Most likely dropping some fruit next week. I sold 10 tons but still have about 3 tons hanging… Napa organic Cabernet Sauvignon. Still have a little Cab Franc and a little Petite Verdot. Brix is about 25. You pick what you want… leave a donation for my ranch manager
Wrapping up my first season of Beekeeping... i have learned alot and will do better next year... I am down to 2 hives in northern CA but the bee company that put 100 hives on property line that immediately attacked and robbed two of my hives is going to give me 3 new NUCs to re-establish my apiary to 5 hives. These will be single deeps that i will start feeding immediately. So i am wondering if i can pull my supers off my two remaining double deep 2 super hives and just start feeding sugar water for a few months along with pollen patties will the hives do well through winter and be ready to go in the spring?
I bought a new 661 for my guys to use to cut a massive oak tree into chunks for splitting. Their ran the saw hard repeatedly taking cuts with the 36. Inch bar all the way in the almost 7 foot across log. After about 6 hours the saw seized. Should I be able to get away with just a top end rebuild or is it likely the entire saw needs rebuilding?
1st year beekeeper in Northern California
Commercial bee keeper moved 100 hives 10 feet off my property line. Single hives no stored honey and he didn’t feed them. They attacked the first time yesterday. Today another attack. The girls are fighting hard. I closed the hive down to a single opening about the size of 2 bees
I will check on them tomorrow
Helped out buddy… this what gratitude looks like…Behike 58
I asked for box of series D No4… he said he would do better… I fully intend to smoke them!
He threw in the Vistosos as a little kicker!
I have 5 lawns at my place. I really want to go robotic. Do the robot mowers go from lawn to lawn while disengaging the cutting blade between lawn areas.?
1st beekeeper 5 hives Napa California
My bees are making a ton of honey. I am about to add super number 3 on two hives. Because I am surrounded by vineyards the winter will feed the bees with acres of flowering cover crops beginning in mid January. Huge stores are not required to overwinter in my area
I don’t have a spinner so I harvest by crushing and straining the comb
I know melting the wax is an option… but me bees are still hard at work making more honey. Can I put the empty frames back in the hive and then sort sprinkle the crushed wax on top of the frames for bees to reuse?
Northern California 1st year 5 hives.
I read somewhere that stinging nettle leaves placed across the frames inside the hives is a good way to control mites. Anyone have any success with that?
I have about 200 premium to very premium cigars… about $7000 bucks invested in this hobby over the last 6 months
Like most of us I rarely pass up a humidor without buying a few sticks… today was no exception… except along with the Padrons… I bought a Deadwood Sweet Jane. Brought that like stick home and hit with the torch. I am not going to lie… it’s a fun little smoke! I had the wife take a few puff… she loved it!
I can see myself buy one or two a year… maybe a few for the wife to see if I can get her to smoke a full stick… gateway cigar for her
Northern California 1st year beekeeper 4 hives
I did a hive inspection yesterday and i have a few questions.
the hives look pretty good... lots of honey being stored. two hives have 2 supers 1 hive has 1 super. the 4th hive had a couple setbacks and is still working in the second deep. I have extractors but none are installed on the hives at this time
One of the 2 super hives has a ton of brood in the lower super. lots of honey but a significant amount of brood. This same hive has 2 deeps. the upper deep shows a fair amount brood albeit a bit spotty on some frames but on other frames solid brood cells across the entire frame. Lots of honey stores in the upper deep. The looking at the lower deep... some brood but not much. some significant pollen stores and some honey but overall not a ton of bees down there... Is this normal? Should i swap the deeps? I was going to check the super to make sure the queen wasn't up there and then add the excluder on that hive only. the other hives don't have brood in the supers.
I did not see any of the queens but lots of evidence they are working... I pulled a frame of fully capped honey from one of the hives and installed a new super frame to give the bees a new place to store honey.
Hi everyone, located in Napa Valley California
I have a small 12 acre property that has an old weeded multi species lawn that i am going to replace. I am going to start by spraying the existing lawn with round up and then scrape the the top inch or so of topsoil and then till in soil conditioner before taking crack at Hydro seeding. My 1st question is how do i get this truly flat and level? Its pretty flat now but i want a really nice super flat lawn. It is about 2 acres of grass. next i am thinking i might replace the sprinkler setup with irrigreen smart sprinklers. Presently i have pop up sprinklers that you might see i public park or on a golf course.
I have a two person crew full time so i have lots of good help but no experience putting something this large. Any comments suggestions and feed back are appreciated.
1st year bee keeper in Napa CA
I have read that hives should face south... Why? My hives all face north and seem to be fine... 2 wild hives on my property also face north
1st year Northern California
one of my hives is really strong but despite having room to lay eggs in the lower deeps I have a queen that has put a bunch of brood and larva in the supers
after reading about how everyone seems to hate excluders I am reluctant to add one
what would you do? I have excluders that I have not used
this hive is double deep with 2 supers
1st year beekeeper Northern California
while viewing reddit i see posts of people holding up frames that are wall to wall capped brood. I did an inspection today and i had 1 frame that was loaded solid on both sides but the remaining frames had decent coverage but lots of larva or tons of pollen and substantial honey stored the outer frames in both deeps were almost solid honey.
in the lower deep i a few frames with absolutely nothing. Just empty comb. Is this normal?
I don’t have a spinner but I wanted to try some honey my bees are making from my lavender
what is the best way to extract the honey without damaging the comb? can I just cut the caps off and let it drain?
1st year beekeeper in Northern California
1st year beekeeper in Northern California
what is the point of buying prewaxed foundation if the foundation just need to be waxed again before being used? I mean seriously...if a company is selling prewaxed foundation shouldn't it have enough wax to be used right of the box? What am i missing?
1st year beekeeper in northern California-- I am seeing lots of pictures of bee hives that look as though they have been varnished instead of painted. Is there any reason beyond appearances to choose paint over a natural finish? On the natural finish is there any toxic concerns with that finish?
1year beekeeper 5 hives Napa ca
I had a hive swarm a few weeks ago and the hive went queenless for about 3-4 weeks
I saw almost no brood when I checked the hive but the bees were still bringing in pollen and nectar . I just went through a huge surge in nectar as all privet hedges bloomed and the bees went crazy making honey and expanding but the swarmed hive just kept getting smaller and no queen cell
I decided to combine what was left of the hive into a mother hive that looked like it had room for the dwindling brood. Last night I capped the brood box hive with newspaper and added the single swarmed hive deep on top of that 3rd deep I put the super that was on the top of the strong hive putting newspaper between them
I have hundreds of lavender plants that are blooming so the bees are focused there a the nectar continues to flow hard
This evening I looked at the hive and it is getting covered with bees
Should I be concerned?
Napa California 1st year beekeeper
I started with 5 hives and nucs on my property loaded with flowers and everything bees want… the hives grew rapidly and my strongest hive swarmed before I added a 2nd deep but a good bee population remained in the hive. I gave it a month but I have only seen declining numbers and no new brood. The hives grew rapidly have almost no remaining brood so I decided to add it to a hive that was strong a couple feet away
Last night at 10 pm I removed the super off the double deep strong hive I put a sheet of newspaper never the hive with some small slits and then I put the single weak deep on top
I added a sheet of newspaper to the weak hive with a few slits in the paper and place the half full deep on top of the weak deep
The super is about half full of honey and was loaded with bees
I replaced the top cover and left them to work it out
How does this strategy sound?