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Michigan Beeks

4K views 16 replies 7 participants last post by  Mr. C 
#1 ·
Who here is from Mi?
Who would be interested in getting a group together once a month or so?
Maybe more often in the winter months to build equipment in prep for the upcoming season?

Bird feeder
Bee Insect Chest Furniture Honeybee
 
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#5 · (Edited)
I have a pretty decent sized shop at my place also (it was set up to work on tractors originally). I build everything myself, but I don't paint, I wax dip.

I've still got some nucs to build and dip yet but there's nothing pressing. I'm waiting till it warms up to do dipping, since it takes a lot more propane when it's cold outside. I do need to make a bunch more frames yet also I guess.

I wouldn't mind getting together sometime either even if it's just to shoot the breeze and swap ideas. If anyone wants to PM me I can send along my email address and we can see what works out. I've got Spring break coming up soon (teacher) and plan on spending most of it in the shop and getting the garden ready for Spring.
 
#8 · (Edited)
Danno,

I get over your way a few tiems every year. I do all of my salmon fishing out of Manistee. I'm usually over that way 4 or 5 times a year. he northern part of West michigan is a pretty area!

I'm starting with two Langs and about a dozen swarm traps spread out over a couple hundred miles. We'll see where this ends up
 
#10 ·
I have half a dozen that were still going last week. I lost a couple late fall to mites and did some combines with swarms I catpured here and there last year. I'm headed to Iowa in June to pick up 6 Russian colonies to try them out this year. Hopefully I'll get a few more swarm and cutout calls this year again to beef up numbers. I will probably stick with the 10-20 range for now, too many irons in the fire to do more currently.

The wife and I brew anything tasty, but just beer currently. We've been doing partial mash, but have the equipment for all grain, which we will probably start doing over Spring break when it warms up. So far we've done, amber, honey ale, stout, dunkelweizen, a founders dirty ba*&^%d clone, a roggenbier (german rye), and a belgian blonde. Only the first 3 ready so far, but I've got supplies for oatmeal stout and another honey ale as soon as I can free up another carboy (or buy another one, we're a little obsessed right now and sound like alcoholics). We prefer diversity over quantity, but we're going to have to start kegging soon, washing that many bottles is getting ridiculous.

I've got a buddy up in Ludington, it is a hike though, a solid hour/hour and a quarter from my place.
 
#12 ·
I went into winter with 70 colonies. I have lost 3 that I could get to. I have 2 yards with 20 each that I have not checked this year yet. Snow has been to deep and they are to far off the road. I try to add a new yard each year with 20 colonies.
I brew all grain ales. We have a brew club and this past weekend we refilled our bourbon barrel with Scottish Strong. Every couple of months we have a competition. The winner gets a revolving trophy. The last style was a brown ale and I took 1st with a nut brown. Next one is going to be a Alt.
 
#14 ·
Yeah, if you were getting a big group together and the timing worked out, I could probably swing out that way. I wouldn't want to do anything too regularly, because it's a bit of a haul, but every now and then could be fun. I'm still pretty new to this wonderful mess, so seeing how other folks do things would be nice. Shoot me a message if you get something together.
 
#16 ·
I'm from the Dorr area and a member of the Holland Bee Club, I would be interested in some type of get together. We are in our third year of beekeeping and currently have 4 hives which are still going well, I'll be heading to Georgia next month to pick up some small cell bees to try. With the 3 small cells and some splits & swarms we are looking to get into the 15-20 hive range. I've been building all my equipment except frames, only doing the assembly on those.

Mr. C- I'm very interested in the wax dipping process and would like to set up to give that a try, I'd be interested in learning from your set-up. Also a few guys from the Holland club are interested in getting some Russian genetics, I'll shoot you a PM. Thanks.

Bryan
 
#17 ·
It's like many things a work in progress still, but I certainly don't mind sharing what I can. It's always funny how small the world is. I drive over to Dorr every year to pick up irrigation supplies from Shields. Once I figure out when I'm dipping again I'll let people know, otherwise it's just a big black tank sitting in my yard. Then you can see how much fun it is to scrape off little black chunks if you're silly enough to paint the inside of the tank like someone I know. A couple more runthroughs and I'll have that junk cleaned out hopefully.
 
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