Submitted by Krista Standeford

Well, let’s just say the winter was very hard for my little critters, and I wish I could say they are ok. But that would be a lie. Now not one is alive.  The harsh long winter was hard on my little friends. They clustered where there was not a lot of honey and ran out. There was honey in other parts of the hive, but they must not have warmed up enough to move.  Now I will have to start my journey over again and hope that I will be more successful. 

Submitted by Krista in Q1

The fall did not end up as I had hoped.  Due to the dry weather, I did not collect any honey.   Since I spotted some hive beetles, I took precautions by inserting 2 hive beetle traps in my hive.  I hope I have said, “Good-bye” to those little monstrous bugs.  I have been prepping my little workers for the winter by feeding them sugar water and putting a pollen patty in their hive.  I also am going to put a big board behind their hive to block some wind and give them more shelter.  Awhile ago, I put an entrance reducer at the entrance of the hive so a lot of the cold weather would not get in there.  I hope my little workers survive the winter.

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Krista Standeford

Submitted by Krista in Q4

    The last three months with my bees has been very interesting.  All was going well, and they were looking strong.  Then, in about the middle of July, they decided to part their ways and swarmed.  I was not home at the time, but luckily my mom was and saw them.  She tried to follow them but eventually lost them when they went over the fence row.  So it has taken awhile for the remaining bees to rebuild and crown a new queen.  

    About three weeks ago, I saw a queen when I was checking on them.  But I also noticed they were not going up in my super.  So my mentor, Sandi Miller, suggested that I take the queen excluder off for a couple of days, and then put it back on when I see they are building in the super.  I am going to check on Labor Day to see how they are doing building in the super.  We have had very dry and hot weather so my bees decided it would be a good idea to take a visit to my horses’ water tank.  But, unfortunately, some could not tread water.  To try to solve the bees’ lack of swimming ability, I put some straw and water in a bucket and set it by the hive.

Submitted by Krista in Q3

      It was so fun getting my bees started.  When I finally got my supplies for my 1^sthive, I went to work building my hive.  It took lots of pounding and painting, then painting again.  Finally, we got finished.  All I had to do was wait and wait and wait some more.  At last, one day my mom told me that Mike Seib was going to bring my bees.  I was so happy that I could have danced, but I didn’t. 

     My mom and I went to work getting my hive box set up.  We found a good spot where it was sunny and there were some trees to block wind.  My mom was a good help because she has three bee hives.  When Mike came, my mentor, Sandi Miller, helped me put the bees in my hive.  Sandi has 13 hives!

     I had to wait a week until I could get in my hive.  When a week went by Sandi came and we got in my hive.  She said I had a very strong queen.  That made my happy.  But the bees were building on the bottom of the frames not on the other frames.  So we cut the comb off of the bottom and put a shoe box under the frames so they couldn’t build it back down.  It is really fun working with my bees and I can’t wait until next week.