FARM JOURNAL | abbottfarm

Winter on the Farm

My beehives winter of 25/26 Here are my three beehives. This picture was taken early January 2026. On a snowy day like the one in which this picture was taken I had several clues to let me know if my hives were currently alive. I have found over the course of time, that you can tell for sure if a hive is alive in winter, but you can't tell for absolutely certain if it is dead. My educated guess, however tells me that the one in the middle, the blue long hive is most likely de

Fall on the farm

The view from my front yard As the season winds down, there are still a lot of things to do on the farm. I checked the bees about a month ago. My rule of thumb is to not take honey after Labor Day. It was just past Labor Day, but I would have collected my last batch if I felt the bees could afford it. But, I did not find honey outside the broodnest of any amount, so I left them as is. I flipped the middle inner cover in my blue long hive. I am still deciding whether to insula