Bees arrive today!

Today I'm picking up a package of bees.  Im quite nervous, I did a few installs last year with my mentor, but it was over a year ago, and I had guidance. This is all on my own. Im nervous because it's also supposed to be kind of crappy out today and dont want to have to decide what is "too crappy" to install them into their new home.

The installation process is fairly easy. You take out the queen, set her aside, inspect her, hang her between frames in the new hive, and literally dump and pour the bees over her and into their new home. Then quickly close up the hive, and put some food on them to nourish them while the settle in, and are able to bring in food of their own. Im going to ask hubby to take a video of the install.

Ok, so here are pics hubby took during install.

 The package

Prepping the hive for install

Dumping the bees into their new home

Shaking the last few from the box (video)

Puttin' the girls to work....

I hate weeding. And have neglected the flower beds out front all winter long.  Weeding garden beds is one thing, but flower beds is another. They don't feed me, and are just to look pretty, so I don't usually want to weed them.  So, we built a 'grazing pen' out of PVC so we can move it across the flower beds, and the hens will eat the weeds for us.  I just have to put a couple of the hens in it, and take them out when they're done.  In the winter, it can also double as a cloche over the vegetable beds if we put plastic over it.

The RIR's are hard at work!