merry everything!

I wish I could go on and on about how special the holidays are but in reality it stresses me out to the max! I usually make all my gifts, and I am a natural born procrastinator and I like to take on many overambitious projects just to make life interesting! this is why it has been a little while since my last post. My family and I went to Boston for Christmas eve and saw the Nutcracker, it was the most spectacular show I have ever seen. Ballerinas dressed up in elaborate costumes with glimmering tutus and fancy updo's and shoes laced tightly, I was in awe. After we saw the show, we decided to do a little window shopping in china town ( my favorite place to shop in Boston) My brother and I discovered this great Chinese herb shop, where I found this great tincture it is ginseng and royal jelly ( a super protein secreted by female bees and fed to larve during the first stages of development, however the queen is fed exclusively royal jelly which helps her fully sexually mature and grow bigger than her worker bees) I couldn't believe it only cost four dollars!!!

my grandmother the bee queen

This is my grandmother I have her to thank for my love and curiosity of these little creatures isn't she beautiful! she is holding my father as a newborn and my aunt peggie is playing with her new brother.  As you can see bees respond to her lovingly.

swarm cells

http://www.beginningbeekeeping.com/SwarmingHoneyBees.html 

I found this great picture of swarm cells today There are 7 cells in this image! 

When the colony begins to feel like their home is becoming overpopulated the workers begin to create these swarm cells ( for a new queen) so essentially they are waiting for the cells to emerge a virgin queen, if there is more than one virgin they will battle to the death until there is only one left to rule, however just before this occurs the old queen will flee the hive taking with her a SWARM of her most loyal attendants and they will leave in search of a new home together. This tends to happen in the beginning of May. Hopefully if this is your hive that swarms you can find and catch the swarm and acclimate it with a new unoccupied hive, because before these bees swarm they first fill their little bellies full of nectar to prepare. And when bees have bellies full of nectar, it means they are ready to draw lots of comb, which they secrete from a series glands on their abdomens. And this is why it is so great to start as a new beekeeper with a swarm as apposed to a package of bees ( who are all pissed of from their long journey, and malnourished) 

You might ask how do I find a swarm. If you feel like you don't have the time in your life to go hunting for swarms to catch there are other ways, for instance if you live in Maine, we have a swarm list you can sign up for through the Maine Beekeepers Association. So when someone finds a swarm in their yard and wants nothing to do with it, they call the town and the town calls the next person on the list. Its a Win Win!

 If the idea of catching a swarm of bees sounds frightening to you, there are always plenty of beekeepers who would love to help out!

Catch a Bee Swarm

I found this beautiful vase today made completly of beeswax it took over 40,000 bees to create!


“I have been interested in contradicting the current consumer society (which is interested in slick design) by choosing to work with a seemingly very vulnerable and ephemeral material – beeswax.
To give a form to this natural product it has occurred more than logical to choose a form of a vase as a cultural artifact. Beeswax comes from flowers and in the form of a vase ends up serving flowers on their last journey."

http://www.dezeen.com/2007/04/19/studio-libertiny-at-droog/

My lifes been sweetened with honey!

Couldn't be happier.....In a sugar coma heaven......Pure BLIZZzzZZZZzz.
    
      About a week ago I finally was able to borrow an extractor from an old boss who is a beekeeper. The extractor I borrowed from him was a hand crank operated spinner, and it held three frames at a time. as you can see in the photo it's a large piece of equipment. So I called my parents around 6pm and told them I was on my way with all the honey. They were both thrilled! (little did they know how messy and time consuming this project was about to be.) So I showed up with one honey shallow one extractor and a bucket.

          Ideally if you had all the snazzy tools that all the beekeeping books tell you to have, you would also be prepared with a heated knife tool however that's hogwash, your should always be resourceful all that fancy equipment will cost you a fortune and lets face it this is an expensive hobby, and one we do for the love of the bees. long story short i used a fork and scored the wax capping (over the basin) you can score both sides before placing your frames in the extractor however i've found its much less messy if you do one side at a time facing the scored side facing outward.
     
              Once you have three frames in your spinner....... Well? Start spinning! This is the fun part,at first anyway then your arm starts to go numb so get helpers. Make a party out of it. Get a bottle of mead cheese and crackers people will come!

            You'll know when you've drained the honey from your frames they'll still glisten but the honey wont pool up.Score the other side and repeat the spinning. Caution don't try and be Hercules with this. My dad thought he'd show off to us all by torquing on it so fast i thought it would start hovering. When I finally got him to stop so we could take a look , the other side was begin to sort of implode due to cylindrical force. It was pretty funny to watch though .

            So as you're spinning the honey and wax capping begins to pool in the bottom of the basin. This is where you need a clean bucket! place under then honey gate and here we go!! YUMMY I couldn't wait I stuck my finger in the sticky stream of honey it was tangy like citrus!

a naked beekeeper?

 

yesterday I was talking about singing to your bees, well this guy is taking it to a whole new level and clearly they love him for it. I don't play clarinet but I do play trombone, wonder how they'd like that?

the last day of bee school

               Last night was the end of bee school, after five night classes we all graduated into "beeginners" And with one season under my belt I felt like I had even more questions than if I was just beginning. (of course some of the information might have prevented a few stings)  Let me share with you a few of these things; smell is a very important factor when it comes to beekeeping. Think for a minute, if a bee can smell the nectar and fly miles to find it you can imagine how sensitive her sense of smell is so if you have even the lightest scent of say, BANANA or ALMOND and especially PERSPIRATION it will piss her right off she does not like the distraction, also each hive has a specific chemistry of odors going on which helps the bees to know that everyone is family and that there is no intruders (robbing honey) in their home. With that in mind it is best to wash with unscented soap, (I use glycerin because it is biodegradable) before you inspect your hives. The bees however will begin to recognize your scent and respond back lovingly if that is the aura that you release. Whistle to your bees or even sing to them, my bees really like it when i sing Joni Mitchell songs.

I'm really going to miss them this winter!

inspecting honey shallows

 

my really technical terminology is due to my overwhelming joy for all the hard work my ladies have done but what i mean to say is that they are producing so much honey that they are beginning to create burr comb and filling with honey to anticipate for the long winter ahead.

capping honey during prime nectar flow

I started this blog thinking that I would be online writing every day when the reality is that between waitressing and beekeeping i don't have much time or interest in turning the computer on when I get home. The summer has flown by and my hives are almost full! It has been the perfect year for honey. All the flowers in my grandmothers garden are bursting open in a beautiful array of colors filling the air with a sweet sent that is almost intoxicating on a hot day mixed with the salted air from the strong oceans breeze.

The first week "flew" by so fast I didn't have time to sleep! Its incredible to see the work they have done inside the hive already. The friend that I convinced to help me, was my not so willing but patient assistant the other day and we noticed that in one of the hives they have already made huge progress drawing out the comb from the foundation on the new frames. While the other hive has barely started. I'm not sure why this is, my only guess would be that hive A. is stronger than hive B. but the unusual part is that Ive noticed more activity of workers going in and out in hive B. so this is bizarre to me.

Today was much better! I got a good nights sleep had plenty of coffee and right after work at 3 I drove straight there.The sun was vibrant today and glistened in the remaining puddles of yesterdays rain I couldn't wait to see what had happened inside the hive in just 24 hours.
And they continue to amaze me, There were spots that they had already welded the frames together with wax! They were so much friendlier and relaxed on a sunny warm day. When I opened the hive they crawled over every inch of the hive, buzzing around my head climbing over my fingers with their furry bodies. The foraging bees returning to the hive had sacs full of pollen on their hind legs, reminded me of yellow chaps. When I removed the first frame today it was covered in bees they all seemed to know their purpose, while some were burrowing their little bodies in the combs to tend to the brood, others were drawing out comb. I could pick out the drones right away, they are fat and dumb looking moving slowly and aimlessly around the hive. makes me giggle. Another great day!!

first day as a beekeeper

After a long spring of waiting, reading books and having bees on the brain they are finally here. I woke up this morning like a kid at Christmas laying in bed at 6:00 trying to force a few more hours of sleep in, I just couldn't do it I was so anxious to go, I had a 2 hour car ride to Albion ME ahead of me and I was ready before i even brushed my teeth. 11:00 couldn't have taken any longer, I had my i pod, coffee in hand and exactly enough money to purchase my two nuc's. I'm ready. Right?
Choosing the appropriate music for a day like today was tough, but I started out with some Booka shade to get me in a good positive groove, then some Itals and a little Joni Mitchell to mellow it out. I was a little bit nervous and a lot a bit excited. The nervousness was due to the fact that I slacked and didn't order my veil, smoker and hive tool in time, so i would have to do without and hope I don't get stung too many times! It is rainy today, just my luck having no smoker the bees are going to be pissed off and sting the hell out of me, but I'm trying to stay positive.