We’re just coming out of a week long cold snap where our temps dipped down to 0° c. at night and right around 10°c. during the day. This is a bit too cold for the bees and so they haven’t been out much which is a shame because we currently have several fields in our area filled with bright yellow canola plant blossoms, the bees love it and it gives them a large part of their spring honey supply. Today our temps are back up and the bees are zipping around like crazy.
Here is a picture of the hives with their additional honey boxes.
Currently there are 4 boxes to each hive, boxes are added as needed for honey storage. In the bottom two boxes the queen lays her eggs and all the new bees are born there. So unless you want bee larvae mixed in with your honey, you have to keep the queen out of the honey storage boxes, you can see in the picture a thin board right in the middle which I’ve marked as “queen excluder”. You place that thin board, which is actually a metal screen, on top of the brood box (where the babies are). The worker bees can pass through the slots in the screen but they are just a bit too narrow for the queen to fit through, so she can’t go up into the top boxes.
My husband has been making good progress with the garbage removal, he’s got the first dumpster filled and we will get another one on Monday which is only for wood. There was heaps of stacked wood left to rot behind the house, we’re not allowed to burn it ourselves so have to pay to have it hauled away.
This mixed material dumpster will end up costing around 500 euro… getting rid of garbage around here is not cheap! The wood container should be a bit cheaper since it only contains one thing.
I haven’t been able to do much around the garden since the weather turned cold so I’m just dreaming about what to plant where :O)
Next year I will plant a large herb garden, but for this year I’m only growing a few things on our bridge, just the stuff we use the most, like parsley, thyme, chives and later I’ll plant some basil.
This is flat leaf parsley that I planted a few days ago.
And here are some plants that I ordered from an online shop. They arrived packed in hay and looking a bit rough but they’ve popped back into shape nicely. I want to use as many native plants as I can, and also insect friendly plants, I’ll probably end up with a yard full of plants that many people would consider weeds, but those are of course the ones that are most attractive to wildlife.
Here I’ve got some lady’s mantle, two types of comfrey, black-eyed Susans, and some hardy “Munstead” lavender.
And these are my catmint babies. Hopefully the cats will give them time to grow before rolling around in them ;O)
How far away are the bees from the house? I want to start raising bees, but I’m unsure of where to set the hives so they are safe yet the house and the horses are safe too.
Hi Monique,
our hives are about 20 yards from the house, mostly the distance is for their sake, so that they have a nice quiet area of the yard to themselves. The bees are really harmless unless you get too close the the front of their hives, then they might feel threatened and the guard bees might sting or chase you off.
Really though they are very passive creatures, we might get 3-4 stings in a year and that is usually when we are working directly in the hive or when mowing too close to the hive, they don’t like loud machines like lawn mowers or weed-whippers, so we usually cut around their area either late in the evening when they are done flying for the night, or we use hand tools to do the cutting. It’s not a problem to mow in the rest of the yard.
They shouldn’t bother the horses either as long as the horses are not right in front of the hive.
Keeping the hives in a quiet area where you will not be walking all the time is a good idea. also some place where they will not be completely in heavy shade is good. They need to get some sun to help warm up the hive. Our bees are on the south side of our house.
I would encourage you to give it a try. Look for a class in your area, or contact a local beekeeper and ask questions about getting started. It’s not hard and you’ll be doing alot of good for your area.