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May in the CandleShop and Honeyfarm

 

In the Candleshop   April 2003 started out quite fierce in Michigan with an ice storm. Our power was out for 4 days and anything electronic (like this newsletter) immediately stopped. Pat was busy playing "pioneer woman" heating our house with wood and hauling water for the bathrooms.   It came in very handy having a good supply of beeswax candles for lighting at night. It really made you think about how it was before we had electricity. Our Cut Glass Pillar, our Container Candles , our 9 inch Cylinder Pillars, along with our Standard Hand Dipped Candles worked out really good.     At the Honey Farm May is a very important time at the Honey Farm. Now we will go through all of our colonies to check their health. Increases will be made by spliting one large colony into two or more colonies and giving the new part a queen cell that we have raised. Package bees will be installed to replace colonies that have died over the winter. A lot of pictures were taken when we installed the package bees and we created a pictorial page that might be interesting. Package bees are sold by the pound and shipped in shoe box size screened packages as shown above. These are 3 lb packs that were shipped from Georgia to Michigan where I picked them up. Popular sizes that they come in are 2lb & 3 lb. This year we purchased 20 of them for $45 each. Package bee installation pictures. Install and raise new queens. More information about "smart (SMR)" queens.

Candle Dipping at Honeyflow Farm Wicks for 6 pairs of candles are on a frame and dipped into hot wax.   6 pairs of candles half finished. The frame is split in half & only 3 pairs are now dipped.   The candles are hanging in a rack to cool between dipps.   The finished product.

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