Ashby Farms

10/09/2026

Keep bees they say. “It’s fun” they say…..

10/07/2026

Shoutout to Clint Brooks for some
Awesome Queens!!!!


-DayNotice
-timers

10/06/2026

10/01/2026

Arrived safely to one of our wintering yards in Eastern North Carolina tonight!

09/28/2026

I was diving into the colonies that just came home from the mountains after a fantastic fall nectar flow. Even the propolis was yellow!

09/27/2026

Never have I ever…

09/26/2026

“The best thing you can feed your bees is diesel fuel”.

A different way to say this is: “Take your bees to the nectar sources”

I left our 4 yards of bees in the mountains after the superb Sourwood flow this summer. I’d hoped that the Astor/Goldenrod nectar flow would be great, and did not disappoint!!! Most colonies added roughly 60lbs of weight while in the mtns.

This is a yard of 40 that I moved last night from the mountains down to eastern NC. Hopefully the fall nectar flow will be great there, and these bees can make another deep box of honey in the next few weeks.

This will ensure 2 things:
1) I’ll go through every colony the last week of October and move food frames around. Every frame in every single colony will be full of food going into winter.
2) Come spring, when we split the entire operation, we should have lots of food frames to go with those splits.

If you don’t know, most NC beekeepers have less than 30 days to get your colonies “up to weight”. If you don’t have a nectar flow, get the sugar syrup in them sooner than later!

09/19/2026

9/19/26 -Caswell County NC-
Yep, that’s capped drones at the bottom of the frame. 🤦‍♂️ I went through 79 colonies today…..15+ colonies still have them. For those that don’t know, that’s where the mites will be this time of year.

09/15/2026

Might wanna check your Mites….
If Amitraz (Apivar) was your choice to treat varroa mites this fall, you likely put them into the hives Aug 1st, and should be pulling them about now. Dr Frank Renkevich (USDA Baton Rouge Bee Lab) presented at NAHBE this past January 2026, about the rise of Amitraz resistance among varroa mites. (On its own, it’s not working anymore).

This is your friendly reminder that if mites aren’t in check (very soon), the math looks like this:
1)Current Varroa Mite counts = too high
2)Virus load in the bees = too high
3)Sick fall bees raise sick winter bees
4)Bees die over winter
5) You’re ordering Nucs in the spring of ‘27

09/12/2026

Come join us at the at Red Oak Brewery Fall festival today!!!