A Survival Guide to Urban Beekeeping

A step by step guide to beekeeping in an urban environment. Original drawings by Suzi Kemp. Click here to purchase for $15.

 

Visitors: The Powers Boys

Abbot’s Cellar Expansion

We’re excited to announce the installation of two new hives on the rooftop of Abbot’s Cellar! We’ll be mentoring the newest beekeepers in the neighborhood and will be sure to keep their progress updated here.

In the pictures above you’ll see the Abbot’s community prepping the hives and installing the queens on their rooftop. These guys are working with an Italian queen and a local queen all procured from the Beekind this spring. More to come!

Yum. Yum. Yum.

A modest spring harvest of two supers worth of honey. Mega lesson learned here, it’s best to harvest honey straight off of the hive, versus storing frames/supers over the winter. Why? Because crystalized honey is soooooo hard to extract and most of it stays in the comb! Oh well, all the more for the bees. What else did we learn? One, that the electric extractor is only mildly more effective, and two, that we prefer a cerated knife to the hot knife. Old school rules!

Sunrise visit

Feasting

Hey – how are you? I’m good.

Queen in her cage.

Here is our new Queen in her new hive. Upon initial installation the Queen is put in a small cage as the hive adjusts and accepts the queen’s scent.

Cam with his new friends!

Up Close!

We were up visiting the hives last week and sure enough, one of the hives was completely empty! Here is a picture of one of the frames from the bottom super. As you can see there was empty comb and some honey on the left side…

A close-up of the entrance for Hive #2

Bees. Coming and going.

Tools of the trade.

 

Using some shims to make sure the hive is level. Details.