Happy Harvest Blog

Well that's a vast improvement
Bees Bees

Well that's a vast improvement

What a relief for the eyes to have the beehives undressed for the year.  This is the view out my front window. Such a visual improvement! The before picture.  Good God,  what a trash heap.  Extraneous stuff wrapped around the bottom is to deter the chickens from pecking at the styrofoam. Nosey's a big styrofoam-eating culprit, and me running outside at her shouting does nothing.  What?  Crunchy! I like Nosey.  I don't want her to die by extruded polystyrene

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Beehive reduction
Bees Bees

Beehive reduction

It’s that time, time to reduce the size of the beehive stacks in preparation for winter, and steal their honey. I hate it. I don’t like taking their honey, and I don’t like the degree of disruption it causes, nor the death. In the process of taking the hives all apart, robber bees come from the other hives and there are disputes and battles to the death. Bees are very good at killing each other and the bee bodies pile up. I don’t know how to mitigate this yet.

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The bees are working like they've had coffee
Bees Bees

The bees are working like they've had coffee

After the frost, we’ve had a warm spell, and the bees are going so hard. It’s their last charge to get their stores in. I feel bad now taking their honey, but they have more than enough, at least the big hives Pansy and Violet do. The other pollinators in the giant wasp nest have made their home bigger than ever. I’m terrified of them, although they’ve only stung me once, for banging on the wall, and I am looking forward to a long wasp-free future.

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A Bee of unusual size.
Bees Bees

A Bee of unusual size.

I saw this bumblebee on the goldenrod so large I had to get my camera. It was as big as the first joint of my thumb. For perspective, the adjacent honeybee. Oh, this totally doesn’t show how large this bee is. She spent the night in this spot too, on the goldenrod.

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Bees in the goldenrod
Bees Bees

Bees in the goldenrod

I have a field full of goldenrod.  Mowing and discing it a couple of years ago benefited the goldenrod more than anything else, and now there is less grass, clover, and diversity than before. I'm ok with that, for now.  I have a bee forage field now, and it seems like the bees are coming from miles around for it. I barely saw any bumblebees all spring and summer; I was worried. 

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Seriously.   Not again!?
Bees Bees

Seriously. Not again!?

Pansy swarmed AGAIN. This time I got pictures. I heard the roaring sound again and looked out. Pansy?!! What's it been, five days? Since a giant contingent of the bees just departed from Pansy, I had a hard time even believing what I was seeing, although, a swarm is pretty unmistakable. Not possible. There aren't enough bees left to split again. There were. I was completely expecting Violet to swarm. The Violet hive is huge and strong.

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A thorough bee day
Bees Bees

A thorough bee day

I had a big bee day, doing all things bee. Building frames and parts, hive inspection, expansion, and more. They needed all kinds of things, including a yard cleanup. I doubt I would have lost that swarm if I was on this a few days earlier, but what's flown is flown. Now all the hives are set on concrete pads, all the wood scraps are cleaned up, and the bee yard looks more classy bee apartment structures, less bee shantytown. 

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Well they're gone
Bees Bees

Well they're gone

I had a hive swarm yesterday (What is that roaring sound? Oh.) They went up in a big pine tree, and while they landed on a nice 3″ branch that could be sawed off, they were 40’+ up, and very much out of my reach this time. I quickly prepared a bait box (inviting new home, move-in ready), with that new hive smell (lemongrass, honey, and old comb). They ignored it. I prepared a second one, too, in another location.

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Flyday
Bees Bees

Flyday

T.G.I. Flyday here today.  All my hives are alive, and many, many bees were out flying today in the warmth. I got to feed them, and replace some straw in the top of their hives; I was happy to find that the wet mouldy straw was only around the top and outside edge - where it was nearest the roof and corners. Nested around the bottle of syrup and the opening in the center the straw was dry and golden, bees dry. Bees were everywhere, all over the paths, in the chicken bucket, and all over.

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Spring break for the bees
Bees Bees

Spring break for the bees

It's just SO weird to put on a bee suit in January. However, it was a warm day, so my bees came out to poop, and I was able to feed them. By warm I mean that in 24 hours the temp shot up from -10°C to the opposite, plus 10°C, wiping out all the snow, and exposing all the gross wet wood and dirt (now the mercury is rapidly falling again). It's the February melt look; it can hardly look worse. Everything is hideous.

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Bees Bees

Bees Snugged I

The bees are almost wrapped. They have their foam on, and I think I’ve really sorted out my wrapping method this year. The hives each get foam on three sides plus tar paper, that wraps the front of the hive too and absorbs heat. The foam I’ve figured out how to get it on quick and easy. First, the three-sided “box” is made. Look at my fancy two-step carving- a nice seal. Foam is so easy to carve. Then I tape that together with Tuck tape, including a strip up the whole seam.

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Bee day
Bees Bees

Bee day

I was reducing the hives to get ready for winter (taking supers off for their more efficient winter accommodation, which usually means taking honey off too.  However, Sunflower is the hive that split, and they did not have as much honey as I hoped.  I'm not entirely sure they have enough for themselves for the winter, and I debated bringing them down to one super, but I left them in two. Pansy, the new hive, had the tidiest little house.  Just perfectly arranged, no burr comb. 

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The five aren't afraid of bees
Bees, Chickens Bees, Chickens

The five aren't afraid of bees

The famous five, in fact, love to rummage around around the hives, and jump upon them. That is the back of the hive, but they rummage equally well in the front. They go underneath. I've seen one jump up on the bee door closure stick. Meeting behind Pansy building!  (My hives are plumb; the camera is tipped)I've thought one would get stung, and that would be over, but no.  It's always just a little tribe.  They have the place to themselves.

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Swarm catching, part 2
Bees Bees

Swarm catching, part 2

At "dusk" (ok, dark), I got the hive box ready. One super full of drawn comb and fresh foundation, another empty super, and an eke.  The whole empty upper box thing is to imitate a spacious swarm box. So they can all crowd up in the ceiling. Then I went to get the nuc box from the woods. Whoa!  Quite a few bees on the outside of the box. More than before. They're so neat. They're like lined up in stacked rows. And quiet, just a low hum. It was bedtime.

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MY FIRST SWARM!
Bees Bees

MY FIRST SWARM!

It seemed to go pretty well. I was getting bees into the box. Only thing, they seemed to want to come out of the box. It was like a really slow boil over. I'd dump bees in, they'd flow back over the top of the box. I'd scoop them back in with my hands.

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Bees Bees

What the heck are these bees doing?

I took a look at the hive and got a bit of a fright that they were swarming (on foot?).  That clump hanging off of the landing ledge...? But then I looked at the other hive: How similar is that!!?  My theory is that it had something to do with the heat and the time of day.  In another hour, they were all in the hive for dark. I was looking forward to going in the hives today, but then there was a sudden (glorious) thunderstorm!

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Not what you expect when you open a hive
Bees Bees

Not what you expect when you open a hive

This hive....*head shake*... I knew right away it was going to be trouble. In the nuc box, they were already busy attaching the frames to the box. At first opening, they had burr comb and bridges everywhere - I figured they were going to be sculptors. Overactive wax glands. Plus about a dozen queen cells that time. I carefully scraped off all that unauthorized comb, but not even two weeks later, they've attached a sail to their feeder bottle. Not sustainable! Full of honey too. 

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Bee waterer
Bees Bees

Bee waterer

The bees have decided where they want to drink.  The purple chicken waterer.  Now it's a bee waterer because the chickens won't use it anymore.  They know better.  They know what bees do. This happened last year too.  The bees co-opted a waterer.  I prefer them to use the top of the blue barrels; that's nice and safe, and closer, but they do what they want. What I'm excited about is fixing the bee drowning problem.  They manage to drown themselves even in that little waterer.  The answer is corks! Lots of bee life rafts. 

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Move-in day for the bees
Bees Bees

Move-in day for the bees

Time for the new bees to go from their nuc boxes (temporary housing) to their forever homes. Sheltered from the rain with a hive lid. These bees were also midnight bees. They came from a great distance, and with the aid of caffeine and chatting on the phone, I did very well on the drive back, until I was 10km from home and the black dogs struck. At midnight there was no one else on the road so I crept, 40kph the last few klicks. My theory was if I fall asleep and go in the ditch, I'll go in slow.

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