I've got a beehive!

Here is the new hive. Not mine as such, but mine to look after. Its only a small one, as it was a split from another, and the queen might not be too robust, so will need some TLC and checking for a while. When it gets going, there is a box to add to the top, that has frames for honey. In this box there are some honey frames, and mainly brood frames, which means the baby bee factory. 

We've faced the hive to the east, and positioned it so it gets the morning sun, to wake the bees up and get them out and about early. And then it is in afternoon dappled shade, so they won't get too hot. Or that is the theory.

I've got a huge pohutukawa flowering at the moment, and the bees all seem to love it, so that is a good sign. I also spotted a lot of native bees on the flowers too.

Oiling Bee Hive Boxes

At this time of year, in spring, all the bees start multiplying like mad. So they need bigger houses to accommodate all the extra family. So many new boxes are required. Here they are, not quite made yet.

And once they have been made they need to be preserved in some way, so they can withstand the weather better. Often you see beehives painted in some lurid colour that looks like the cheap leftovers from the local paint shop (or all beekeepers are a bit colour blind?).

But these boxes are going to be dipped in hot linseed oil for preservation.

The oil comes in huge drums. And it is being added to the heating trough.

 Which is then heated up, the boxes added 6 at a time and left to soak, then fished out.

 Dripping on the side for a while...

 And isn't this just a beautiful sight? Golden and oiled, waiting for new homes.

Winter Flowering Hebes

A couple of my newly planted hebes are starting to flower in winter. Hebes all seem to flower at different times, so it is a bit of a lottery as to which type you get. Winter flowering will be good for any bees that are still out and about, give them something to snack on.

Varroa Free Bees to save the world

Our world's food supplies rely heavily on bees for pollination. But they are increasingly under attack from various causes, creating colony collapse disorder. But here is good news of an amazing dude who has been working hard on bees in Niue since 1999. That's 16 years, so patience is often required when working with nature, as this guy must know.

Check out the article Creating a Global Bee Sanctuary.

What to do to bees in winter

I got to be bee girl today! And I didn't get stung! Although all the bees were quite quiet and sleepy, as it was quite cold, and they are mostly settling in for the winter, ready to seal up their hives and bee-hibernate. Even the dog wasn't so wary, and came up round the hives.

Some of the hives were being attacked by wasps though, so we went out to deal with that, by restricting their entrances, so the bees had more chance to fight off the intruder wasps. Here you can see that the bees have got a whole lot more interested in us and what we were doing, they all came rushing out to defend their hive, perfectly proper bee behaviour.  Normally in summer, there would be crowds of them like this anyway, just going about their foraging business.

These hives have all got a feeder in them, the black box hole to the left. This contains sugar syrup and helps with those hives that don't have enough honey reserves to see them through winter.

Boundary Rejunvenation Mk 1

Plant No. 1 in the 'Boundary Fights Back' wars.  This is a hebe, a lovely NZ native which will have white flowers in spring, and attract the bees.

 

 

When we were transporting it home from the garden centre, it fell over and a biggish branch broke off.  No matter!  Now we also have a whole lot of cuttings.  These might be donated to the bee enterprise for pollen gathering before the manuka starts flowering.

 

Bees and Honey

 

This weekend, as a change of pace from only digging clay (although there was a considerable amount of that too), I helped a friend put honey into jars.

 

It was our first time, so we had to experiment a bit.  We ended up with a bain-marie of hot water and 2 small pots of honey melting over it.  The one at the front being stirred is nearly melted, and the one at the back is just getting going.  The honey needed to be strained to get rid of all the impurities (um, that would be bees legs and such :-/ ). We didn't want to heat the honey too much as I think heat destroys some of the essential goodnesses in raw honey.

 

 

We made quite a few pots of honey too - lovely dark, strong and healthy manuka honey.  When we had finished we gave the pots and utensils back to the bees for them to lick clean.  Assuming my friend's dog didn't get to them first.  And then had a sourdough and honey sandwich.  Of course!