Draper's Bee Blog

I posted this on our Facebook page but thought I should post it here also.

My grandmother Draper passed away today (12/14/12) . She was an integral part of the business when it started almost 40 years ago. One of my earliest memories of her and the business was how she always made coffee for my father and grandfather and I was in charge of transporting that coffee from the house to the business. I would go in the house every morning to the smell of fresh brewing coffee and bacon, my grandfather’s favorite food and she always greeted me with a big smile, a hug and a hearty good morning! She did much more than just make coffee…she was the rock that we all were anchored too! I have to honor her and say that she was truly the most loving, least selfish and most caring person that I have ever known. I have so many good memories of her, that it would take pages and pages to list them all.  Because those memories are stored with indelible ink upon my heart and mind, and I’m certain on the hearts and minds of many others, she has accomplished something that far too many people will never accomplish…she will be remembered.  I am sad…but I am also happy that she is finally able to be with my grandfather, my mother and of course those that she loved that have gone before her. Your pain is gone, you have been lifted up and I rejoice that you are free…I love you grandma!

We are looking for Sourwood and Tulip Poplar honey. If anyone has some or knows someone that does we would love to talk! We can even pick the honey up at your location. Please contact us by email or phone.

I am taking next week off and will be back on the 24th. I’m sorry to any of my custom printed label customers that need labels…because I won’t be around to print any I will get to them when I get back.

Hoping to extract some honey off of my own hives this weekend and then a week of taking it easy…I hope…wish me luck as I often end up working on one thing or another on my vacations.

We now have 12 oz. cut comb and chunk honey back in stock.

We are picking up a load of comb honey this next week and will have it up for sale the following week so check the website around June 26th if you are interested.  We aren’t getting as much as we had hoped to get so what we do have is going to go fast.

Also I have decided to post important updates here as well as on our Facebook page for those of you who don’t have a Facebook account.

Honey production is down in the south and it doesn’t look like we will be able to get any Tupleo, Sourwood or Tulip Poplar this year…bummer! We are still looking and if we are able to find some we will pick it up…however I guarantee it will be the most expensive honey we have ever purchased.

I’m going to try something new for my blogging – I am going to start posting on our Facebook  page for awhile to see if I and all of you like it. I have more options available to me on Facebook than I do here and it saves me from having to type things twice. It seems that more and more people are on Facebook and since I am on there every day anyway it will be easy for me to post updates from wherever I am. Our page on Facebook is: http://www.facebook.com/draperbee

We have had some crazy weather this week; one day it’s 14 degrees the next 60 degrees, it’s raining, then it’s snowing, the sun is out, then it’s overcast…repeat, repeat. The Robins are back in the area and I wonder what they think of this weather? The bees we have around the business are getting out when it’s warmer and it won’t be long before the first pollen of the year becomes available to them on the maple tree in the yard. I will take a picture when I see the bees on it…maybe even try to get a video. It’s something to see because they are so excited about it.

We are still taking orders for package bees for both pick up and to be shipped. We will start having queens available here at our location starting April 23rd.

I went to talk to some school kids last week and ended up doing an interview with a local news paper and here is a link to the article: http://thedailyreview.com/news/western-bradford-notebook-supplying-honey-to-the-presidents-1.1279499

I also went to Wellsboro, PA this week to talk to some seniors about the bees. I have a lot of bee related lectures planned already this year. Busy as a Bee I am! (says Yoda the beekeeper)

We bottled a tank of Buckwheat honey this morning and the rest of the day I have spent answering phones, sending emails and making…I’m sorry to say…price changes to some of our bee supply items. Price certainly aren’t going down on anything.

We have made a new type of observation hive that is able to be locked up and is more secure than our normal hives, although you would need to be carrying a screwdriver around with you to open our regular ones. But some customers have shown an interest in something that has locks on it, so we made one, you can take a look at it here: http://www.draperbee.com/catalog/page7.htm#lockable

I have been working on pre-counting bee supplies for what we hope, will be a busy spring season. It is so much easier having frames and foundations pre-counted into bundles of 10 when you get a dozen people in the office with orders to fill. I also cleaned up in the warehouse waiting for our driver to return with some 9 5/8 budget hive bodies that we needed.

The bees were out and about for a little bit today but it was getting windy so they went back inside…don’t blame them…even with the warmer temperatures it was really damp and chilly with the wind blowing. They are saying maybe snow overnight…booooooooo!

Another busy week of taking package bee orders. Our first load of bees, that will be here for pickup on April 21st, will be sold out sometime this coming week. Once it is sold out we will still be taking orders for the May 5th pickup date.

All shipped package bee orders taken now will start being shipped in May sometime. I will send emails out to everyone that places an order with their proposed ship date within week or two after receiving your order. I want to remind everyone that ship dates are affected by things that we can not control…mostly the weather conditions but sometimes queen production and even the Post Office can affect when the bees ship. I will post any delays on this page and the package bee page if they occur.

We have been making up some syrup pails just in case we need them this spring. This is a good time of year to make up some syrup to be ready for your package bees. We mix ours with 2 parts sugar to 1 part water. If you don’t have time to make syrup you can always use a light corn syrup directly as feed.