Thornhill Farm

From the cover of an old scrapbook, found at justsomethingimade.com

In the old days in many parts of England and Scotland, it was said that honeybees hummed in their hives exactly at midnight on Christmas eve — some even said they sang a Christmas hymn. This belief also existed in France, Belgium, Switzerland, and Germany. (See The Sacred Bee: in Ancient Times and Folklore. Hilda M. Ransome. Dover Publications, 2004.) It may have originally been associated with the Winter Solstice.

Perhaps you would like to go out at midnight on either the Solstice — which occurs this year on Friday, December 21, at 6:12 a.m. EST — or, on Christmas Eve… you choose! And put your ear to the hive to see if the bees are singing!

Warm wishes for a sweet holiday season and a Happy New Year.

Annie Watson

We’re heading to the bottom of the year now. In the last few months, the bees have worked hard to make enough honey to get through the winter and build up enough numbers to reproduce and survive. For now, the queen has stopped laying. Beekeepers have installed mouse guards, added insulation, and wrapped their hives with protective and heat-absorbing black tarpaper. Now comes the time to hope and trust that colonies will survive until the first pussy willows and maple flowers come out in early spring.

Visit Live from the Hive around December 21 when we will have a special Christmas/Solstice edition of Live From the Hive!

Annie Watson

The staghorn sumac (Rhus typhinia or Rhus hirta) flowers that the honeybees pollinated in June have developed into dark, velvety fruit clusters, or drupes. You can gather the drupes to make into a Vitamin C- and flavor-rich drink, or to dry and use next summer for your smoker fuel if you keep bees. Make sure you’re not collecting poison sumac fruits. Identification info at this Ohio State University web site, and a recipe at Healing-from-home-remedies.

You can also leave the fruits for the deer and birds to enjoy all winter, and for visual beauty in the landscape, their burgundy red standing out against the white of winter snows.

At the hive, the bees are still flying, gathering the last bits of pollen and nectar from late-blooming garden flowers and the last few asters, dandelions, or goldenrod.

Annie Watson