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Publication
Description
The Backyard Beekeeper, now revised and expanded, makes the time-honored and complex tradition of beekeeping an enjoyable and accessible backyard pastime that will appeal to gardeners, crafters, and cooks everywhere. This expanded edition gives you even more information on "greening" your beekeeping with sustainable practices, pesticide-resistant bees, and urban and suburban beekeeping. More than a guide to beekeeping, it is a handbook for harvesting the products of a beehive and a honey cookbook--all in one lively, beautifully illustrated reference. This complete honey bee resource contains general information on bees; a how-to guide to the art of bee keeping and how to set up, care for, and harvest honey from your own colonies; as well as tons of bee-related facts and projects. You'll learn the best place to locate your new bee colonies for their safety and yours, and you'll study the best organic and nontoxic ways to care for your bees, from providing fresh water and protection from the elements to keeping them healthy, happy, and productive. Recipes of delicious treats, and instructions on how to use honey and beeswax to make candles and beauty treatments are also included.… (more)
User reviews
He did suggest one interesting thing: one frame of specifically drone-sized foundation keep against one wall of a hive body so that wax moths (which prefer drones since their larvae are bigger and meatier than worker larvae) will concentrate there. He didn't suggest how the queen knows to lay only unfertilized eggs in that foundation, though. But queens know a whole lot; maybe they can sense different depths of cells.
At the end of the book are recipes for crafts, cosmetics, and food to be made with wax or honey. Most are sane. At least one is not: "Take selected large red or white currants. One by one, carefully make an incision in the skin 1/4" (.6cm) deep with tiny embroidery scissors. Through this slit remove the seeds with the aid of a sharp needle, preserving the shape of the fruit. [Preserve in honey.:]" (154)
Who am I, Danny the Champion of the World? Also there's a scene in the sequel to Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry in which Cassie's half-white-thus-alien cousin helps her dig chiggers out of her foot with a needle. I don't know which is less appetizing, currants full of sleeping pills or full of maggots.
Mr. Flottum lays everything out in a very straightforward manner starting with the basics. He helps the hopeful beekeeper by providing a step by step plan of attack.
The hubby found it very helpful for bucking up his basic knowledge and for answering several questions that arose over the a cold snap that we had. Our winter has been quite odd this year with it never really getting and staying cold but rather being cold for two days then warmer and rainy. He thought it was messing with the bees but he found his answer in the book – they were just hivecleaning.
He is very glad to have this book in his beekeeping library and he says it will be his go/to book when he has questions. It’s written in an easy to understand manner for people who are just starting up with bees or whom are interested in reading on what is required to give bees a home whether you live in a rural or urban environment.