Hey everyone! I’m so bad at keeping up on this site. I just wanted to let everyone know Continue reading “It’s been a while”
LIP BALM SALE!
I’m having a pretty frustrating day so I thought I’d do something nice to put myself in a better mood.
For a limited time only Lip Balm is BUY TWO GET ONE FREE.
Continue reading “LIP BALM SALE!”Valentine’s Day
Give the gift of 🐝 love.
Continue reading “Valentine’s Day”Cosmetic Ingredients
Hi all!
It’s that time of year where we really need those products for our lips and skin. I thought I’d take a few moments to talk about the ingredients I use.
It’s a new year!
Hi all! I hope you are enjoying your 2019 so far! It’s a very snowy day for us which my kids and dogs are loving. Me, I’m inside making body butter for my drying hands. I’ll get out later to enjoy it but it’s not fun having dry hands and I need my body butter.
Continue reading “It’s a new year!”Culling the weak
Winter is setting in and the snow’s flying. Yesterday was warm, about 60! The bees were active bringing in what they can find left. There’s bright yellow pollen and a bit of nectar coming in still. I believe both are coming from our native American Witchhazel (Hamamelis virginiana L.).
This time of year is bittersweet. The bees are quietly waiting out the winter, which should give me a break from them. On the other hand, it’s stressful being able to do so little to help them through this critical time. After last winter’s losses, we had a lot of new hives this summer. With the fickle weather they didn’t take off like they should have, so not only did we miss out on getting honey from them, but they also don’t have enough for themselves either. To get them through, we block the cold north winds with hay bales, place insulation on the covers to hold back the cold from snow, and do our best to make sure the boxes have no gaps or cracks to let in the weather.
With the warm day, I took the opportunity to weigh the hives to see how much food they have, and popped them open to see how many bees each one had. Several are borderline, but we’ll just have to gamble on them and hope for a short winter. Three though were very light on food and bees. They would surely starve by Christmas. For these three, I found the queens and pulled them out, then combined all the food and bees into a single hive, leaving the best queen of the three (based on the summer’s records of performance). This is risky, but at this time of year, there aren’t many options, and certainly no time. This moves me from a guaranteed three lost to one with a chance. Now we’re down to just 12 going into the winter. We’ll just have to wait and see how things turn out.
Upcoming Events
Hi all! I’ve been so busy having fun making and selling products. I’ve been lucky enough to be a vendor at some markets this year and I have some more coming up.
2018 Honey harvest is here!
It’s been a long year and a late harvest, but we’re pleased to give everyone the good news! Our honey harvest is finally bottled and we’ll be putting them on sale immediately! We got a little more than last year, so we’ve decided to offer the half pound as usual, but also the full pound bottles! The honey this year has a great balance of flavor and sweetness. This is local at it’s best, not like what you’ll find at the store. We’ve also got an assortment of hand made candles and cosmetics available in the shop too, perfect for gifts this coming holiday season. The candles are 100% beeswax, and the cosmetics are made using our honey and wax with a limited number of additional all natural ingredients and pure oils.
Visit our shop (link below or from the ‘Shop’ link above) to make your purchase. Please select pickup if you plan to meet us to receive your bottles, but make sure to leave comments so we can reach you. You can pay online ahead of time by PayPal, or select cash to pay at pickup, either by cash or card. When checking out, create an account so you can check progress of the order, reprint your receipt, etc. Don’t worry, we don’t store any payment information or share any of your info. Don’t wait too long. We’ve sold out quickly every year so far!
http://store.waltershoney.com/
It’s booth time!
Hi all! It’s been a while. I’ve been so busy with the kids and getting ready for this booth and a silent auction. I’m having so much fun with new molds too. I can’t wait to share with everyone. Come on down to Brown County and see us. Only a couple weeks away!!!
I’ll have lots of candles, body butter, lip moisturizers, honey sticks, and hopefully some other new items. I’m getting really excited. Hope to see ya there!
To plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow.
Here we are in late August. Change is in the air. It’s still hot and sunny, but the bees know something’s coming. They’ve shifted into winter prep. The queen is focused on building up a population of bees to help her through the winter ahead, while the workers are feverishly gathering anything they can to fill every available space. While winter doesn’t seem that close just yet consider it from the bee’s perspective. 12 bees spend their short lifetime collecting nectar, all to produce just 1 teaspoon of honey. To survive a winter in Indiana, the bees need a lot more than that, in the range of 100 pounds or so! The bees have built up well this year, but haven’t packed away quite as much as they’ll need to get by, so I’ll be watching this closely in the coming weeks. All the hives are into their winter setup of 3 boxes. They’ll be organizing things for the cold days ahead. Continue reading “To plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow.”