This winter we have been taking a beekeeping class and we are learning alot! It has been really interesting and we are hoping to expand our beehives this Spring. We had 3 hives on our farm last year (1 belonging to us and 2 others belonging to a friend) and we could really tell that they helped pollinate the garden. We saw bees all of the time and our yields for most things were good, even though we had a less than ideal growing season with our wet and cooler than normal Summer. The wet and cool weather also took a toll on the honey harvest. We were only able to harvest 3 pints of honey from our hive and our friend harvested around 150 lbs. ( I think) of honey from 4 hives. We have learned in our bee class that in a good year it is nothing to harvest 150 lbs of honey per hive! We are hoping to add 2 more hives to our 1 that we already have...and we are hoping for a Summer that is a bit warmer and drier! If all goes well, we'll have some all natural honey to sell!
This is fascinating! I had a friend where we used to live that had hives. I was always afraid to get too close but I loved listening to her talk about them.
ReplyDeleteJennifer sent me over here:
www.gabbygwenhwyfar.blogspot.com
Thanks for checking out the blog marineswife! Bees are fascinating (and a bit scary) to me as well. We are learning a lot in our bee class and will hopefully be ready in spring for our new hives!
ReplyDeleteBeekeeping (or apiculture) is the maintenance of bee colonies, commonly in man-made hives, by humans. Most such bees are queen honey bee in the genus Apis, but other honey-producing bees such as Melipona stingless bees are also kept.
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