It always brings me much pleasure to see my honeybees enjoying flowers I have planted for my enjoyment and for their benefit. During the next several months I will long for warm days, colorful flowers and the sight and sounds of buzzing bees.
Honey has been extracted, beeswax has been collected and melted and we are heading into the long winter season. We had a warm day yesterday, so took advantage of it and went through our hives. Two years ago we started out with 4 hives. Between swarms we have caught and ordering of new packages this last spring our goal was to be at 25 hives this summer. We didn't make that goal this year, but overall it has not been a bad year. We have had 3 months of wonderful, drier weather which helped make up for such a rainy spring and summer.
We are going into winter with 16 strong hives and hope it is nothing like last winter! Now that the outside work has pretty much come to a standstill I look forward to using the long winter months creating skin products with my honey and beeswax. For everything there is a season!
