Today was around 21 degrees celsius and mostly sunny. It has been very hot just after Christmas getting above 30 degrees celsius and then cooler, misty, rainy for a few days. Today was however perfect so I did a follow up inspection to one a couple of weeks ago when I was concerned about the wax moth larvae I found. Thankfully I saw absolutely no evidence of anything this time. The inspection went well. I found the…
Last week I did an inspection. After putting the super on – I wanted to see if everything was ok. I’ve read that it’s not uncommon that a new beekeeper will not get honey in their first season. So patience is essential. Given it was January 2016 (southern hemisphere) when I received my nuc – I’m still not sure if I have done one complete season or just a kind of half season. I’m now into the second…
I had some old cast iron chairs from a New Zealand theatre – that I’ve had for 30 years. I’m guessing they are nearing over 100 years old. I bought them intact – but as i’ve left them outdoors for the past 10 years, they have slowly rotted to the point only the cast iron frames remain. The guilt associated with this rotting corpse of history in our hidden part of the garden was getting too much. So this…
I’ve put the super on today. I’ve waited for this moment for 11 months so am a little excited. putting the super on is nothing more than putting another box on top of the bottom box and took about 30 seconds. It’s great how something so simple can reap much joy! The super is the part with the Flow Hive System which is different than Langstroth hives. It’s the part that has the plastic frame/hive system that ultimately the…
I have finally done my beekeeping course. About 10 months after I first received my nuc, I turned up last weekend to Doug Purdie’s (from The Urban Beehive) course. Joint owners of the business Vicki and Doug keep about 100 hives all over rooftops and urban backyards in Sydney. The course was a one day everything course. First half of the day was theory and the afternoon was practical. I chose this one because I liked his…
Last weekend I did another inspection – #7 since receiving my bees in January this year. The last two I have enticed the entire family into helping so I can concentrate on just the hive. So I have one person with me just on standby, I have one of the kids taking photos, and one taking notes. It was 18 degrees, and the bees were very active. I did it at about 2pm. My bees are so…
Last weekend I opened up the hive to inspect everything for the first time since May. The weather has been getting warmer for about 3 or 4 weeks and I made sure the day was at least 15 degrees as per the research I’ve done on temperature to open your hive at. I had everyone involved to assist and observe, I figured the more eyes looking, the better chance we had of seeing anything untoward. Obviously as…
I love photographing my bees. I’m now on holiday for a week and it started with the most beautiful day on Saturday. I spent a long time just photographing my bees, experimenting with different lens and post processing everything in Adobe Lightroom. I use a Canon 7D camera and for each photograph I have listed the meta-data for the picture including lens. I know I love to know how bees have been photographed as I trawl through my…
Our blossoms are confused. It happens around this time every single year in Katoomba. We are only a few days away from the official start of Spring, but it’s almost always a false start. There are some very warm days for a week or so – then we get another very cold snap late September. The true spring doesn’t really start until well into October. Last week we had days that were upwards in the high teens,…
Ants. I really don’t like them very much. Particularly when there is a stream of them making their way up the concrete blocks, the base board, onto the hive and up into the roof. I had noticed them for a little while when it occurred to me – and hopefully not too late – that perhaps they were causing more damage than I realised. As you go through life it’s just something you see – streams of ants in the…