On a Warmish December Day....

the bees are all over this plant in my neighbor's yard. It's a shrub with palmate leaves about 1 foot in diameter each and with nine "fingers" on each leaf.

The bees are busy collecting something from this plant when it's warm enough to fly as it was this afternoon.  From looking around the Internet, it may be a Japanese shrub named Fatsia japonica.....or maybe not.

Anyone have an idea of what this is? Put your answer in a comment below.

Making Hand Cream

Another beekeeper's winter thing-to-do:  make hand cream.  I still don't have the process down but here's currently what I am doing.

The recipe I used (always in revision):

1 3/4 cup olive oil
1/2 cup sweet almond oil
1/4 cup + 1 T cocoa butter
7 oz coconut oil
4 oz beeswax
2 T lanolin oil
2 T honey
1/2 cup or so of water

Melt the first seven ingredients together.  Pour into a blender container.  Blend until it starts to thicken.  Gradually blend in 1/2 cup water.  Blend for 20 minute increments and stop blender and cool mixture for about 5 minutes.  Continue until the lotion is thick enough to put into containers.  (This takes 4 to 4 1/2 hours).

If you simply pour the mix into the containers, it will be hard as a rock.  The blending is necessary, but I haven't figured out how to simplify this process.  Let me know what you try and what works for you.

The finished product can't be slathered onto your hands or they will remain rather greasy.  As in Brylcream, a "little dab'll do ya."  I use a fingertip's worth to lotion my two hands.

Meanwhile, here's the slide show (click to see it full sized and read the captions):

Making Lotion Bars - A Winter Beekeeper's Joy

Lotion bars are quick to make and a holiday gift that the recipients love to get.  The ingredients are only three:

1/3 oil (avocado or sweet almond oil are best)
1/3 butter (shea butter, cocoa butter - I like a half and half combination)
1/3 melted beeswax.

Equipment needed:

A boiling water bath
A large measuring cup
Chopsticks to use for stirring
Molds for the bars (commercial ones can be purchased or you can use ice cube trays)

One caution:  These smell great because of the cocoa butter.  Once I gave one to someone and she took a bite out of it!  Important that your recipient knows they are lotion (although nothing in the bar would be bad for eating!)

These take a short time and are fun to do.  Here's a slideshow of the process:

Newest Grandba-bee

Born Dec 2, 2011 and weighed in at 7 lbs even.  My third grandchild and second grandson.

Think he's ready for a beesuit yet?

A Beekeeper's Guide to Cyber Monday

Brushy Mountain is the only bee company I can find offering any benefit for Cyber Monday.

Brushy Mountain offers free shipping as per the paragraph from their Dec E-Flyer below:

"Cyber Monday: Cyber Monday is the internet's response to Black Friday at the brick and mortar stores and is always the Monday after Thanksgiving (November 28). No long lines, no rushing, just the comfort of your keyboard and mouse. This year we are offering free shipping anywhere in the lower 48 states as well as at least 10% Off on all items in the "Holiday Gift Ideas" section of our site. Here is the fine print: orders must to over $100 to qualify; excluded from the free shipping are buckets of corn syrup, honey, glass jars, and truck shipments; to get the free shipping and special prices,you must enter PCCM into the promotion code field of the cart. Once the code is entered the special pricing will be visible."

General Bee Report as Winter Approaches

First, I'm sorry I've been rather lax in my postings.  I hope some of you have taken the opportunity to review some of the old posts while you wondered where in the world I was.

Last week was my birthday, my middle daughter was visiting from Maryland, my youngest daughter here in Atlanta is pregnant, due any day, and I hosted Thanksgiving for my family at my house.

Needless to say, the bees have taken a back seat.

However, over this weekend I checked on most of my Atlanta hives.  Most appear to be going into winter with good supplies.  I fed the bees bee tea going into the fall and most of the hives were slow to take any food, which is a good sign.  Generally they would prefer nectar and around my house we had a pretty good fall aster bloom (and therefore a decent fall flow).  So they haven't taken the bee tea because they didn't really need it.

For example, I put these two feeder jars on the Blue Heron nuc on 11/14.  Here it is almost two weeks later and they've barely touched it.  So I can feel pretty sure that they don't need it.  

One of the advantages of the rapid feeder is that it can stay on the hive during the winter.  A second advantage is that thick sugar syrup rarely freezes so if it is warm enough for the bees to move around, the syrup is there for their taking.  So my 8 frame hives will keep the rapid feeder through the winter.

Plans for winter:
1.  Make creamed honey from the early honey this season that has crystallized
2.  Build my unbuilt nuc boxes
3.  Paint equipment and assess my equipment needs
4.  Try to look for a possible local place to put the beehives from south Georgia
5.  Make plans about our bee business Linda Ts Bees with Jeff to determine where we need to focus come spring
6.  Work on my short course talk with Cindy Hodges on the year in the bee yard in a beginning beekeeper's year.
7.  Work out a sugar shake schedule to begin in January for all the hives.
8.  Decide about splits - surely I can split Colony Square and probably Lenox Pointe as well.

Bees in Winter at the Botanical Garden

For the first time this year, the Atlanta Botanical Garden has a new event, a festival of lights that is really beautiful. We toured the whole thing the Friday right after Thanksgiving....along with about 2999 other people.

It was really spectacular - especially the display in the main plaza.

When we got to the back side of the garden, they have an herb wall garden.  Each brick of the wall has herbs growing on/from it.  In front of these herbs is a display of bees created from light.  We, of course, just had to take pictures!  My daughter took all of these below.



One of the bees up close and personal.



Here I am in front of one of the bees.



And again.

How One Beekeeper Approaches the Winter

While walking my dogs past my friend and fellow beekeeper's house, I saw Jerry sitting in his driveway. He usually keeps a solar wax melter about at this place in his driveway and keeps it working all during the warm months.

But now we are about to have cold weather. Snow is expected on Tuesday (it won't stick, if it shows up, because the ground is much too warm) - snow in Atlanta in November.

Jerry has taken on a non-beekeeping task. He is hulling walnuts in a special frame he built for this purpose. He hauled five huge bags of unhulled walnuts from Missouri in the back of his truck.

Now he sits in his canvas chair and pokes at the walnuts with a shovel until the shell falls off.



Here is the second phase of the walnut after Jerry's shovel has had its way with them.



Beekeepers come up with many ways to while away the winter!