Until Furtherer Notice

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This ole blog, along with its YouTube channel, Twitter feed and Facebook page, has been getting more attention lately. I’ve been asked, “When are you coming back?”

I don’t know.

But here’s the deal for when and if I come back: I’m going to press DELETE and start again. I want to remove some of the earlier posts where I went out of my way to give advice, advice that I know came more from my ego than expertise. I also don’t have it in me to fix a technical glitch that killed the photos from most of the older posts.

So if I come back to this, I’ll be starting from scratch. I don’t expect anything to happen until sometime in 2019.

But thanks for asking.

— Phillip
July 4th, 2018

Until Further Notice

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After unplugging from the internet for the past year, I’ve decided to keep riding that train. Anyone new to this site might want to check out my Guide to Beekeeping that collects pretty much the best of what I’ve posted anyway. Photos for many of my older posts were deleted during a technical glitch a while back and it could be some time before I have the chance to fix them. I will, however, continue to upload photos and video clips on Twitter, but that’s about it for now. Here are the details…

I got bonked on the head near the end of 2016. I’m just now beginning to feel like a normal human again, capable of doing normal human things. I can walk my dog, watch TV, eat a peanut butter and jam sandwich whenever I feel like it. Things are looking up. Things are looking so up, in fact, that I don’t want to mess with a good thing.

Ask anyone who’s had a serious concussion injury: Even when things are looking good, or especially when things are looking good, you have to take it slow. It’s not much fun being forced to take it slow, month after month after month, but then you realize that walking, not running, listening, not talking, isn’t such a bad place to be.

After a year of taking it slow and unplugging myself from all things that have a plug, you’d think I’d be ready to get on with things. But low profile mode is working so well for me, I’m going to stick with it a while longer. That means no blog posts any time soon, no beekeeping videos, not much of anything online except for my Twitter account. I won’t be joining any beekeeping groups or participating in any kind of workshops either. I do appreciate the friendly conversations on the Backyard Farming & Homesteading NL Facebook page, but otherwise, I’m out. Not out for good, but until further notice.

Thank you to everyone who helped me out over the past year. I’ll see you later.

Cheers,

Phillip
January 8th, 2018


Concussion

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I’ve been recovering from a concussion since December 2016. I don’t want to get into the details. However, I expect I’ll write a thorough blog or a book or an article about it sometime after I recover. All I can say for now is that I’ve been lucky to find a specialist who is helping me and things are slowly getting better.

In the meantime, I’m stepping away from Mud Songs and pretty much everything else I do online. I will be keeping a low profile. Locally, it means I won’t be involved in any beekeeping groups, workshops, conferences, beeyard visits — nothing. I wish everyone the best, but I need to take a break. I hope you understand.

It’s been a pleasure to share my beekeeping experiences with all of you.

Take care,

Phillip
March 17th, 2017

JULY 18th, 2017: I might occasionally post something on my Twitter account, but otherwise I’m still keeping a low profile as I continue to focus on my recovery.

Beekeeping With a “Flir One for Android”

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I will update this post continually (instead of writing multiple posts that could easily take over this blog) as I explore the capabilities of the Flir One infrared camera device. The updates will appear in descending order. The latest update was posted on December 19th, 2016.

DECEMBER 19, 2016: I know people who are getting much better results with their Flir One than I am. I realize my long rambling post here probably isn’t providing the best information because I’ve more or less taken the point-and-shoot approach. I want to turn this thing on, take a thermal image and immediately see something that’s useful — without having to modify the image later on using another application or program, because I don’t have time for anything else. Easily 95% of the images I get following that approach don’t show me anything that helps me. For people like me who may have day jobs, family responsibilities or other activities that don’t allow them much time to fiddle with something like this, I’m not sure I can recommend the Flir One. It’s too expensive and time-consuming. I’m not saying it doesn’t work, but in my experience so far, it’s definitely not something that produces great results just by plugging it in. It takes time and perhaps some knowledge of thermal imaging to get the most out of it.

DECEMBER 07, 2016: I took the following thermal images with my Flir One today. The automatic settings didn’t give me much to work with, so, again, I tried to adjust the settings on the fly and got various results. Using the Flir Tools app or the software on my computer would probably produce better images, but I don’t have time for that. If I can’t get a half-decent image by using the Flir One as I would my cell phone camera, then it could easily become yet another beekeeping chore that takes up more of my time. I’d rather instant results, not something that requires additional processing afterwards. So I’m aiming for simplicity at the moment even if it means I’m not utilizing the Flir One to its full potential. So… It was about -10°C when I took these pics, and no wind. It felt icy cold. Everything was frozen.

The wrap on this hive is loose on the bottom left. I can't get a useful thermal reading off it. (Dec. 07, 2016, 10:16am, -10°C.)

The wrap on this hive is loose on the bottom left. I can’t get a useful thermal reading off it. (Dec. 07, 2016, 10:16am, -10°C.)


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Feeding My Bees In The Wintertime With Sugar Bricks

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These days I use sugar bricks to feed my bees in the winter and here’s a quick 2-minute video that demonstates how I do it.

This is a condensed version of a 4-part video series (not unlike the original Star Wars trilogy) that I posted last winter.
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Finally Adding Sugar Cakes

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    The following was updated on December 1st, 2016, and will likely be updated again within a week.

I usually add just-in-case sugar above the top bars in my hives around early November. By that time — in my local climate — it’s usually so cold that the bees move to the bottom of the hive beneath their honey stores (and then gradually eat their way towards the top of the hive throughout the winter), which makes it easy for me to put the sugar in without bothering them. But that didn’t happen so much this year because November has been unusually warm. Only in the past few days have I noticed the bees, at least in some of the hives, clustering below the top bars. So I decided to add some sugar bricks today…

About 700 grams (or 1.5 pounds) of a sugar cake added to this hive today. (Nov. 30, 2016.)

About 1.3 kg (or 3 pounds) of a sugar cake added to this hive today. (Nov. 30, 2016.) I’ll probably add more later when I find the time. These bees were breaking through the top bars were so cold, it was easy to slide the sugar in without bothering too much.

I followed my Sugar Bricks Recipe (12 parts sugar mixed with 1 part water) and made bricks that weighed between 1 and 3 pounds (0.5 – 1.3 kg).
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Tips on Using 6mm / Quarter-Inch Mesh

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It was 18°C / 64°F today and the bees in all of my hives — even with shrew-proofing 6mm / quarter-inch mesh covering all the entrances — were out in full force.

Quarter-inch mesh covering all the entrances. The mesh slows them down, but doesn't prevent them from getting out or inside the hive. (Nov. 17, 2016.)

Quarter-inch mesh covering all the entrances. The mesh slows them down but doesn’t prevent them from getting out or inside the hive. (Nov. 17, 2016.)


I’ve heard arguments that the bees can’t get through quarter-inch mesh. But that’s not true. If it was, my bees would have been locked inside their hives behind the mesh all last winter. The bees in the above photograph wouldn’t be flying around today.
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Beekeeping on a Budget: Hive Wrap

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    The following was last updated on Dec. 01, 2016.

I made this quick video as a response to several emails I got from new beekeepers asking me if there were more affordable ways to wrap their hives for winter other than to plonk down $20 to $60 per hive for commercially available hive wraps. There are always cheaper alternatives. A roll of roofing felt is one of them.

I’m not saying roofing felt is better (though I have heard some convincing arguments), but it’s cheap and it’s worked well for me for the past six winters. Keep in mind that the bees don’t need to be warm and toasty during the winter. They just need to be warm enough to break cluster once in a while so they can migrate across the honey frames and not starve to death. (I might expand on this in the comments.)

Slight correction: In the video I mention #15 roofing felt. It’s actually referred to as a “type 15 asphalt felt.”
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Problems with the “Mountain Camp” Method of Dry Sugar Feeding

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    This post was updated on November 13th, 2016.

Despite following the Mountain Camp method of dry sugar feeding in the winter more or less since I started beekeeping, I don’t do it anymore. I’ve switched to easy-to-make and easy-to-add sugar cakes.

Bottom side of a sugar cake eaten away by the bees. (April 17, 2016.)

Bottom side of a sugar cake eaten away by the bees. (April 17, 2016.)

I don’t use dry sugar anymore because the bees tend to remove it from the hive if they’re not hungry enough to eat it. Spraying the sugar down with water so it hardens helps to prevent this, but if the weather is still warm enough so that the bees are flying around, they’ll do what active bees like to do: clean house. Whatever grains of sugar are not hardened together will often get tossed out of the hive. I used to add dry sugar sometime in November after the temperatures took a serious dip — when the bees were clustered below the top bars, not actively flying around in house-cleaning mode. Overall, the discarded sugar wasn’t a huge problem. If the bees were hungry, they ate the sugar regardless of the weather. But still, sometimes it seemed like a waste of sugar.
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100 Pounds of Honey? Really?

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I expected to be part of a panel discussion at the recent NL Beekeepers AGM but instead found myself in the spot light listening to words come out of my mouth like I was having an out of body experience. I apparently spoke about moisture quilts and what was referred to afterwards as my “winter ventilation strategy.” Okay. I would describe myself as somnambulistic after a week of work that left my brain running on fumes by the time I showed up at eight-thirty in the bloody morning for the AGM. Then, to cap it off, what I thought was a panel discussion scheduled for the lunch hour got pushed to the end of the day, by which time I was fighting to keep my eyes open, going to the washroom every 20 minutes to splash cold water on my face. By the time I arrived at my moment shine, it was great. Just great. I wish I had it on tape. I had a good laugh talking about it afterwards when I got home. You gotta laugh.

IMG_0384-thick-comb

At any rate, someone who was lucky enough to be graced by my presence at the AGM sent me an email this morning asking me if I really got 100 pounds of honey from one of my hives after I put an empty moisture quilt on it for ventilation. My answer was: “You better believe it!” I don’t even remember saying that during my presentation, but apparently I said it — and it’s true. I responded to his email to explain how it happened, how I lucked into it really, and then I copied and pasted my response to Facebook, and now I’m copying that Facebook post to ye ole Mud Songs blog because I’m reaching the end of another long day at work and I really don’t have the brain power to do anything other than copy and paste.

So here it is, the story of how I got 100 pounds of honey from a single honey bee colony, and in Logy Bay, Newfoundland, of all places:

By the way, I plan to write a post that covers all the topics that I expected to talk about during the panel discussion, in the form of a conversation between three beekeepers, just as I imagined the panel discussion would play out. It, too, will be great. Stay tuned.