning and a ring doorbell photo of a young bear coming down my street toward the park and walking trails. Fortunately, it didn't stop in for a snack at my hives. Do we need to try and get a speaker at one of our meetings on the topic "Bear Fences for Back Yard Beekeepers?"

[rbunch]

If they would just snack and move on that would be nice. In reality they don't stop until it everything is gone, which is not fun if you are out of town like I was. After my Bear disaster in April I did quite a bit of research on bear fencing before I built my setup. There has been much written on the topic. Below is a collection of information on Bear fencing I found from various state university extensions. I was mainly looking at all these to get ideas on what would be easiest for my site, and easiest on my bad back to build:

https://www.ncwildlife.org/Portals/0/Le ... eHives.pdf
https://extension.psu.edu/hive-protecti ... nce-design
https://scientificbeekeeping.com/scibee ... ce-PDF.pdf
https://vtfishandwildlife.com/sites/fis ... ehives.pdf
https://www.mass.gov/doc/electric-fence ... e/download
https://dwr.virginia.gov/wp-content/uploads/fencing.pdf
https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/publication/IN1318
https://fwp.mt.gov/binaries/content/ass ... h-2017.pdf

The key concept in all of them is alternate wires with lowest wire hot and about 8 inches off the ground. Alternate hot and ground as you go up, with a wire roughly every 8 inches. Bears aren't good jumpers so fence only needs to be around 48 inches. You need a charger/zapper with at least 2 joules delivered in the shock. The key is is you are building the fence to shock and scare the bear not stop the bear. Most recommend baiting the hot wire at nose level of the bear with bacon if there are already Bear problems in the area. The first shock is very memorable and self correcting for the Bear

Here is an idea that I wish I had seen earlier. I think it might be great for a small backyard apiary. In this scheme instead of a fence you make an electric hat for the hive. It looks brilliant to me:

https://dwr.virginia.gov/wp-content/upl ... eehive.pdf