To plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow.

Barn hives prepped for winter

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.”

And we’re off…!

Smoker

It’s been a while since my last post.  Thanks to good weather I’ve had little time to spare so I haven’t been posting as much as I’d like.  At my last post news was not good.  We lost a lot of hives this year.  While we were still in winter mode awaiting spring, it suddenly jumped right to summer with May delivering day after day of high 90’s and little rain.  Blooms were good, but the dry weather did little in the way of nectar for the bees.  The pollen was great though, and the hives built up quickly.  I did my queen rearing a month late due to weather, but still got 8 new queens to add to my surviving 4.  I split several hives to receive them.  I also spent time with all the failed hives cleaning up frames and boxes, painting them and doing repairs as needed.  We also added some new equipment this year. Continue reading “And we’re off…!”

Finally into thirds

7-8-2017 All into thirds.

All the hives at the farm are finally up into their third box.  They still need to build the wax combs, then fill all the boxes with Continue reading “Finally into thirds”

Still finding food

7-1-2017 Bee on Mountain Mint (pycnanthemum virginianum)

This time of year can be hard on bees.  When the ground dries out, so do the flowers.  Luckily this Mountain Mint is providing some nice nectar for the bees today.

Moving the farm into thirds

6-11-17 Hanging out outside

The hives at the farm are doing great.  I’m starting to add Continue reading “Moving the farm into thirds”

Going up!

5-29-17 Going up, moving to second medium box.

The farm hives are building up nicely.  I’ve added a second box to several already.  We need Continue reading “Going up!”