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teeny tiny hive
Here you see the hands of Ken, adjusting the frames of his little model beehive. The wee box is resting on the much larger, normal-sized beehive. Ken is going to leave the small box on the larger box – there’s an opening in the bottom so the bees can come up into it – so the bees will draw out the honeycomb a bit. He doesn’t want them to store honey in the little demo hive, but he does want them to show what they can do in building up the wax in preparation for honey storage. He brings this hive to places where he talks about bees, so people…
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don’t wash your hive tool
This here is a scrap piece of metal I found in my 'bee bag' that holds my various beekeeping tools. It's a good thing it was there, because I somehow ended up out at the hives without my trusty hive tool.
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first honey harvest
Since I had a super full of crazy curvy comb - that can happen when you don't use foundation - I couldn't just pop my honey frames in an extractor and give them a spin. First, I had to cut the comb from the frames. I used the wires in the frames as a guide, so it all came out in strips.
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bee escape
Setting up the bee escape and waiting for a few days allows the beekeeper to come back and take the box of honey without having to shake out the bees and piss them off. Or use a bee brush on the frames, which I can't do anyway since the comb is not actually in the individual frames. It's kind of meandering through the honey super. So I need a bee escape. And I need to go check it soon, since it's been on there for a bit. Here's a pic of the escape:
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a taste of honey
I've filtered my first half-cup of honey through this old food mill that belonged to my Grandma - see the honeycomb in the cone - and now I just want to look at it! I've tasted it, but that's all. It's a very light yellow - here's the comparison to Ken's:
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new momma for the girls
Many thanks to Ken for helping me yesterday with my queen and observation hive! The hive is a bit of a beast - it's so much easier with two people and more experience (Ken's, not mine). Anyway, here's the queen cage with queen and attendants - same one we saw yesterday, only in this pic Ken is uncorking the end. You'll notice the white bit - that's the 'candy' that the bees will need to chew through in order to free the queen. The cork is a precaution - there's so much candy there that Ken also made a wee hole through it to get them started.
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wacky house day
Here are the results of yet another experiment: I thought I'd try putting honey frames into the hive without foundation. Other beekeepers suggest rubbing beeswax along the top underside of the frame, to encourage the bees to start the foundation along that line. Sounded like a great idea. So I tried it. I put wires in the frames: