Beekeeping is something that started for me about 6 years ago. A friend brought me a hive and that's all she wrote. Bees keep me in touch with nature and can teach us a lot about hard work and perseverance. I've had up to 7 hives but always end up giving them away. Now at four hives, moved down from NC recently, I find the SC honey is very tasty. Lot's of Holly and some sourwood.

FEBRUARY 22, 2004 - Spring has begun

The bees were out in the 55 degree weather today, bringing in lots of maple pollen. All four hives survived winter and are doing great. The maple is really blooming already. A new year has begun.

MARCH 3, 2004 - Getting warmer every day. The Maple is still the major blooming flower and the bees are expanding, big time. All four hives appear crowded already! I'll plan to split all 4 this year and requeen. Gotta move the hives somewhere else this year. They are too close to the house and dogs and neighbors.

April 3, 2004
Honey comin' in! Lots of it and so early. Got 6 supers on 4 hives and at lease 3 are almost full. Everything is greening up but major honey flow has yet to start. This must all be fruit bloom. Checked all hives for queen cells but none were seen. That's a good sign. I've reversed the hive bodies and added supers early. 3 new queens arrive April 19th. I'll split or requeen soon. Gotta get the grain scale under some sort of protection so that I can start to measure the honey flow. Looks like its going to be a great year.

April 11, Easter, 2004
Her majesty! Can you find the queen? This queen was relatively easy to find. We went through the hives on Sunday and found one with loads of queen cells. That means they were planning to swarm. We split the hive and have new queens coming. Lots of bees and lots of pollen coming in. Interestingly, the hive with the queen cells were doing much. I quess they were packing their bags,