A new Chapter in Beekeeping
As I mentioned in a previous post, I kept bees with my
father as a teenager, after my father passed away in 2011, my brother was
selected as the Trustee of the estate. I have never had many conversations with
my brother either before or after my father’s passing so, when I get a call out
of the blue asking if I would come down to the farm to help him with something.
Evidently, to my surprise, I discovered that my father had
continued to keep bees right up till his death, also a weird twist of irony my
brother is highly allergic to bees (had that not been the case he never would
have called me)
When I got there he reveled all this to me and asked if I would
take the hives. Since he has been such a jerk about the whole estate situation,
I had a few conditions. They were that I would be taking all the bee keeping equipment
including the honey extractor also the cider press and the apple grinder.
Of course he agreed and I got to work. I got up on the roof of one of the barns where
my father had built some unique hive stands ( he was always very innovative) I checked
them out and saw bees going in and out but since I didn’t have any protective suit
I told my brother that I would have to
come back in a few days and come back with my truck and trailer and new
hive bodies as they were in very bad ( see above Photos) conditions and I knew
that I would have to transplant any surviving bees into new hive bodies The
next week I came back but before I showed up at the farm I made a trip to
Medford, OR ( a 4 hr. round trip) to get some new equipment I spent $500.00 on
new hive bodies, supers, a new suit, gloves, smoker, and other miscellaneous tools.
Once I got into the hives a major disappointment hit me. Both
hives were dead and the bees I previously saw were bees robbing the left over
honey stores. I rescued the remaining frames with honey and burned the rest. So
sad. However, I got a good apple cider press out of the deal. The other good news was now I was ready to
start my own bee keeping operation. And as luck would have it, I was called in
the
following May to rescue a wayward swarm of bees. And I am still using the
honey from that hive.
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| old hives on roof of barn from the ground. |
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Old Hives Vew from the doorway opening |
