I'm back...almost

Happy Thanksgiving 2015!!!

This is a quick post to let you know that I am alive and well in rural PEI. We have 9 1/2 acres of farm land with a tiny bit of woods and are dreaming of turning the first field into orchards, gardens and wild flower meadows. Bill is dreaming of turning this space into a sculpture garden as he turns the barn into a shop and I dream of a perfect habitat for bees!

I have chatted with a beekeeper who has 2,500 beehives situated all over PEI and will be getting a couple of colonies from him after his bees have pollinated the blueberry fields. I would rather get swarms so I don't have to change from deep frames with foundation to my shallow open frames but there is no way of guaranteeing a swarm capture. I will place some bait hives in the spring just to see.

In the meantime I am cleaning up all my boxes and painting them in anticipation. I am also re-reading my bee books to make sure I remember how to do this. I got a wonderful book called Bee Time by Mark L. Winston, a bee keeper, scientist and thinker in Vancouver, B.C. which is fantastic. It is a unique look at our relationship with bees, both wild and managed and nature in general.  Worth checking out for everyone.

So to all of you I wish a beautiful Thanksgiving weekend...and if you have time to read, lucky you!

Fall-Winter 2014 Update

I finally have time for a blog!  Sorry to have been away so long.

I am afraid that my news is not good news.

At the end of September, both hives were doing great.  Lots of honey and healthy queens...Olivia still had 2 queens but all seemed to be well.  We had found piles of dead bees in both hives a couple of times throughout August and September but I decided that the wet summer we were having was the cause of that.  I put them to bed feeling confidant.

In mid-October we had a sunny cold day but I didn't see any activity at either hive so I went in.  Queen Mab had a cluster of dead bees covering 4 frames with a lot of honey around her.  Queen Olivia was exactly the same story.  Quite likely, the cause of the bee kills wasn't too much moisture but herbicides at the train yard across the street. The bees just couldn't sustain themselves once they were confined in the hive.   The train yard had been cleaned up this summer in honour of the LPGA Tournament being hosted by CP Rail here in London.  It was quite a coup for London to have this international event here.

Moral of this story?  Be careful what you wish for!  The train yard had new fences put up, beautiful blue spruces planted and wide swaths of grass laid.  There was not a weed to be seen.  We were so excited by the "improvements"!  Now we know what we lost for the next little while--healthy herbicide free wild flower forage for the bees.  Give the train yard a year and the golden rod, asters and daisies will be back.

I will be sending samples of the bees to the inspectors as soon as spring comes to find out for sure what happened. Sorry for the sad story!  Onwards!