Duration: 1st September – 30th September 2020
Number of books: 7
Hosted by: Crazy Challenge Connection
September 2020 Scavenger Challenge | Beekeeping in a Honeycomb
September 1 – 30, 2020
Beekeeping has been rising in popularity as headlines warn of the detrimental loss of bee populations. After a little study, and after a little experience, beekeeping is a relatively easy endeavor. The seven items below are a brief glance into apiculture.
5/7 Completed
1. To be able to harvest a good amount of honey by summer’s end, the prospective beekeeper should get their hives set up in early spring. Come June, you want a really healthy colony, one that has many babies (brood) and still more adult bees (about 45,000) ready to begin foraging for nectar and pollen.
🌺 Read a book that takes place in Spring (March, April, May); tell us when OR read a book involving beekeeping; tell us how if the connection isn’t clear.
2. The American Golden Italian Honeybee (Apis mellifera ligustica) is probably the wisest investment for a homestead apiary. They’re great honey producers with gentle dispositions, have a strong resistance to disease and natural enemies, and are well able to withstand wintering-over in colder climates.
🐝 Read a book with a bee on its cover (must be visible in the GR thumbnail); post the cover OR read a book with a character who has a gentle disposition; tell us who. – Bluebird by Malcolm Knox (Gordon)
3. Most packaged bee houses now sell only pure, tested Italian queens and swarms in two and three pound lots. Each lot is called a “nuc,” short for “nucleus.” The hive must be ready upon receipt of your bees (via parcel post!) and beekeeping equipment at the ready. The new beekeeper will want a hat with veil and gloves at a minimum. A smoker is very helpful in calming the bees.
🍯 Read a book with any type of hat, veil, or gloves clearly visible on its cover; post the cover OR read a book whose location begins with a letter in NUCLEUS; tell us where. – We Hunt the Flame by Hafsah Faizal (Sharr)
4. The modern beehive is very simple and easy-to-use. While you can build one, factory-made equipment is so inexpensive and well made that you’ll probably find it worth the slight extra expense. The bottom layer will be a cypress-wood platform, followed by a reversible bottom board and then the brood chamber (commonly called the “Langstroth movable frame hive”). It looks like an oversized milk crate without top or bottom, and contains 10 foundation frames on which the bees build comb to raise brood or store honey. The ten frames hang side by side in the chamber.
🐝 Read the 10th book in a series OR read a book with an intact “10” in its original YEAR of publication; tell us the pub. year. – Moonlight Road by Robyn Carr
5. Directly above the brood chamber is one or more supers, or storage sections. Each is a duplicate of the brood chamber (although often only half as deep) and contains 10 comb frames where surplus honey may be stashed. You can stack as many as five of these supers on a hive and reap the sweet liquid as it comes in, or you can wait until the honey flow ends and do all your collecting at once.
🍯 Read a book that has been in “storage” for some time – i.e. a book that you have owned for more than a year without reading or a book that has been on your TBR for over a year; tell us how long you’ve had the book on your reading horizon OR read a book that has a “5” in its total page count; tell us how many pages. – Ink and Bone by Rachel Caine (on shelf for 2 years)
6. A hive’s queen spends most of her time in the brood chamber, being fed and gently groomed by young worker bees and laying upwards of 3,000 eggs a day. Apart from this reproductive function, her presence is essential for another reason: she secretes an unidentified “queen substance” which keeps the colony in good, productive spirits and inhibits the workers from laying.
🐝 Read a book involving a queen (queen only); tell us who OR if you have a large TBR, read a book in position 3,000 or higher; tell us the book’s position.
7. The procedure for getting your newly received humming mass of insects safely into their new home is simple: Just follow to the letter the directions on the shipping container and there’ll be no trouble. Two hints to make the transfer easier: [1] Feed the bees well before unpacking them so that they’ll be gentle and quiet. (Make a syrup by dissolving two parts sugar in one part water and smear this liquid generously over the wire screening.) [2] Install your colony in the late evening to reduce the chance that some of the exploring workers will be lost. With night coming on, they won’t go far and will naturally return to the nearby hive.
🌺 Read a book with an evening or nighttime scene on its cover; post the cover OR read a book featuring a dinner party or feast; tell us briefly about the event. – Obsidian by Jennifer L. Armentrout (school dance dinner)
Buzz 🐝 Buzz 🐝 Buzz 🐝 Buzz 🐝 Buzz 🐝 Buzz 🐝 Buzz 🐝 Buzz
CHALLENGE RULES
See this thread for more detailed rules for all CCC challenges.
♣ If you want to participate in this challenge, please sign up by posting at least a partial list of the challenge requirements. This gives us a post to link you to, which you can use to update your books as the challenge progresses.
♣ For each book you read, please indicate the title, the author and the date you finished reading it. If a challenge task gives several options, please make it clear which option you’ve chosen. If the task calls for an item on the cover, include a link to the book cover.* If it’s not obvious from the book title or cover, be sure to explain how your book fits the task. If you don’t, you won’t get credit for completing that task.
♣ Unless otherwise noted, books must be at least 150 pages long. (See the link above for rules regarding graphic novels.) Books may only be used for one task in this challenge, but cross-challenge posting is encouraged 🙂 Re-reads are allowed, as long as you read the entire book. You must read at least half of the book AFTER the challenge begins in order to count it for this challenge.
♣ Books may only be used for one task in this challenge, but cross-challenge posting is encouraged!
♣ If you want the challenge moderator to check your progress as you make updates, please copy/paste your update into a new message . We don’t have time to scroll back through the entire thread looking for “message #15,” or to follow links back to an original post.
♣ When you complete the challenge, please post your entire list as a new message to make it easier for everyone to see what you’ve read. If you don’t repost your list, you won’t be included in the list of those who have completed the challenge.
*If you don’t know how to post a link to the book title or cover, see the instructions here: Link Instructions
Earth and Skye 