Surprise Guests

This summer, my brother gave me some of his old bee boxes and books on beekeeping. I gladly hauled the boxes home from Oregon and was excited to do bee research over the fall and winter, then buy bees in the spring for pollinating my berry plants, vegetable plants and fruit trees.  Of course the bonus of sweet golden honey to harvest later in the summer would be a welcome addition to our kitchen.

bee boxes 

One of the boxes had frames loaded with about 60 pounds of honey which I thought I would replace with new frames in the spring.

Last week while I was at work, my husband called and said one group of bee boxes was covered with bees and they were moving in!

The new tenants

Now I'm on a crash course trying to keep my new hive of bees alive through the winter and have gone from this....

to this.....

I'm feeling excited and a little nervous about my new tenants. If anyone has suggestions on winter beekeeping, please leave a comment.

This post is part of Simple Lives Thursdays.