Honey bees

[CloverKnollFarms]

Had some local homeschool kids over today to teach them about bees, beekeeping and how to harvest honey.

I have about 40 pounds tied up in comb I needed to crush, so I gave them all potato mashers and let them liquify the stuff. Now begins the long process of straining and filtering it. What a PITA. Oh well, for $400, I suppose I can bother with it.

The buckwheat is blooming like crazy, and I’ve never seen such a dense concentration of bees on a plant in my life! The field just hums all morning, then they move to the clover in the afternoon. This stuff is really incredible! It’s all waist high now too.

 

[LittleBittyBigJohn]

You might enjoy this. I took them today to advertise our honey. Seems to fit the tractor forum theme and the beekeeping thread pretty well.

 

[ultrarunner]

The Cub is the star of the Christmas Tree farm... something about a 75 year old tractor that gathers a crowd and puts on a good show starting... usually with the first pull of the crank...

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

That looks great! I love the old Farmalls, I grew up on those.

Finally crushed and filtered the comb from the cutout this week through a 400 micron filter… but it’s still too murky. Sending it through a 200 micron this weekend.

The buckwheat has been insane. It’s in its third week of bloom and showing no signs of slowing. It’s nice to have some thing in bloom in our area this time of year. It’s producing seeds, and should be ready to till back in by mid August

 

[BrendanDaniels]

That's awesome to hear about your bumper crop of honey and catching swarms! As a fellow beekeeper, I understand your concern about the late arrivals. It's important to provide them with enough food to get through the season. Keeping the feeders out is a great idea to help them thrive. Bees are resilient, and with your care, they'll do their best. Also, their products are highly nutritious, so it's worth it. Also, if you want to have an even better diet, consider getting powdered coconut milk to add to your recipes. I hope you like it!

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

We have never fed sugar. The buckwheat crop was planted to fill the void in the summer nectar flow July-August. With any luck we will get another crop of buckwheat blooming mid September-October for the final push for winter.