My next adventure...

Happy hour starts in 5 minutes
Short a few pints I'll still collect with more draining time, summer 2017 haul was 45 pints, or just about 5.5 gallons. This year's honey was quite a bit lighter than previous years. I attribute that to a rainy spring when the tulip poplar's were blooming. Tulip poplar is the primary nectar source here - and it produces a very dark honey. This stuff is delicious but a little lighter than usual. Likely mostly blackberry nectar and mixed flower honey.

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I have recently eliminated nearly all of the processed sugar from my diet. When a sweetener is needed, like in oatmeal, I now use 100% raw and unfiltered domestic honey. What a treat! I'm jealous of your beautiful yield but not the effort you undoubtedly put into it.
 
Well, never lost a hive over winter in 4 years of beekeeping. This year, 3 of 4 hives didn't make it through the cold. So I'll be picking up 4 replacement 'nucs' (starter colonies) at the end of March to get me back to 5 hives. Will be replacing some equipment as well. Upside of losing a hive? The dying colony leaves behind all of their honey. I pulled in close to 3 gallons as I dismantled the hives.
 
Boone said:
Well, never lost a hive over winter in 4 years of beekeeping. This year, 3 of 4 hives didn't make it through the cold. So I'll be picking up 4 replacement 'nucs' (starter colonies) at the end of March to get me back to 5 hives. Will be replacing some equipment as well. Upside of losing a hive? The dying colony leaves behind all of their honey. I pulled in close to 3 gallons as I dismantled the hives.
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Well, kudos on the harvest...sucks you had to lose so much in order to do so.
 
Installed 4 new hives a couple of weeks ago. Here's some video of my surviving booming hive from this weekend...




Took some video of the front door as well. You can see how hectic the activity is with marauding bees constantly returning to the hive with nectar and pollen. You'll see one bee removing some trash from inside the hive. The brightly colored pouches on many of the returning bees legs is pollen from different tree sources which the bees use for food.

 
I've recently developed a relationship with a beautiful woman who was born and raised in Russia and emigrated to Finland twenty years ago. I met her at my business while she was visiting for the month of December and she returned for six weeks in April and May.

I will be flying to Helsinki in June to see her and to travel for a little more than two weeks. We will be traveling to Tallinn Estonia, Riga (ah, Riga) in Latvia, then through Lithuania and Poland to Germany. We were initially going to go to Moscow and St. Petersbugh but the visa process is ridiculous.

I'll admit I'm pretty pumped.
 
That sounds like an adventure all right! Happy for you brother. Got to admit, I think Russian women (and others from that part of the world) are just beautiful...
 
Boone said:
That sounds like an adventure all right! Happy for you brother. Got to admit, I think Russian women (and others from that part of the world) are just beautiful...
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(Didn't cost me much either.) :drummer:
 
So, I arrived in Helsinki yesterday and we took a long evening hike through a forest area (about 12K). Here is a pic I took at 11:30pm. Similar light to Alaska, Win?

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Tallinn, Estonia. Late June and colder than a witches intimate body part.
 
Very cool pics Chris - hope you had an epic trip!
 
This year, had very little time to focus on my bees. I did replace 4 hives with new bees after the original occupants didn't survive the winter. Put my honey boxes on in mid-March. Retrieved honey a few days ago. I probably only pulled 20 frames or less but they were absolutely loaded. The wax was the cleanest I have ever seen, and the honey was much thinner and lighter than usual. We had a ton of rain in April and May and I'm thinking that this washed away a lot of the tulip poplar nectar which is usually their primary source and which typically makes a very dark and thick honey.

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Fewer frames this year as I ONLY took extra honey frames and did not *raid* the actual next boxes for honey as I have some years. This is better for the bees as it leaves them with a lot more honey.

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As mentioned, the amount of honey and comb on each frame was much greater this year. I have started to put 9 frames instead of the usual 10 in the honey boxes which gives the bees more space to fill them up with honey. I had a number of them just loaded like this one.

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I use the 'crush and strain' technique to harvest. Basically scrape all of the wax and honey off the frames, hand crush it, and then filter out the wax.

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I've never had honey this light in color. Bees are weird :) It's absolutely delicious.

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Final take for this year was 6.5 gallons. I may be able to harvest more in a month or so as I left boxes on the hives.
 
Boone couldn't you insulate your hive differently? Or even run an electric blanket in it?
 
5 active hives this summer after losing all my bees over the winter. Only two of them seemed to be storing a bunch of honey a month or so ago when I checked. Went out last weekend and one of them had filled both honey supers chockfull, so I pulled those 18 frames. The other hive had some honey but it was not yet 'capped' (ie...the honeycomb cells were still open meaning they were still storing honey) so I may get another couple of boxes from that hive in a few more weeks.

So basically, one hive produced. Got about 4.5 gallons. This year the honey is very light in color. The #1 nectar source here in NC is usually tulip poplar which typically makes super dark thick honey. The 2nd most common nectar source is blackberry so I'm thinking because it rained a lot during tulip poplar blooming that this is mostly blackberry.

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Chris said:
So, I arrived in Helsinki yesterday and we took a long evening hike through a forest area (about 12K). Here is a pic I took at 11:30pm. Similar light to Alaska, Win?

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My bad Chris, just noticed this post and a great shot btw. Yes similar but yeah it's even more light out here in Alaska over the summer. You HAVE to black out your windows or you'll never get any sleep here. Dark as can be in the winter too. I'll snap a pic here soon to show you guys.

On another note it's 90 damn degrees here today! I left Las Vegas thinking the heat stayed behind too, not so much.
 
Boone said:
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Just thought of you after reading a story about Coal Miners who were put out of jobs, being given a new vocation. They are teaching them beekeeping skills. The story is from Jan vary, but I just saw it today.

https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2019/01/28/685878133/out-of-work-appalachian-coal-miners-train-as-beekeepers-to-earn-extra-cash
 
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