Honey bees and beekeeping

Braving all the oak pollen this weekend my dad and I took a class about honey bees and beginner beekeeping. I'd really wanted to learn about it ever since I read a book when I was much younger called The Moorchild. Then I read The Secret Life of Bees. Plus honey bees have been dying and desperately need help. I love Burt's Bees lip-gloss and chewing on the beeswax in the honey bottles. All that made me realize that it would be so awesome to at least look into keeping bees but I honestly never thought I'd get the opportunity to do that.

Look at that honeycomb!

When I saw the class I jumped at the opportunity. We learned about:

• good online sources to read about beekeeping (such as the American Bee Journal)
• all the things we need to house honey bees
• how to light and fuel the smoker
• how to protect ourselves from stings when opening the hives
• when & how to harvest the honey and beeswax

The hive, smoker, and veil (bottom right).

They did a few drawings and I won a milkweek plant! Here's some info (from http://www.butterflyencounters.com/milkweed/index.html):

Milkweed is a great plant for the garden and provides habitat for many creatures. In addition to being a host plant to the monarch butterfly, milkweed offers many other benefits:

• Milkweed flowers produce nectar that all butterfly species benefit from.
• Honey bee's take nectar from milkweed flowers. With the decline of honey bee populations in the US, planting milkweed in your garden can help to provide feeding stations as they fly between crop fields and orchards.
• Hummingbirds often use the floss from milkweed seed pods to line their nests.

My milkweed's new leaves :)