Sadly, my last colony perished this past week. I believe it was queen failure. The hive was full of honey, and not a single bee. So, for the first time in years, my garden is quiet. I’ve decided to only host four colonies this year—three skeps and my wall hive. So, today, I got to…
It’s been a year and a half since my Sun Hive workshop, where I first learned how to start weaving straw hives. I love my Sun Hive, but honestly, I love the little skeps more, so that’s where I’ve put my efforts. I’ve been working on these little hives pretty much in isolation, so to…
July is late for a swarm around here. I’ve been watching with interest the swarm preparations my Sun Hive has been making for weeks. I knew they would swarm again (second time), so I was weaving furiously on a new skep I was weaving out of pasture grasses gathered just this past month. Meanwhile, at…
It has been five months since I brought my bright and beautiful Sun Hive home, and just three months since I escorted a small cast swarm up a wooden ramp and into its dark and enfolding interior. Small the swarm may have been, but the bees took to the woven hive like they had been…
Michael Joshin Thiele spoke as he always does—softly and deliberately: “How was this for you?” he asked in the most lilting German accent you will ever hear. We circled around him, about fourteen of us hailing from different states and even different countries to attend the first-ever west-coast Sun Hive making class. In front of…