Winter Winners This Year

Reader Contribution by Kim Flottum
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Winter Winners

There are few things in the hobby or business of beekeeping that give more satisfaction than seeing that the work, the study, the effort, the experience, the weather, and luck made things go right. And it takes all of those things…you have to do the right thing, the right way at the right time every time to make managing bees good for the bees…which everything we do has to do…and good for the beekeeper.

Winter…winter’s the killer when it’s hard where you live. But it hasn’t been too hard here (and not too hard in many  places, actually) so far this year. We went into the fall thinking it was going to be the hardest winter in years…cold, lots of snow, more cold…nothing but confinement for the bees for weeks and weeks. That’s what they told us, back in August in the almanacs…be prepared they said. So, be prepared we were.

And here’s the deal. Our bees didn’t choose to live where I put them. And they didn’t choose how many other bees were in the neighborhood they had to compete with for available nutrition. And they didn’t choose the homes I put them in, and they didn’t choose the climate I’ve forced them to survive in. No, they came here because I had money to buy packages, time to collect swarms, and skill to make splits. But not one, not one single honey bee of the thousands and thousands of honey bees in my back yard complained. Not a peep, not a whine, not a whimper.

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