Honeybees

We have had honeybees since 2015. Unfortunately, we struggle to overwinter them and have lost all of our hives over the winter over the past 3 years. This year we plan to overwinter the hives indoors as we have repeatedly had no success keeping our poor girls alive. At $100-$140 per nuc, honeybee keeping has been a rather expensive hobby for us. Large scale honeybee keepers typically lose 40-50% of their hives. They then split the remaining nucs in the spring to cover for the loss. When you only have 1-2 hives, however, this starts to get to be an expensive hobby. Still, we are persistent (or stubborn) and we will be trying again this year. We pick up our hives rather late but they should be ready the first week of June.

This past weekend as I was snapping pictures of all the blooming trees in our apple orchard, I was so excited to have our oldest, healthiest apple tree BUZZING with honeybees!! We have 7 apple trees, 2 of which were original when we moved in. We are losing one of those but trying our best to nurse it along. These trees are almost 10 years old. We have been busy planting at least 1-2 new apple trees every year.

Along with our apple trees, our lilac bush in the butterfly garden is in full bloom! I found a recipe for Lilac lemonade that we will be making this week. The irises on the south side of the garden shed are blooming beautiful blues. These little snippets of real spring after this winter in Minnesota were very welcomed. I can barely stay out of the garden.

#springtimeinminnesota #apples #appleblossoms #lilacs #irisflowers #iris #bees #honeybeekeeping