Tuesday, April 23, 2019

Upcycling a Cheap Plaster Thrift Store Find for Outdoor Use


Sometimes when thrifting you find something that is almost what you want it to be.



I found this classic pinecone (or pineapple depending on who you ask) shaped plaster piece.



 It wasn't terrible at all, but it was chipped and since I wanted to use it outdoors I decided to try something new.

A concrete wash.

I don't even know if that's a thing but I loved the shape of this piece and wished it was concrete. Not wanting to lose the detail I decided to water down even more of that premixed concrete from this project...


and this project...


to give it a concrete surface. I also toyed with the idea of buying some concrete, mixing it up and filling the hollow interior, but that seemed like a lot of time and expense. Y'all know I adore a "use what you have" project. 


I used a little of the concrete and some water then added a bit of Jolie Legacy to the mix to give it a bit more age than just the plain concrete color. Why even have anything that doesn't look like it's a gazillion years old? 


After a thorough mixing, I used a brush to apply it to the pinecone in a thin coat. Remember I loved the detail and didn't want to lose it by being too liberal with the concrete.



After that was dry to the touch I used a bit of Miss Mustard Seed Boxwood with a little of the concrete mixture and made it into a really thick chunky paste. I wanted this to mimic some ancient mossy goodness in all the nooks and crannies.


This little project literally took minutes apart from drying time and covered up all the places where the plaster was chipped. I still don't know how waterproof it will be.


I'm currently debating whether to seal it with a waterproof sealer, but for now, it's on the porch.


Side note: This makes the third project I got out of one tub of the premixed concrete. I'll use the rest of it to reinforce some weak spots in the salvaged bird bath. If you pay full price anything can still be a really good deal if you use all of it. Now if I could only apply that to my refrigerator situation. 

Also, are we loving this Marie Kondo trend or what? 

XOXO Y'all! 


Wednesday, April 17, 2019

Let's Take a Peek Inside the Hives


Last week I did inspections of six of my eight hives, five that overwintered and one swarm I caught a couple of weeks ago. Here's a quick peek inside the hives!


After smoking the girls with a cool smoke and giving it a minute to waft throughout the hive I remove the top and inner cover. In this case, I also removed the honey super I'd put on when the honey flow started. Those flat brown circles are called "capped brood." They are baby bees waiting to emerge. In the picture above it looks spotty. That's fancy beekeeper talk for not a solid brood coverage. 


This frame of brood looked a little better. See the glistening white in some of the cells? Those are larvae. If you think your kids are wearing you out asking "what's for dinner?" these larvae eat 1300 times a day! They are fed by nurse bees, royal jelly at first and then a mixture of honey and pollen called "bee bread." At just the right time the worker bees seal the cell with the tan and porous beeswax you see in the photo. At that time the bee spins a cocoon around itself. We can't see that part because it takes place under the capping. Inside the cocoon metamorphosis takes place. At the appropriate time a fully adult bee eats through the wax covering and emerges to begin her first task in the hive, cleaning out her cell so it can be reused.


In the picture above you see a really beautiful brood pattern. This queen is doing very well. The holes in the middle of the brood pattern are where bees have already emerged.

Read about how I caught a recent swarm. 


In this picture you can see the bees building out the honeycomb in the honey super. If you look closely you can see that they've already started putting honey up.


I love it when the honeycomb is new. It is snowy white. Notice how the bees line up on the left frames to look at me and see what I'm up to.

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I didn't see any of the queens on this inspection day but here's a picture of a purchased queen from last year. Notice that she's marked. When you buy queens they are marked with a different color for each year. It helps beekeepers keep track of how old their queens are.

Next time I try to remember to take my good camera to the bee yard. But it's just so easy when I'm holding a frame of bees to say "Hey Siri, activate camera."

Hope your week is buzzing along!

XOXO Y'all!




Monday, April 8, 2019

Swarm Season Round 1




It's the craziest and most unpredictable time of the year for beekeepers! You'll see bees clustered on cars, mailboxes, the doors of businesses. You'll see beekeepers in trees, on porch roofs, and on ladders. You'll even see bees on the news. Here's a pic of a swarm from a couple of years ago. The sky fills with them and you can see that here.


 Swarm is kind of a scary word to people. It's scary to beekeepers too but for different reasons. Read about how I caught my first swarm here. For a beekeeper, it means that half your bees might fly away and reduce your honey harvest for the season. On the other hand, if we can catch a swarm, it's free bees! We love free bees! 

A swarm is the natural reproduction process of a colony. It means a healthy hive and laying queen have outgrown their hive and are looking for an expansion opportunity. The swarming bees have stuffed themselves with honey before embarking on their journey. Since they have no home or brood nest to defend they are quite docile. If you see a swarm in the spring just leave it alone and it will go along in a day or two. If it's where you just can't leave it because of kids or pets call a beekeeper to come and get it. If you need a laugh you can read my post about catching my very first swarm, Queen Bee Wars: Swarming Mean Girls.



While I was relaxing with a friend on the porch last week my bees swarmed. It's an exciting thing to share with someone who has never witnessed it before. How many times do you see the birth of a super-organism? They landed on a branch hanging over the fence separating our yard from our neighbor's and I went on about my socializing confident that in a couple of hours when I was ready to catch them they'd still be there.

Silly beekeeper. 

When I was ready they were gone. I carefully looked all through the bushes and around my yard. I popped open the compost bin thinking it might seem like an inviting dark space. Nothing. Then my husband suggested we check the neighbor's yard.

Which meant knocking on the door. The absolute worst part of being a beekeeping introvert. 


Explanations ensue. I find the bees on the ground and regret my procrastination. The swarm that could have been so easily retrieved from clipping a branch and lowering into a box in less than a minute turned into a 3 hour ordeal of sweeping up and catching the bees in a box and trying to get the queen. But mostly waiting for them to get in the box...


I was successful on the second attempt and then hung around the yard waiting for the bees to all go in but as the sun was setting about a third of them didn't go inside but hung on the outside of the box.



Near dark, I picked up the entire thing, a box full of bees and thousands of hangers-on and gently placed it over the fence and into a wagon on my side of the fence. Early the next morning while it was still dark I popped (meaning I slammed the box down on top of the empty hive) the bees on the outside into a hive body and then dumped the bees inside in as well. I sealed up the front and wheeled them over to their new home.


It sounds so easy as I read it here, but there is always a big adrenaline rush when catching a swarm and then again when hiving it. 

We are now experiencing several days of rain, so they are stuck inside getting used to their new home. I was glad this queen didn't get away as she is stellar and this hive had 3 times as many bees as any of my other hives.

Now we'll wait for the next sunny day and see if any other hive is feeling swarmy.

Hope you have success this week whatever you're up to!

XOXO y'all!