The buzzing of bees (in my head)...

Any guesses what this is?

I really had no idea how much of a world beekeeping is, populated with many new enthusiasts, a few old beekeepers, many conflicting theories, burgeoning new research... Knowing that CCD has demolished most feral bees and many hobby and commercial hives and in keeping with the permaculture philosophy of a sustainable homestead, I want to keep bees for pollination and some honey. After sitting through a local beekeeper's meeting, talking with a couple of family friends with varying views of conventional beekeeping with Langstroth hives, and reading oh-so-many blogs and forums about bees, there is about an entire hive buzzing in my head...

A few interesting things about bees:

• A busy summer hive can have as many as 60,000 bees
• A hive will only have a few hundred male 'drone' bees, and they get kicked out of the hive in autumn, no dead weight to drag the hive down in the winter
• Hives used to survive basically on their own, my friend's hive producing 160lbs of surplus honey each summer
• Bee hives now have to be nursed along, many producing only 20-40lbs of surplus honey and many dying in the winter.

Anyway, we'll see what I've decided after my beginning beekeeping class tomorrow, but I'm thinking now that I will go with an alternative hive setup, the top bar hive, originally from Greece and used in many developing countries because of their low cost and self-containment. The benefits of this hive over conventional Langstroth hives is they allow for a more organic experience for the bees (no drugs or medicinal treatments), they don't require storage of the many boxes and extra tools required for the life cycle of bees in Langstroth hives, and they allow bees to more naturally create their own combs. Hopefully they will lead a life less stressed by chemicals and pesticides, pests, and disruption than those in conventional hives. They do require more regular intervention from the beekeeper in keeping the free-hanging combs straight and don't usually produce as much honey. If you're interested in this, check out these links: http://www.biobees.com/ and www.bushfarms.com/bees.htm. So, we'll see how it all works out, stay tuned for pics of me hiving bees for the first time in April!

The sun still exists!

Some pics from a snowshoe with a friend Wednesday, just east of Snoqualmie Pass... With a late start, we sipped tea for an hour on Domerie and soaked in the peaceful late-afternoon views, while directly south on the Oregon/Washington border, wind gusts were up to 70mph! You've gotta love our mountains for the inversions and crazy weather they bring, as well as adventure ;)

Dawn with the goats...

Here are a couple pictures of the goats I work with a couple days a week, milking and sanitizing the raw milk certified St. John's Creamery. The milk is delicious, tasting basically like cow's milk because we get it on ice within an hour of milking. It's always a little hard to get up at 5am to drive to the farm, but then I drive against traffic and I'm always grateful that I'm not in the long string of cars driving from the suburbs to work in the city in the hours before dawn. Instead, I get to see happy goat faces eagerly following me as I bring around the food and feel the satisfaction of emptying udders.