And then it was winter

 We went from a warm and balmy October into winter by the end of the month. Shortly after wrapping the bees we got snow. But then our first major snow fall came on the 5th of November and left us with a good foot of snow. The snow didn’t leave. And we got some cold weather early. Nights dropping close  to -20 a few times.

As usual I never got my honey extracted until October. Yup, not the ideal time, but that’s the way it goes sometimes….ok maybe a lot of the time.

The guys were out hunting so I went down stairs and started the process. Everything was going good until about half way through and my electric extractor stopped. The guys looked at it but it seems cause of its age something had worn out and it wouldn’t spin. I even tried  made a new washer out of leather to see if that would work but, nope.

So armed with our headlights we headed across the road to one of my bee sheds and retrieved the very old and very reliable manual extractor. I’m talking vintage. My Grampa used one like this in the 40’s.  So we packed it in the back of the truck and brought it home. I threw some soapy water in it and let it sit overnight.

The next morning after giving it a good scrub, I packed it up the front stairs and in the house. Then dragged the stand James had built me for my electric extractor up the basement stairs and got to work.

To make a long story short….it worked flawlessly and I finished all the frames. When there was something vintage to use, I had no problem finding extra arms to crank the handle when my arm got tired.

Considering the very hot dry summer, I was very happy at the amount of honey we got. I know a lot of people didn’t get any extra this year…so I am feeling blessed.

I also got a fair amount of wax. I haven’t really done much with my wax over the years so I decided to spend a few days cleaning it all and melting it down. 

I really need to find a easier way to clean the wax, the process I did is so time consuming and messy. It was so messy I ended up splashing hot wax in my hair and down the front of my shirt. It was easier getting it off my shirt then out of  my hair 😜. Sheesh, I am such a clutz.

Anyways here it is November 26 and we are having our Christmas craft sale today. It’s snowing lightly, so I am feeling rather festive. My table is set up, with all the things that my girls worked so hard to make this year. Honey and wax, then I made some wax food wraps and some beeswax wood conditioner. 

I have new plans for new products for next season….all going well.

The bees are put to bed for the winter. I have done all I can do for them. It’s all up to them now and Mother Nature. 

Now the hives sit quiet. But if you listen real close….you can hear the gentle hum coming from inside. See you in the spring 🐝❤️

   

                                                                  

  

It’s in the air

 September 17 2022

As I am walking over to the beeyard, I see that all the native plants along the road are turning autumn shades of yellow and orange. You can now hear the leaves crunch under your feet. I love this time of year. I love the smells and the sounds of everything changing around you. I love the thought of curling up under a blanket watching the snow fall, holding a steaming cup of hot chocolate. 

We have been feeding our bees for the past couple weeks now and I will continue til the end of the month. They are still bringing in a little pollen from here and there.

During the summer a friend gave me a big dahlia in a pot which I put at our front porch. For the past week, we have been watching the bumble bees, honey bees and a few different pollinators visit the flowers and collect pollen. Overnight the bumble bees curl up and sleep in the flowers, sometimes two or three different kinds in one flower head and I found myself hurrying out each morning to see who had slept over.

Dahlia with two different types of bumblebees sleeping in it.

October 15

Here it is mid October and we finally had a good frost last week. But it is still unseasonably warm though. The bees are still flying, so I have continued to feed them syrup and fondant. But this will be coming to an end by later next week.

Tomorrow we will be going over to the beeyard and start to get them ready for winter. I won’t be wrapping yet, but I will be putting the insulation in their attic box. Next week I hope to start making candy boards, then I can get them put in. Each hive this year, will be getting a 8 pound candy board.

October 17

I got the candy boards made and they are downstairs drying. I had two packages of fondant left so I added them to the four boards.

October 19

It’s really cooled down. There is snow on the mountains finally. It seemed strange not seeing any snow up there. I decided to slip in the candy boards and get them one step closer to getting them all done for winter. I keep telling everyone how calm my bees are. But today they were a tad feisty. I got my first sting of the year while reaching in their hive to remove the bottle feeder. Ouch.

I managed to get the first three done but started to have second thoughts about doing Hive 1. Hive 1 is a huge hive and most time when I go in the hive I can hardly find the bottle feeder for bees. Was I actually going to have to put gloves on…? I opted for smoke instead. To my surprise they  were pretty laid back and I was able to get the board in and put back together without any problems.

I still have to screen off the inside cover and insulate their attic boxes and I will be all done inside. It looks like tomorrow will be good enough to do that.

October 26

So lots went on over the last month but I finally got the girls wrapped and tucked away for the winter. It’s all up to them now. I have done everything I could. 

I think I miss them already

Wrapped and ready for winter

Next blog I will talk about my honey harvest….as usual I was late extracting it. But I got it done. More on that next time.

Happy Fall everyone.

Quiet time

I love my bees

 My beekeepering friends probably get tired of me talking about how calm my bees are….but it’s true.

When we retired and moved back home in 2019, I ordered new bees from BeeMaid in Alberta, three packages.  In the past I had mostly gotten nucs but since I had lots of drawn out comb and had some nasty experiences with some nuc suppliers, I decided to order packages from New Zealand. When they arrived, they were beautiful healthy bees, with nice temperaments. I was very happy with them.

Here it is Sept 2022 and I still have those three original hives plus a split I did from one of them last year.  I love these bees. They are calm and relaxed. And even the bee inspector commented how calm they were.

 I decided two years ago to start going into the hives with only wearing nitrile gloves. I wanted to be able to feel the frames better and they are way less bulky. It won’t stop a bee sting but that’s ok. This year I decided to go gloveless all together. What a difference not wearing anything on your hands. It forces you to slow down and to take note where your fingers are. There is something really neat about the feeling of a bee crawling on your hands and arms. Nothing else feels like that.

Today I went into my big hive to start pulling honey. This is my overachiever hive. It’s motto I am pretty sure is….go big or go home. Not only was there lots of honey, there was lots of bees. As I removed each frame, my hands and forearms were speckled with these little vibrating insects. There is something very calming about that. (Or frightening in some peoples eyes). 

Anyways….I don’t really know why they are like this….but I am glad they are.

Til next time….cheers🐝❤️

Swarms, splits and wildflowers

 The end of July is quickly approaching. It’s been a weird spring/summer. I’m not sure but suspect I say that every year. Spring came very late. The cool temperatures went on forever. But it is nice now and everything is lush and green. 

I am feeling we are about two weeks behind normal. I look at my greenhouse and the tomatoes are finally growing but certainly a long way from being red. But oh well, you can’t do anything about it.

Swarm season for our area can start as early as late May but mostly in early June. It was late this year…and I know of people in our general area  who are still having swarms.

I am pretty sure I had some. But didn’t see them or catch anything. I did however, attempt a split but it wasnt successful and didn’t want to try again as we were getting late in the year. I would sooner make sure all the hives have honey for winter then make more splits now. It’s not worth it. 

We added some new plants in our forest garden/orchard/bee yard this year. We made a blueberry bed and added two more bushes for a total of four now. We also planted a rose and two black elderberries. I am excited for next year, as we are adding fruit tree guilds around each fruit tree and bed. The bees will be so happy with all the new things they can gather pollen and nectar from.

Girls hanging out

August 2

Why does it feel later than August. Maybe because the days are getting noticeably shorter. It’s 9:30 and you can hardly see across the yard. It seems like only a week ago I could see across the yard well after 10:00.

So every year I promise myself thst I will pull honey st the beginning of Aug. I think I will wait til mid Aug this year since we are a little behind. I am pretty sure the girls have brought in enough nectar to take them through the winter, but I am also hoping there will be a little honey to tide us over too.

It has been a very hot dry summer. I can’t remember our yard ever having crunchy areas. We have had very few heavy down pours that went on long enough to saturate everything. We did yesterday however, and it was glorious. Everything looked so refreshed. 

We still have quite a few wildflowers in bloom. And for the past week or two, the girls have been bringing in whitish coloured pollen. I suspect it might be from the wild purple asters that are in bloom. Some of the plants still blooming are, fireweed, tansy, goldenrod, asters, hemp nettle, yarrow and a few other things I can’t think of off hand.

I started pulling hemp nettle out the other day but then noticed all the different bumblebees visiting every flower. I got mesmerized watching them go from flower to flower. I couldn’t bring myself to pull out any after that.

Anyways I am going to end this here so I won’t ramble on any longer.

Til next time. 🐝💕

New black elderberry bushes

New blueberry bed with comfrey 

Keeping bees in a Rain Forest part 3

 June 9

Up to a few weeks ago, it had been a very cool spring. It had seemed winter wasn’t going to let go, but it did and warmer temperatures arrived. We haven’t seen frost for weeks now ( touch wood).

Late May and June are always such busy months. There is gardens to prepare and plant, greenhouses to open up and get planted and lawns to cut. But it’s also a very busy time for the bees. 

I had great intentions of getting all the inspections of the hives done early. But of course that didn’t happen. The weather would hold long enough to get one hive done….then it would start to rain or the winds would start and get cool. I am not sure I have left on their winter wraps this long before. One of my hives is still partially wrapped but for the most part they are done.

I did managed to check for swarm cells last week on my big hive. But didn’t find any, so it’s given me a bit of a breather. Tomorrow I have the whole day to do what I want. Which seems to be rare these days. So as long as Mother Nature behaves I can finish doing the last three inspections and removing attic boxes and candy boards. Yes some of them are still on. I know…they should of been off weeks ago.

June 14

So I finally got all the candy boards off and put away for a few months. I added extra boxes to the hives that needed it.

Hive one, which is one of the three hives that have wintered over three years now are bursting at the seams. I was blown away that they had already filled a deep super full of dandelion nectar. The dandelions were in great abundance this year and since we live in the country (some people call it the boonies) we only cut a small portion of our lawn and left the rest. It was a sea of yellow.

June 22

The weather this past week has been unstable, cool and wet. It almost seems everything is behind by a week or so. I snuck in to hive one, between a thunder storm to see if there was swarm cells. I was really hoping the full box of dandelion honey was capped so I could remove it. But they were still working on it. I had trouble lifting it off so had to use the old lady method of removing frame by frame till it was light enough. I really should get shallow boxes. 

Still no swarm cells. But I got a new hive set up so we can take a better look once this weather settles. I also put up three swarm traps….just in case.

I check the weather  daily, it’s just a thing I do after living in the bush in a somewhat remote area, years ago. Our weather is suppose to be improving by the weekend then “they” are calling for hotter than normal temperatures during July and August. So I will start to prepare to get things ready in my bee yard for that over the next week. Last year when we had that long stretch of extreme temperatures (for our  area) I scrambled to figure out how to keep the bees cooler. So now I know, so I can prepare for it.

This is what I did last year during the “extreme” heat.

It wasn’t pretty but it worked. Over their honey supers I added my winter attic boxes (without the insulation pillow) which have a vet hole in it. Then I put on the inside cover and outer lid. I added a piece of styrofoam insulation to the top. I ratchet strap all my hives so I didn’t t have to worry about it blowing off. Before I did this my big hives were bearding on the front of the hives. As soon as I added the empty attic box, this helped a lot. I also handed two more water stations for a total of four. I had to fill them  twice a day….not that they always needed it but I did anyways.

Well……that’s all for now. Bee safe during the upcoming hot temperatures. Happy National Pollinators Week 🐝💖

Keeping bees inside a rainforest part 2

April 12 2022

It is now the middle of April and the weather hasn’t changed much. The last three nights it’s between -9C and -12C over night. The days have been sunny but it’s been windy and cool during the day. 

At these temperatures, not many of my hives are out flying. It’s that time of year where you start worrying if you don’t see them all out and about. Three weeks ago I had four out of five hives alive. Today, I have one hive only out flying. I’m pretty sure the others are hiding out inside. It happens almost every year, I worry I lost them, but suddenly I take off the lids and there they are. So I am hoping thst will happen again this year.

Last spring my friend and neighbour got her first box of bees. She was pretty excited today to find hers still alive, hiding out inside. Her bees are spicy Chilean bees. I say spicy cause…..they are fiesty, hot tempered little girls. But even so I am happy to have more boys in the hood so my queens can be bred.

Keeping bees inside a rainforest has its challenges. Our weather can be extreme, more rain, more snow and cooler temperatures. On the upside, our landscape is very lush. Forest fires have less chance of running wild because of the conditions here. However last year there were some fairly close but thankfully they were knock back. 

Also on the upside, we have tons of tree pollen available and acres of native flowers and wild fruit bushes

April18

Yesterday was a beautiful day but cool. It’s still below 0 at night and for a few hours warmish during the day. It is still very cool and very little melt on the mountains. But things are slowly coming to life. Pussy willows will be sending out pollen in a few weeks and the catkins on the hazelnuts will be appearing. But for now….we have to be patient.

May 11

I have been patiently waiting for a warm day to go inside the hives and do a spring inspection. But the days have been on the cooler side. So I have to wait. But the snow is pretty well gone and the bees are bringing in bright yellow pollen from the pussy willows. I have given them some syrup but they haven’t been eating it as all of them had some of their candy board left and some honey.

Beautiful willow pollen coming in

I have a hive that decided going out the back of their hive is way better than the front. I had blocked off the upper entrance for the winter but they managed to wiggle their way up through the insulation and get outside.  It was weird, all of the hives were busy coming and going but hive three wasn’t. I kept looking inside the hive to see if they were alive and they were always up top eating. Then one day I decided to open up the hive and check to see if there was a dead mouse on the bottom board or some other reason why they weren’t going out the front. The sun had come out so I quickly tore the hive apart.  There was nothing on the bottom board so I decided to reverse the boxes so that the brood box was on the bottom. Thinking they would for sure come out the front. But nope…..they like the back door I guess. So once the warmer days come and I can remove the insulation I will turn the top entrance around so they can come out the front of the hive. I wished I would of had more time to check for brood but the wind had come up and it started to rain. So I did what I had to and closed it up.

May 19

Well I need to finish this up tonight. Soon we will be in full swing with the bees and the garden. The weather remains cool. The nights are barely above 0C most nights. And during the day we are lucky to hit 17C, on a good day. So many of the days hover around 10 - 13C. 

Today we attempted to extend our hive stand out….but things didn’t work like we planned, so we gave up to rethink our plans. There were a few bees out today and were only bringing in a little pollen. But while walking home…I was excited to find two dandelions in bloom…woohoo. Soon the girls will have lots of nectar to bring in. And I can gather a quart or two of the flowers to make some honey dandelion jelly.

Soon the dandelions will be in full bloom

Ok enough of this rambling. Time to finish this off. I am excited for the upcoming season. It won’t be long til the bees want to swarm, I can finally remove the winter wraps and it will bee time to do some splits.

 It’s been a very long winter and I have missed sitting on my chair next to the hive listening to the bees constant hum of contentment. 💖🐝

Keeping Bees inside a RainForest

I think Spring is finally on its way. I started writing this March 17 and the temperatures have been fairly mild. Even though it’s snowing as I write, it’s spring snow…it never lasts.

Enjoying a spring day

The other day, we were finally able to walk up to the hives. Armed with shovels we dug our way through the 28” of snow that is still lingering. I had been wanting to check to see if the bees had made it through the winter. 4 out of 5 did. The one we lost was one of the splits I made last year . A few days later I went over to check their food and added a pollen patty. After a couple days of warmer temperatures, we came back and we’re finally able to access the entrances of the hives, so we could clean out the bottom boards.

Digging a path to the bees

March 29

Holy we are almost at the end of the month now. We are finally down to 18” of snow now. The bees are out flying looking for water and pollen. There are a few pussy willows out and the catkins on the wild hazelnuts are starting to appear.

We are starting to see life. We have a few butterflies now and the robins and red winged black birds are back. It gives hope that soon we will see grass again. Although the sun isn’t out, the thermometer reads just over 12C

Snow is receding back and we can now see bare ground