How is your crop looking?

[Elwood]

Not much of a honey flow where I'm at. Even with the strongest colonies it is pretty light. Seems like the blooming times are a little out of whack too.

[Ben Franklin]

In Northeastern Ohio, clover (dutch) and bridsfoot trefoil, Basswood is ready to bloom any day. So far bees are storing a lot, even my swarms have stores of honey. So Far So Good.

[Beeslave]

Sweet and sticky

[Vance G]

A very successful local farmer always answered that question the same way when I was a kid, "It varies". That is always a good answer.

[Roland]

You are right, it varies, ours is only sticky and sweet. Actually it is too early to tell. Will the Alfalfa continue to bloom in a drought, or do we need a rain to "freshen em up".

Crazy Roland

[Vance G]

Alfalfa does best with wet feet, cool nights and hot days. Give it that and there aren't enough bees to use it up. If you could just arrange that for all of us the next six weeks, we will all be filthy rich.

[Brent Bean]

I am already have extracted more honey that I got all last season. But if we don’t get rain soon the flow will slow down.

[BeeGhost]

My hives in town are packing away the black berry flow that is happening right now, both hives almost had a full medium super packed and I added another medium to them. One hive is a swarm hive I picked up at the end of March, the other hive threw a swarm on me in April and is already built back up to strong numbers. These hives are two deeps and two mediums now!!

My other hives in the country have stores, maybe from the vineyards or something, but just enough to sustain until the star thistle blooms. I think the star thistle is going to be late this year, seen very few plants blooming along the road ways, but in the pastures not much is even growing yet, hope it does, because last year was phenominal and I could have easily pulled around 400+ pounds if I had the hives I do now!!

Hope to extract the city honey in a couple weeks after things are capped!

[matt1954]

We just extracted this week here in Virginia. I averages 3.5 to 4 gallons per hive. Some running double supers. Not the best, but certainly not the worst I have had. Our flow is about done for the year. I wish we had Alfalfa fields here.

[khaas15]

spring flow was good in N. Illinois. I pulled 29 pounds off my strong hive about three weeks ago. Saturday I pulled a medium super off both of my hives. Harvested 60 pounds. This honey must have a heavy linden content because it sure is minty.

The bees are now working milkweed and thistle. After that we might slow down for a while until we the goldenrod, aster, and sunflower bloom.

[Elwood]

Anyone from Southern California have a report?

[The Honey Householder]

Ran out of supers. The main flow looks to be starting. The race is on. Just hope the new operation can keep up this year.

[Sweet to the Soul]

Just hope the new operation can keep up this year.

Ron, I hope your new operation cannot keep up this year. That would mean we were enjoying a great year.

[sqkcrk]

We had some HOT days here and the bees really worked their wings off. I was hoping it would last more than two or three days. Temps dropped down into the low 70s after that and then we had cool rain. It was in the 40s or low 50s last night.

When it was hot clover and staghorn sumac were blooming like crazy and bees were seen yesterday working on the cranberries. One yd in particular has hives almost as tall as me, 6'3", after I gave them another three shallow supers, because they already have three supers of honey above the brood boxes.

[swarm_trapper]

what is your new operation Ron?

[Keth Comollo]

Same story here Mark. Was booming for a bit but this rain and coolness has slowed them down a bit. Hoping for sun!

[sqkcrk]

Just saw the weather map showing the heat staying down below the NY State line for the next week. Bummer.

Keth, you seeing any Basswood yet? I'm not sure whether it will even bloom here this year. Though it isn't yet the 4th of July. We had no locust.

[Keth Comollo]

Was walking my dog last night and walked by two big basswood trees and didn't see any sign of a bloom on them at all.

Locust failed here this year too.

We need some sun to get the nectar flowing again!

[Solomon Parker]

Looks like some fellas didn't read the poll question. You northeasterners taking a vacation this year?

[The Honey Householder]

Nick, I'm running a gunnies over spinners with an equinox and 80 frame hubbards extractors. Just when to a 1000 gal. holding tank, hope to fill each day.

Kevin, if this setup works the way I think. I'll need the best year ever to give it a run for its money.