Sometime happen miracles

At work everybody was looking for me. Ring to your apartment! I have ringed my Mother and she said to me to come at once home because my neighbor finds a bee family in his stove she wants to demolish it. (Parenthesis: During Ceausescu regime they did not give us enough heat to our apartments and if you have kids you have to add a supplement of heat. So, a lot of families build stoves in their apartment. The way around, now.)
The man doing this job-his name Mircea ( Michael if you want)-is a softhearted and took care of this little and wonderful creatures and ask my Mother to get me to save the bee family. Back home, going strait to workshop pick a new hive and try to get the bees in their new home. A difficult job but at the end it was successful operation. A lot of stings but worth it. In the afternoon I picked the train and go to Capruta to get few drown combs with honey to use them in new hive. 7:30 pm back home and started to transfer the bees on the new combs. 8:05 pm the bees are on the new combs. Today March 29, 2006 I take a look and I saw eggs, the queen started laying. I’ll keep the hive closed because they will go back to their home. Now I’m a happy owner of a small bee family on the balcony in the middle of the town Arad.
A bet Toni? Who will get more honey from one hive on the middle of the town?
Do believe me I’m so happy.
15 years ago ,when I started keeping bees I did keep them on the balcony for one year.Is this a new start?

First sting this year (25 March 2006)

Thanks God the spring is here. The sun it’s on the sky and a promising day it’s coming..
Arrived at Capruta 9:20 am. When I left Arad the temperature was 1 C degrees, it’s about 5 C degrees the time of arrival.
Well, for the beginning I have to plant some prunes and cherries I brought with me. I want the place, in the coming years, to become a garden ( the exact word is orchard)
By the noon I started working my bees. Before opening the hives I took a look at the hives entrances. As you can see in the photo they bring in pollen. As far as I know it’s hazel pollen, the first pollen in the area- except of the snowdrop and viola. Judging the activity in the hive- looking at the hive entrance as the books say- must be a lot of brood inside.
Opening the hives I saw a really big coming and going and everybody is busy. So, I decided not to disturb them. I did take a photo and live them alone. Seems that the bees don’t like my camera so I got stings. Two stings. These are the first stings this year I’m really happy anyway.
I did received an email asking about united the 2 hives with both queens and what happened. Yes you can unite the 2 hives with the 2 queens. Important is the 2 queens to be clipped. Happened as working with 2 queens. If you do want to see how this works take a look here.

A little bit nervous and a little bit tired

I’m a little bit nervous and a little bit tired. Nervous because the spring is not coming and I had enough of this winter. In spite of the calendar and the forecast the temperatures are still low-midday the temperatures are not more than 8-9 C degrees. Tired because I worked a lot in my bee yard.
8 AM. Left for Capruta to see my bees. The temperature is 2 C degrees (but feel like 0 C Celsius). 9 AM. Arrived to my bee yard. The temperature is 4 C degrees. It’s to cold to work my bees.
In the back of the existing fence I planted plants to make a bushy fence. In August this will have flowers like one you can see in photo. These flowers have a lot of pollen. I did plant some prunes.
11 AM. Start working my bees. Except of 2 colonies all the hives are ok. and come out of the winter in good conditions. It was a difficult moment for me. What to do: to unite the 2 colonies or to let the alone. I decided to unite them because I don’t know what the weather will be and in the case that the bad weather will continue the colonies have no chances. Well, I come to a conclusion: I’ll raise all my queens from local bees. The queens raised in the plain are not good to winter on the hill.
The rest of the families are in good condition and plenty of capped brood.
Checking the dead hive I saw a lot of bees with deformed wings. Conclusion: the hive was heavy with that bastard named Varroa . Well, I was asking the many times if the bastard did not become resistant to the Varachet (Romanian drug for varroa). In my opinion varroa become resistant to this drug. I have read that the American biologist-Walker Jones- find out a fungus(Metarhizium anisopliae )agains varroa. It’s interesting idea. Waite to see when will be on the market.

Somebody stolen the spring

Saturday I did visit my bees. It’s 11 of march- the calendar says that’s spring time- but the weather is cold and on the hill you can see snow. The temperature is 4 degrees Celsius but feel like 0 degrees and the wind blow at 28 kmph in blast. I start thinking that the weather is changing I mean the climate. Years ago (when I was child and even 10 or 11 years ago) at this time we had a clear seasons I mean the spring was spring and the winter was winter. Now we have mild winter in February with sunny days and the temperatures up to 12-15 C degrees in February and snow and cold in April. And a lot of floods
I intend to check and change (or clean) the floorboard. No chance. The wind was blowing and decided to postpone this till next week. The only things I made were to open one hive take a quick look and give up. Few days ago I was thinking to my bees and ask myself what the bees dream in long cold nights of the winter? Do they dream to flowers on the field or on the hill? I’m sure they do.
Being a householder I started to work in the garden. I planted a walnut. I love to eat toasted walnut with honey. They are delicious. You can eat toasted walnut and drink wine.