have you had your fill?
It’s Saturday October 14. It was about 60 degrees for about 5 minutes at noon and has been mid to high 50s for the remainder of the day. There is little wind, and it is partly cloudy. Tomorrow is the last day to feed the bees. It’s getting far too cold to be tampering with the hive and exposing the bees to the elements and letting in other bees for robbing, also the syrup gets too cold for them. Drinking it can mean death, as it will lower the bee’s thoracic temperature to a point where they can’t even move back to the warm ball in the center of the hive. Knowing this, they won’t drink it any longer.
Don’t mind all the syrup that I accidentally spilled while removing one of the feeders. I hope not too many bees were harmed by my mistake. They will do their best to clean up as much as possible.
It’s a good thing that a few days ago I thought to check in with another beekeeper in our community, because I was worried how cold it had been this past week. She suggested that I really needed to put the feeders inside the hive, if they were still needing to be fed. I wasn’t sure when I moved the feeders if my bees were actually still bringing syrup into the hive or if I was seeing robbers, bees from other hives, yellow jackets, or bumblebees taking the syrup. Putting them inside would help determine this. So I set the feeders on top of the inner cover and placed a couple of medium supers topped by the outer cover. Because I had removed the entrance feeders from opening of the hive, I also installed an entrance reducer. This helps the bees by making a smaller entrance for them to defend against robbers and protects against the elements, like wind or rain.
The girls have only two small spaces to enter and exit the hive now, one of the entrances is located underneath the cluster of bees down in the lower left corner. You can’t even see it, it’s so small. The other entrance is up top between the inner and outer cover, it is the same size as the lower one.
That was Wednesday. I have been ill this week with a respiratory infection and wasn’t able to visit the hive to check on the feeding status. I still haven’t kicked the illness, but I noticed it was beautiful and sunny with little wind and it was almost 60 degrees outside, there might be no better time to do this. I put on my bee suit, and I lifted the outer cover and peered in, right away I saw there were bees around the feeders but also noticed that both feeders were still full of heavy syrup, it looked like very little had been taken since Wednesday. I removed both feeders and the two supers.
Amidala, reduced to three medium supers. Last checked had brood, copious amounts bees young and older, an active queen, and I witnessed drones being kicked out, lots of activity when weather is warmer. The hive had several full frames of capped honey and lots of nectar with much space of empty drawn comb for feeding. I fed 8-10 gallons of syrup before stopping, uncertain how much was robbed.
Orange saddlebags! I noticed that the girls are still bringing in pollen. I saw a bunch of them with these orange saddlebags! I love seeing this. Natural foraging is always better for our pollinators, it means they have a well-balanced diet.
In other news! My cousin Erin and her husband Gordan are giving me a Flow Hive! If you don’t know what these are, check them out in the video below! They purchased it a while ago when they were brand new and then never got around to setting it up. They say it was collecting dust and they wanted it to go to good use! I am very excited about trying this, I will likely fill it with a split or a swarm next spring.
As my first year of beekeeping is wrapping up, I am reflective. I am still just as excited now as I was before my bees arrived in June. Now I have new questions, with actual experience to draw answers from. Even though I still will seek another’s ear or opinion, when I listen, my own intuition astounds me. I know I’m asking good questions. I understand that there are MANY ways to do this, and so much of it comes from a creative way to problem solve. I love this way of learning. I am getting comfortable.
I got started on this blogging process a little late. It was after the beekeeping started, and I spent a little time trying to bring any readers I might have up to speed, and at the same time trying to discover my voice as a writer. I never thought of myself as a writer but always wanted to write. I write poetry sometimes, and write letters that I never send or deliver, and write social media posts that are loquacious when I am inspired and feel like I have something to say.
As I started out, I tried to understand why I wanted to do this. What was my goal? I knew I could keep my bees and write in an old-fashioned or even electronic journal, just for myself. I could track facts and findings and make goals and record outcomes. It’s all very scientific, and that’s not me. I realized quickly that the part I need is the creative outlet and the sharing a part of myself with others. It is why I bake, and why I make videos, and why I am writing this blog; it is creating something for others to enjoy, it fills me up. When I bring things to share with others and they enjoy it, I feel good. So, I’ll just be over here, doing my thing, getting my fill, one video, one batch of cookies, and one bee blog at a time. I hope you keep popping in to see what’s up.