Returning to Georgia Beekeeping

[Lupus]

Hello all:

I live on 12 acres North of Atlanta in Alpharetta, GA. I have been at this location for about 7 years. I have been pretty busy getting this property in order. I have had 20+ hives in the past. My first hives got molested by kids during the winter and I lost all the bees. I just made a new Bee yard closer to the house and less accessible to would be "evildoers". I am trying to get back in the buzzz!

I bought 3 Med. depth super/nucs and housed a purchased package. I housed a swarm that I was called to in the community thats 5. I bought 4 queens 2 from BJ at Weeks Works and two Buckfast's from Weavers. Two Queens went to existing hives in need, the other two made splits. If the release of the second Buckfast goes well today then I will have 7 pretty equal hives. There are some property pictures at wolfbrook.com.

I would like to over winter 6-8 hives this year. A large part of my property is flood plane, next to a large creek. There seems to be plenty of Blackberry, Poplar in Spring, some Sourwood later in the summer and good Goldenrod, Aster etc. in the fall.

I hope to get caught up on issues like that little hive bettle here.