Claude attended the 2021 Spring Beginning Beekeeping class. He had kept bees many years before so still had some equipment available. Claude lives on some beautiful property in Reidsville and thought he’d give beekeeping another go. As a skilled carpenter, Claude was able to add to or repair his existing equipment. He ordered a package of bees and was ready to go.

I went out to meet Claude in person and help him install his bees. The queen in the package of bees was dead, so Claude had to go back to Kernersville to get a new queen. He installed the bees and the queen just days before the freeze hit. For whatever reason, the new queen didn’t make it either. So I pulled some frames of brood and eggs from one of my hives and we installed them with Claude’s existing bees. They made a new queen and are doing well. Not an easy restart to beekeeping, but a good learning experience.

Since then Claude has come to my bee yard to help with inspections and to learn how to do shakes to check for varroa mite load.