Hi From Ca

[Angi_H]

Ok I finally had a few min to write a little about me. My name is Angi I am 34 married and a mother to 2 boys. Ages 3 (will be 4 Jan 14th) and 7 (just turned on Dec 3). My husband is a firefighter For the state of CA. I riase rare breed and hearitage Breed poultry. Here is a list of breeds I have. Cuckoo Maran known as the chocolate egger. Dark Cornish great meat bird. Welsimers another nice dark egg breed, Royal Palm turkeys, and Black Mottled turkeys, coturnix quail and indian runner ducks in 3 colors, Fawn and white, Fairy fawn and fawn in with a blue fanw drake. I also grow heirloom veggies, tomatoes and fruit all chemical free. As organic as I can get it with out being registered as with the other fields and places around I can not get organic status here. I am a certified producer and sell my produce at farmers markets and eggs and hopefully honey soon. I also sale hatching eggs on Ebay, Ovabid and used to be egg bid. But I also sale on several yahoo groups I belong to. I am a chronic pain patient. I take massave ammounts of pain meds. Including a pain patch and break through pain meds and muscle relaxers. I have TMJ in both jaw joints and have had a failed surgery on both of them. I also have fibromyalgia, restless legs, chronic fatigue, IBS and Degenerative discs in my Mid back. I am also a vet tech. And i used to be a firefighter and was a volunteer firefighter for a while. I do not have my bees yet but will be getting them in the spring from a friend. I am also getting from him a 4 frame extractor and holding tank that he is giving me. My husband has known him for years and he was one of my hubbys groomsmen at our weddings. He has also worked with him and fought fires with him. He is taking me under his wings and I will be working with him to learn.  I have a wish list a mile long of what I need to buy yet. I guess that is it for now I am getting tired and my back is killing me. I ran out of meds and have a drs apt tomorrow.

Angi

[JP]

Angi, You sound like you lead a very interesting, busy life. I wish you the best at dealing with your pain. Have you considered apitherapy when you get your bees? It may help, lots of anti-inflamatory characteristics in bee venom. Of course you would want to consult with your doctor first and run it by him/her.
 My wife's dad is a volunteer firefighter in New York out of Long Beach. He was on stand by if they needed his group at ground zero during that terrible time.
 Cornish game hens! I don't raise any but I love to eat them, hope that doesn't offend you. I cook them in a roasting bag with vidalia sweet onions with an oriental roast chicken seasoning that I found yrs ago that gives the dish a unique, wonderful taste that I've been unable to top.
 Will your hubby be helping you with the bees when you get them? I bet he will become interested if not and then he will. Its so much fun and addictive, in a good way!
 Welcome aboard, JP.

[Scadsobees]

Hi Angi, welcome to the forum!!!

I've got boys the same age (and in between and younger  :roll:) and they love bugs, and like to help out with the bees.  The trouble is is that I'm too cheap to invest in kid-size stuff so they end up out there with winter gloves on and all wearing huge veils!  Looks rather like an alien convention....

If you haven't bought your equipment yet, you may want to look at getting all 8-frame mediums with your back trouble.  They are lighter and some people here use them.  Not as common and harder to to find, but something to think about.

Hope you get your prescriptions filled soon and feel better....

Rick

[Cindi]

Angi, now that was a piece of beauty, your telling us more about yourself, officially.  YOu are up to some very interesting stuff and you will bring a wealth of information to our forum about your farm, yea!!!!!  You have some young men in your life, you must be very proud of these little dudes, yea!!!!

You know you will love beekeeping.....just wait until you get your first bees.  This is exciting for me, and for you, it is strange, the funniest things turn my crank and the thought of more beekeepers coming into this wonderful field is just something to behold, yea!!!!

You know you have been on this forum for a while, you know that you can ask any questions that you want, never ever think that some question does not deserve a great answer, because every question asked, is one more little thing for even people who have been around bees for awhile, is one more question that reinforces the answers that come to it, sometimes the answers are even reminders for questions or learning forgotten (like me, sometimes I forget things and then it is like learning all over again when a query has a reply), yea.

JP mentioned apitherapy.  You should really do some studying on this wonderful field because the by products of the bees are worth more than their weight in gold, they help many, many malades, and this is 100% true.  Good luck with all your pain, and one day finding alternatives to what you need to use to help to keep your pain at bay.  Beautiful day, beautiful life, beautiful of the beautiful things.  Cindi

[Angi_H]

Ya I have looked into it. My friend eddy says all he wears is his veil and dosnt worry about stings. He said I should do it also because of my pain and all. He also said he has a lady that comes by and wants 100 bees a week and he cant keep filling that order. So he sends her to other places. She uses them for her self and her mother. So that is an option for making a little money as well. But what does someone charge for that kind of thing lol. I am excited to get going. I have my suit and hat and gloves and veil. I have a smoker, hive tool (cheap one I want to get the better one with the hook for helping get out the frames), A little smoker fuel, I have a bottom board, brood chamber with waxed plasticel foundations. An inner cover and telescoping cover. I still have a wish list a mile long. I am going to be getting my bees from our friend. More of my hubbys friend but he is also giving me a 4 frame extractor and a honey storage tank stainless. He uses a 50 frame one now and this one has been just sitting there for a while with no use. So I need a capping knife and scraper a capping tank and strainer bucket. As CA requires a certain level of straining. He also told me to call out local sherrif and poliece departments and the local highway patroll and let them know next year that I am willing to go and pick up Swarms. He said sometimes they will give you bee boxes to go and get them. He said to also let the extermionator places know as well. He said oh you will be up to 10 hives before you know it. Well I dont have room for 10 hives right now. Now if my other friend plants the Almond orchard then I will have a place to store the bees about 3 miles away. I know of several farmers as well and I am sure I could work something out with them for storage as well as honey. So i have allot of great info and I need to get a few more brood chambers and some supers and foundation. And also a bee brush.  If I get more them one hive going I was thinking of making at liest one box a cut comb hive. My pain is a little high today it was cold and rainy as storms always make me hurt more. In Jan I have a huge poultry show in Stockton Ca to go to. I am showing my Royal Palm Turkeys and my runner Ducks. I am also selling a few things there as well as picking up a few things. I can not wait. As this time I am only going. This is my vacation. As my hubby gets to board and so does my kids. And it makes it for not a fun time when I keep having to yell and chase down the kids every 2 min.. So this will be my break. hoto if it works is of my Cuckoo Maran Cockrel Maurice.

Angi

[Cindi]

Angi, good, the power of the sting is power in many ways, hee, hee.  I still only wear a veil when I am working with the bees, never, ever any gloves, if I do get a sting, yea!!!!  more power to it!!!!  I rarely get stung, but have had a few good ones where my face swelled up quite a bit.  That was when I was catching a swarm and didn't have any protection on.  I couldn't hold the branch that my Husband had cut (thought I was stronger), and it kind of fell and the cluster broke.  The bees fell basically partly on my head.  Eeeks!!!  That was in my second year of beekeeping.  I still remember feeling all those little feet of the bees sticking on my face as they took their grip and plunged their stinger into me.  It was something that I will never forget  :roll: ;) :( :) :) :)  My Husband had a bee sting him right between the eyes during that year too.  We were going to go to a funeral that day and he had gone to get his beer that he left up at the apiary.  I was doing something with the bees that had annoyed them and he went to get his beer and one went right after him.  Ha!!!!  That was so funny.  He saw her coming and could do nothing.  Anyways, he went to the funeral looking like alien man.

He is so funny.  He took the picture of me and him with our great big faces and sent an e-mail out to friends and family, with a funny little word caption saying some funny little thing about bees stings being priceless, something after the lines of the Mastercard commercial.  Got a hoot and a hollar for sure.  I think that I actually put this on our forum, it was good for a laugh or two, he always makes me laugh!!!!  I am so in love.....oh brother, here I go again, off topic, what the blazes is wrong with me.

When you get all the rest of your stuff for the bees, Angi, do this.  THis was a tip that I listened to on our forum.  Sometimes instead of using the bee brush, get a great and wonderful feather from one of your birds and use beautiful feather instead of the bee brush.  It is a very useful tool for me.  Sometimes I don't want to brush the bees briskly and a feather has that light touch, it is one that I use all the time instead of a bee brush.  When you have the need to brush the bees with a bee brush, brush them briskly, quickly, don't linger with the brush.  Bees don't like to be brushed, but if you have to, quick and sharp, it will not hurt them, it is more of a flicking motion, the best that I can describe.  If you can brush from the head, that way, they don't like to be brushed from the butt forward, I think that really annoys them even more.  My two cents

You are getting very well set up for your bees, yea!!!!  Good for you and you are making me envious with what you have.  Have a wonderful and beautiful day, great health wishes.  Cindi