Cleaning the Bee Box
Saturday afternoon was astonishingly
beautiful. The sun pounded down and melted the snow until I had to go outside.
I ended up cleaning up the bee box, scraping off old wax then scrubbing
it down in a washtub of lightly bleachy water. Many people
recommend scorching the old boxes with a blow torch before reusing
them, but I think I might stick to this simpler method and hope I'm not
carrying over any diseases.
The old hive smelled of bee --- honey, beeswax, and sun-warmed
wood. I put the finished product (minus the exterior lid, which
Mark will build later) on cinderblocks at the edge of the yard. I
figure we have a month or two before we can add bees, and I want to
spend some time moving the box around to find the perfect spot --- not
in any direct human paths, but not out of sight; catching the early
morning sun, but a bit protected by late afternoon shade. I also
want to give us some time to get used to the idea of bees on the farm.
While I mused, I took my first outdoor bath of 2009 --- joy and rapture!
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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