It’s been a funny month from my Beekeeping point of view. On the positive side, I managed to get myself better prepared for the upcoming season, especially as I finally got the equipment needed to be able to boil up some frames which had accumulated.
When I first started beekeeping, I certainly never anticipated all the equipment I’d need. Who knew?
In spite of feeding all my colonies, I have lost one due to isolation starvation. It’s so sad opening a hive and seeing it still and quiet. Luckily the other colonies are doing well so far, with three of them very large and strong. When we had the few days of fantastic weather a few weeks back, I was able to have a quick peak in all my hives. I decided to put two supers on the strongest colonies to give them loads of space and some added work to do. I decided to do that as I didn’t want to risk early swarms on the allotment and given the forecast, it didn’t look like the weather was looking good for regular inspections. Hopefully that plan will work.
I also started a new project in March. I started making mead with some naturally fermented honey I’d obtained. I added apricots, apple, cinnamon and black tea as flavourings in the mead. I’m well impressed as its actually smelling quite nice and seems to be progressing as it’s supposed to. It’s almost ready for secondary fermentation.
In early April I noticed two fields of oil seed rape starting to bloom not too far from my site, so hopefully the foragers from my colonies will be making the most of that.
Denali Enns