End of Winter?
Jayne Barnes
-Posted by Isaac
Is it over? Is that all she wrote?
Goodbye and good riddance?
Technically we've still got another month of winter, but it sure has been warm lately. Unfortunately we're not yet donning the sunglasses. Rainy season has reared its ugly head.
Yesterday I did a little mitigating. And today, once again the rains fall steady. I think they said four inches this week. And that's just here. South of here, it gets really bad.
Oh well. Back to the shop. Back to the projects. The wet weather gives us a chance to finalize some winter jobs. Like piecing together the last of two thousand frames.
And finishing up 150 new lids.
Yes, we're going up in numbers.
But to do this, you need your bees alive in April.
More than anything, our late winter project has been keeping the girls fat and happy. They are now multiple frames into brooding and they're hungry!
Round three on the feeding took place two weeks ago. I had Mason's help on one of the days.
The kids were out of school with a snow day. Perhaps the last of the year?
Since I had a cameraman available, Jayne asked me to take some videos for Instagram. The clip below is one of the attempts that landed in the reject pile.
It didn't make the cut because it was longer than six seconds. Apparently the Instagram folks have extremely short attention spans. Not so with you pensive blog readers... setting aside your Tolstoy for a few reflective moments of Honeyrun Farm.
As you no doubt noticed, it was warming up that day. The bees were flying and Mason didn't have his veil on. I thought we'd better cut the video short rather than have a freak out. We're trying to project an air of professionalism here.
And I mentioned that the smoker was in the other truck. There is a reason for that. The previous evening I had buried the bee truck. It was the last yard of the day and I had to call Dad to come pick me up in the dark.
I had actually thought about fording the river and running the five miles back home, giving you a heroic winter beekeeping tale. Plus, Dad was right in the middle of Fox News and I really didn't want to pull him away. But I still had a little charge on my phone... Eventually logic and Apple and Direct TV recording won out. No heroics.
The next morning, instead of taking the time to pull the bee truck out (and possibly burying the other truck) we just transferred all the feed and hit the road.
Forgetting the smoker in the process.
Our girls were waiting and the show must go on. Round three was completed by week's end. The muddy bee truck made it home a day or so later.
Now I'm mixing feed for round four. In March, the bees need a bit more protein. And protein is expensive, especially in patty form. To lesson the impact, I'm mixing it myself this year. The only casualties: a little more time and a couple burnt drills.
The maples have just now started to bloom. We've got a little warmth, but the rain is preventing the girls from making it out for any length of time. You can see they're desperate for protein. I put out some pollen dust a few days ago and this was the scene:
So hopefully, if we eventually dry out, they'll find those maples. Warm days and happy times ahead!
And think of all the fun we'll have! Beaches, boats, barbecues... Bye bye winter!
It's truly a joyous time for a consummate optimist like myself.
Oh, the things we'll do!