Here I write about my day-to-day beekeeping: what I observe in my colonies, what occupies my mind, and what I learn along the way. No textbook theory — just experiences from the garden and the field.
The Ant and the Varroa Mite
While checking the monitoring board today, something caught my eye that I’d heard about but had never actually seen until today: a small ant, right in the middle of the debris, with a small reddish-brown something clamped between its mandibles - suspiciously the right size and color for a Varroa mite.
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The Bee-Eater
Last year I tried to make a split. It turned out: the mating flight is quite dangerous for a queen…
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Honeydew - Honey That Doesn't Come From Flowers
When I harvested the first super of the year at the Bellevue apiary, I was surprised: almost pure honeydew honey, dark, robust, with that typical malty, spicy note. No blossom honey tastes like that. High time to write down what’s actually going on there.
Read more →The Grassland Temperature Sum - When Does the Season Start
Every year the same question comes up again: when does the real work with the bee colonies actually start? The Grünlandtemperatursumme (GTS), or grassland temperature sum, is a figure from agriculture that helps farmers plan the first cut or the first round of fertilizing. I use it to schedule the first care measures for my colonies.
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The Woodpecker and the Hive
It was late January 2026, there was still some snow on the ground. My wife and I made a quick check-up visit to Bellevue. Good thing we came, because our bees had had a visitor. A woodpecker.
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Chaos Theory
In my first year of beekeeping I started with five purebred queens, all from the same breeding line, all mated at the same mating station. Same hives, same feed, same treatment. I thought I’d do the same thing on every visit, colony after colony, like a production line. Yet within a few weeks the five colonies drifted further and further apart.
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Traveling with Bees
It was the very start of my beekeeping career: as intended under the young-beekeeper support program, I ordered five package swarms, each with a purebred queen. But then came the logistics.
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