A podcast that I listened to a few weeks ago suggested a good place to maintain a record of your beekeeping activity was a blog. So I will give it a try.

I am keeping two hives this year. I have not been faithful in working them so far. I manage to do just enough to keep them going. It is my hope that starting now I can be more diligent. We will see.

Here is what I have done so far:

April 13, 2009 Broght the two hives home. I boughht them from Eddie Collins for $60.00 each. I have the hives Alpha and Beta.

April 15, 2009 Eddie had neglected to bring the telescoping tops with my hives. I picked them up and put them on the hives this evening.

May 9, 2009 I put a second hive body on each of the hives.

May 21, 2009 I inspected the hives. Both of them are in good condition. I saw Alpha's queen. I saw a small hive beatle in Beta. I fed both hives with 1 gallon of sugar syrup in a 1:1 ratio. On Alpha I have a top feeder. On Beta, I placed 4 1 quart bottles with holes punched through the lids. I placed these on top of the frames of the top hive body, put a super over this, and the top over that. I will build Beta it's own top feeded later.

June 27, 2009 I inspected Alpha this afternoon. The hive looks strong. Six of the frames in the top hive body are drawn out. That means that soon I will need to add a super. I did not see the queen. I saw a few small hive beatles on the frames but a lot of them on the bottom board. I will have to develop some type of trap for them. I changed the bottom board for a sreened bottom board. Ther was brood, honey and pollen in the hive. Except for the SHB, the hive looked good.