Fall Full Autumn Moon Our revels now have ended. The very last of the year’s harvest, four-foot long decorative squash and birdhouse style gourds, Kate brought in yesterday. The bees are done for the year. Two colonies will die over the winter and the third, with luck, will survive. Even if it does, this is […]
Read the rest of this entry »Bee Diaries: April 9, 2011
Spring Waxing Beehiving Moon This morning: an auto da fe, an act of faith, but as you history buff’s know, also a burning. Acting on the word of Mcarthur Grant Genius, Marla Spivak, I burned my old hives and frames since I believe they had an infestation of American Foulbrood. They were old and came […]
Read the rest of this entry »A Parent Colony, A Divide, And a Package Colony
Imbolc New Moon (Awakening) Bees. Bees. Bees. Bees. I’ve had two 8 hour sessions of nothing but bees. And more stuff about bees. Today I learned about dividing a colony, a successfully wintered colony, which is our situation here. As Marla Spivak says, “If you’re not sure, just let the bees do it.” That conforms […]
Read the rest of this entry »Late June Hive Inspection
Summer Waxing Summer Moon Mark and Elise came over today. We wandered through the garden and the orchard, followed by Rigel and Vega. They licked and pressed and jumped. New people! New people! Oh, boy! Oh, boy! New people! Rigel and Vega found Leif and Tate and Tate’s twin really, really interesting. Baby head! Baby […]
Read the rest of this entry »Still sinking.
Beltane Full Dyan Moon Kate can tell when I begin to submerge, move below the surface of day to day contact. I become short, irritable. She gets the feeling of walking on egg shells. By the time this happens I’m not in touch with my effect on the outside world. Distraction and self-absorption reign. She […]
Read the rest of this entry »Hive 2 In Place
Beltane Waning Flower Moon Mark came over and we suited up. The bees have been busy. I saw the small larvae curled up in the very bottom of a comb’s cell, several of them. We investigated each frame, finding one frame with many capped cells, maybe 60%. The bees did not seem interested in us. […]
Read the rest of this entry »A Green Miracle
Spring Waning Seed Moon The bee hives have a new coat of white sealer, a soothing color for them. The raised bed on which I painted them has some tulips pushing up and the bed across from it have the garlic. They’ve begun to wake up in force now so we’ll have the pleasure of […]
Read the rest of this entry »Is There Such A Thing As An Individual Bee?
Spring Waning Seed Moon The bee hive essentials are in the red car and they come out today. The bees themselves arrive next Saturday by semi. Mark Nordeen told me last year’s delivery came during an April blizzard, hit a patch of ice, rolled over and killed all the bees. This will be my first […]
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