When you keep honeybees, one of the really amazing by-products to honey is bees wax! Over the last two years we’ve cut out all sorts of “rouge comb” in order to keep the hives nice and clean. We’ve been mindful to collect all of the extra comb and have been storing it in this five gallon bucket!
So this post is a long one…mostly pictures, but I just couldn’t help myself. I am so excited about having a fish pond in our backyard, even if it is just a cattle stock tank! So you may be wondering what goldfish have to do with honeybees, but the truth is, it’s a bit of a symbiotic relationship (ok, that might be an overstatement!?). Honeybees need water, and if you have a pond you need goldfish to keep the mosquito larva away. See there…we just had to buy goldfish for our honeybees!
So it started out with a trip to Wilco where we picked up a six foot cattle stock tank. We then started to prep the area where the tank was going. We raked back the bard dust, tried to level the soil, and ultimately used a bag of sand to get things leveled.
Way back on April 25th…yes, I’ve got a backlog of photos…please forgive me! We pulled the honeybee packages out of our new hives. We received our honeybees on April 15th, and general practice is to let the packages rest in the hive for 7-9 days so that the honeybees can accept their Queen and start making honeycomb. Due to some inclement weather, we had to wait a little longer than we wanted to, which meant that honeybees started to build some “rouge comb.”
We were having dinner with our neighbors last Saturday night, when I checked my phone and saw a text message from a number I didn’t recognize. Even stranger was the picture in the text message…it was a swarm of honeybees…
Things sure have changed since my last visit to Ruhl Bee Supply. Last year around this time I was nervously following The Renaissance Man into this huge warehouse building full of honeybee supplies. I had no idea what I was doing and was convinced we were getting in way over our heads with this whole “Beekeeping Thing.”
I’m happy to report that this year I felt like a seasoned pro! We must have spent two hours perusing the store and slowly filling our carts with new honeybee equipment. Just look at all of those supplies.
Yesterday was a beautiful day, it was the kind of January Saturday that you dream about! The sun was out, the temperature was in the mid-60s, and I could feel the hints of Spring almost everywhere. Despite having our fair amount of rain this winter, the temperatures have remained mild and I’ve been slowly watching my daffodils peak out of the ground.
Before I get back to all things Dundee, I wanted to do a quick recap of our weekend spent on Orcas Island celebrating the marriage of our two wonderful friends.
As I mentioned in my last post, we arrived to the Orcas Island on Friday which also happened to be the First Friday of the month! Lucky us, we were treated to all sorts of sales at the local shops in Eastsound. If you plan to visit Orcas Island you really need to make sure you have adequate time to visit all of the shops. The town of Eastsound is straight out of a movie with a quaint downtown perfect for strolling about.
The south side of our house has been very neglected. It’s the one area that unfortunately has been, out of sight out of mind. The Renaissance Man has spent last week rototilling, leveling, and preparing this space to bring the bees home. This side of our house will become our The Apiary a.k.a. The Home for the Honeybees.
Did you know it’s National Honeybee Day? I just found out, and if I hadn’t been looking online it would have gone unnoticed. Now that we’re beekeepers, everyday is a honeybee day! They’re even having a big awareness event today at the Portland Farmers Market.
