New Hives Being Established

"I have a huge belief in the importance of bees, not just for their honey, which is a healing and delicious food, but the necessity of bee colonies that are vital to the health of the planet."
~Trudie Styler

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Since we only had one hive left of our hives that we wintered, it was time to add more bees to our apiary. We like to help the environment where can and we love HONEY! It is great for our allergies and quite a few of us have them. Now where to get the bees from? That is a good question. We have traveled up towards Plattsburgh  for bees and all the way near Binghamton for nucks and packages. 

 There was an ad on Marketplace  that showed someone local had bees for sell. They were running an amazing deal. Buy a package and get an extra queen for $150.00. This allows you to create two hives out of one. What not to like on this deal? Packages are normally $135 to $150 by themselves. Hawkshaw Meadworks offers apiary supplies, honey  bees, honey, and more.

Thousands of bees camping out on our table for the night.

Thick as pea soup.

A straggler hanging out.

The day has to be nice to introduce the colony to their new hive. They don't like it windy or rainy.  It needs to be warm because they don't like it too cold. Guess when you work as hard as a bee then you have the right to be picky. These images don't capture how massively impressive a colony of bonded bees is.

During this process, Donald learned that his  hive was getting ready to split. Good thing her worked them when he did. He removed some brood from our established hive and put it with the hive with less bees in it. The queen for the one was found in her hive and the other queen was still in the cage but put in the hive to have them help her out. Both will be marked on the next inspection.

Into their new home.

That is a lot of bees.

The King Bee himself all suited up.

 Donald's suit is hot. Maybe they should be made of some white summer material, too. He didn't get in to his existing hive for inspection but did see the activity of the queen there. A extensive inspection will be done later. We really enjoy our little bee friends. The little ones are not scared of them. They call them their friends. It normally goes something like "I see you there, my friend." Appreciating nature and working on our small part to bring up the bee  population.