Remember my Beehive I built and place a 3 pound package of bees inside in the spring of 2009? Well, they died recently. Sigh. I had seen them out and about in February when we had some warm days, but about a week ago the weather was warm enough for them to be out, but they weren't. I opened my hive and my fear was confirmed. They were all dead. It was a bit of a sad sight. The hive had gobs of bees and gobs of honey. There were many bees still holding on to the comb and many trying to eat out of empty combs. After much internet search and contacting experienced beekeepers, I believe the bees starved to death. We had a cold snap about 2 weeks ago for several days and the bees couldn't move much and the honey was just one comb too far away. Isn't that sad. to die of starvation when food is literally only inches away.
Whenever I have a cool farm thing going on I try to get some young kids in on the action to check it out. I love teaching about this stuff.
This is a honey comb, not fully capped. The capped honey is perfect honey all set for storage. The uncapped part (the darker part) is basically "watery" honey. It hadn't been fully evaporated and finished the process. Some of the uncapped stuff was crystalized which I thought was interesting.
When I was in Africa and harvested honey for the first time, I ate honey right from the comb on site. It was a warmer day and the honey was a bit warm. It was the most amazing honey I have ever had. So, now I think I should eat honey straight from the comb whenever I harvest honey.
Low tech way of separating my honey from the comb. Crush the come and sift it through nylons. This is an incredibly slow way of harvesting honey however it is sediment free. I switched to just straining it trough a metal mesh strainer which was much MUCH faster but leaves a little bit of sediment.
One jar is raw organic honey, the other the comb left overs. Now I am trying to figure out how to purify my wax to make some candle........or maybe just one. One comb doesn't make a lot of wax. I know I look gorgeous. I am really working the pioneer woman angle. If only I could be cute and productive, it just seems to allude me.
This is a honey comb, not fully capped. The capped honey is perfect honey all set for storage. The uncapped part (the darker part) is basically "watery" honey. It hadn't been fully evaporated and finished the process. Some of the uncapped stuff was crystalized which I thought was interesting.
The bee graveyard. Boo! - not boo as in scary boo but boo as in "not cool" and "lame"
When I was in Africa and harvested honey for the first time, I ate honey right from the comb on site. It was a warmer day and the honey was a bit warm. It was the most amazing honey I have ever had. So, now I think I should eat honey straight from the comb whenever I harvest honey.
I have a tendency to make whoever I am around eat things I grow/harvest ect.
Low tech way of separating my honey from the comb. Crush the come and sift it through nylons. This is an incredibly slow way of harvesting honey however it is sediment free. I switched to just straining it trough a metal mesh strainer which was much MUCH faster but leaves a little bit of sediment.
One jar is raw organic honey, the other the comb left overs. Now I am trying to figure out how to purify my wax to make some candle........or maybe just one. One comb doesn't make a lot of wax. I know I look gorgeous. I am really working the pioneer woman angle. If only I could be cute and productive, it just seems to allude me.
Overall I am actually impressed how well they faired over the last 2 years. You see honeybees are not indigenous here as it is quite wet. Then to boot we are having a global epidemic of the death of honeybees. Then to add to to that most typical hives require a lot of treatments of antibiotics, feedings, and re-queening to keep alive. My hive was for the most part was ignored and left to nature to decide its't fate. Many "typical" beekeepers told me my bees would die a lot sooner. Plus all the traditionalist (which is most beekeepers) booed my top bar hive design. So the good news is, my bees did not get sick and have enough foliage around and about to make enough honey (even during last summer which was colder then most). The top bar design was a good little home and now I know I should re-arrange some combs to facilitate closer honey for this next winter, my bees hopefully should do well. I thought I would wait a year to get more bees since I have so much yard work, but the more I work with the honey and wax, the more I want them again now. Bees are seriously cool!
No comments:
Post a Comment