Pastor of MuppetsOne cool side effect of putting a canopy over my beehive is that not only does it keep the hive shaded and cooler, but when I stand under it with a smoker to check the hive, I'm basically hotboxing with m'girls
Good god. I was certain last winter that our beehive was dead. Now it's barely March and it is so insane with activity that we've split off a few frames to a friend and added a fifth (!) box, AND may have to start a second hive with another spilt.
Turns out my yard is the Bee Promised Land, I guess. And I am Beesus.
We are upgraded from "we are not having a harvest" to "we are having a small harvest, probably next weekend". My #beekeeping master Lauren helped me understand that freezing is a bigger winter threat around here than starving, so smaller hives are better, easier to keep warm. So we pulled the capped frames to harvest and the empties to store, and I'll spin maybe about 15-20 pounds next weekend. #hiveblogging #BzzzFeed
Bees appear to have noticed that the heat has let up. Production has increased. Babies look good. No sign of swarming, but signs of a possible insurrection coming. TONS of beetles on the swiffer pads. Looks to be a good fall harvest. #beekeeping #hiveblogging #BzzzFeed #HivesOfMastodon
PeculioBees on a sunflower #bloomscrolling #bzzzfeed
Being an amateur #beekeeper is good spiritual practice. Because fear is an unaffordable luxury, you get exposure to loving something that can hurt you, and there's lots of practice in doing the right thing without expectation of reward.
I also got stung like six times, which is a personal record, and which is a pain level appropriate to many spiritual practices.
YOUR HOME IS FREE OF BEETLES AND MITES, YOU'RE WELCOME, ASSHOLES
Just pulled two full hive boxes for harvest and could have gotten frames from a third, but I need to get an extra box and frames to pull that off.
Regardless, those two boxes weighed roughly a Squeaky Pete each, i.e. about 50 pounds. I couldn't lift both at once. Gonna be lousy with the good stuff this weekend. Happy Father's Day to me.
Just went out to do a hive check.
The good news: there will be a sizable honey harvest next weekend. Couldn't believe how heavy the top two boxes were. Halfway capped.
The bad news: a bee stung me on the boob. RIP, boob bee.
Last year, our #beehive record was five boxes. Biggest hive in the mentoring program I just graduated from.
I just did an inspection with my #beekeeping mentor Lauren and put on a sixth box. Thing's a tower now. We are gonna be lousy with honey.
After I put on the new box, three bees crawled up my pant leg and stung me on the thigh. Ingrates. #hiveblogging #BzzzFeed
@kellogh @lysdexic I pledge to you that I will make it real. Though I may be the only #beekeeper on Masto who uses it, I will put a #BzzzFeed tag on every single post I make about bees
This is the way