Local county prison farm produces "Jailhouse Honey" and "Jailhouse Jelly"

I can tell you that jail is a boring place. That's because I worked in one for two years. In case you didn't know it, I was a deputy Sheriff for 18 years, and my first two years of full-time service was working in the county jail. It was one of the best experiences in my career because you learn a lot about human nature. And one of the most important lessons I learned while working there is that not everyone who goes to jail is a bad person. Yes, they did something bad to get there. Many of the people behind bars have some good characteristics too, but they made bad decisions for whatever reason and landed in jail. But as I said, jail is a boring place and much of the time, there is absolutely nothing to do. Some watch TV, some play cards, some sleep when they can - and the others may try to figure out some mischief to break the monotony. The mischief is what all jails want to avoid. It is better to keep the inmates occupied with something good than something bad.

One local Sheriff's Office is doing something to break the monotony of serving jail time and teaches some post-release skills too. The Guilford County Sheriff's Office, which is headquartered in Greensboro, North Carolina, runs a prison farm. Not just a prison farm but the only remaining county operated prison farm in the state of North Carolina. The prison farm has a capacity of 134 inmates and consists of 806 acres of land located in eastern Guilford County near Gibsonville. The prison farm is just that, a working farm. It includes cattle, greenhouses (the prison farm sells plants to the public), hay, corn, and lots more. And inmates maintain the farm under the supervision of ever-watchful detention officers.

In 2010, the prison farm added a muscadine grape vineyard. No, the inmates aren't making wine with the sweet grapes, but they are making what is called "Jailhouse Jelly". And to help the grapes and other plants to thrive on the farm? Yep, bee hives! Three prison farm staff members attended a basic beekeeping course held by the Guilford County Beekeepers and brought back their newly learned skills to form a 10 hive apiary on the premises. Between the acres of other crops, and the vineyard and the apiary, the detention officers share their skills with the inmates, and the inmates can use those skills when they go back into society. It is a win-win for everyone, plus it helps the honey bees too. I think it is a fantastic idea to teach these skills to others, and I hope more jails and prisons that operate farms will pick up on it.

Here is a clip with details about the prison farm apiary and vineyard. It comes from a weekly television show called "Guilford Sheriff 911" which is hosted by Sheriff B.J. Barnes and airs on Guilford cable and WGSR 47.1 in Reidsville. In the clip, Steve Carney, one of the detention officers and beekeepers, details how it all came about. I was graciously given permission to post the segment by Arch Embler, the public services liaison and producer of the show. Thanks, Arch!

And hats off to the Guilford County Sheriff's Office for not only helping the inmates learn something they can take with them when they leave, but for helping the honey bees thrive too!

Yes, fellow beekeepers: I'm baaaack!

It has been seven months since my last post on this blog.  So needless to say, I am a little behind.  Nay, I'm way behind.  Even thought I had the best intentions of jumping online and update my blog, something would come along and my ambition would be set aside.  But I do appreciate the messages or emails from several of you who just wanted to make sure that I'm still alive and kicking. The good news is, yes, I'm very much alive and kicking.  The bad news is that the realities of life got in the way of me keeping everyone updated on what was going on.  So let me catch everyone up from then until now.

The last part of 2011 was somewhat of a mess for me.  I'm fond of telling people that I was wide awake on New Year's Eve, not so much to celebrate the grand entrance of 2012, but to make sure 2011 was gone for good (and good riddance too).  

My mom was sick quite a bit in 2011 which included several hospitalizations, so my brother and I had to make sure my dad was taken care of while she was away.  Plus there were countless trips to and from the hospital too.  Luckily she got well and was able to finally come home.  Once she was stable and settled at home again, we got to go on vacation in September and spent a great week at the beach.  But it seemed as if once I got back home, life got hectic with work and other things that took up a lot of my time so many things fell by the wayside.  From Labor Day to the New Year, especially during the holidays, it is a really busy time in the broadcasting business anyway. 

I started feeling really bad in mid October, physically ill, and thought I may have developed an ulcer.  But as the days passed, the pain I felt became more localized, so I finally went to see a doctor (after changing my self-diagnosis to a hernia).  Thank goodness I'm not a doctor.  It wasn't an ulcer or a hernia; it was my appendix which was at the point of rupture.  After having a CT scan, the doctor would not let me leave the hospital and they started pumping me full of antibiotics for an early surgery the next morning.  Thank goodness it all came out just fine and I only had to spend two and a half days in the hospital.  My only real pain afterward was the bills that started rolling in.  I think I received a bill from every doctor within 10 miles of the hospital.

But then November rolled around and more problems came along.  As I started feeling better, our beloved Fritz, a Dachshund we adopted from the local pound, started feeling poorly.  We took him for several visits to the veterinarian to find out what was wrong, but an ultrasound revealed the worst fears we had.  He had cancer of the liver.  In the thirteen years he was with us, he had been through so much.  He had survived several surgeries to remove stones in his bladder and various cysts here and there too.  In the last three years he became totally blind, but he did really well with it because he had learned his way around the house and was always with us.  But this cancerous tumor was something he couldn't fight and we knew time was running out and running out fast.  Two weeks after the diagnosis, old and weak, he lost his fight.  With us surrounding him with all the love we could muster, he drew his last breath and left us for good.  Truthfully, it was one of the toughest moments in my entire adult life. And four months later, it is still hard and not a day goes by when I don't think of him.  I plan to post more on him later.

The Christmas holidays rolled around on time, and while I had finished everything I needed to do (including shopping and cooking)..I started feeling really worn down on Christmas Eve.  Thinking that I was just physically and mentally tired from the holiday rush, I finished what I needed to do and had dinner that night with my family at my parent's home.  After dinner, I went back to my own home and was so tired that I just couldn't hold my head up so I went to bed.  You guessed it!  Just a few hours later, I was really, really sick.  I'll spare you the gory details, but it turned out to be a really nasty case of the flu.  I finally got to see my family doctor on the day after Christmas (being a cheapskate, I wasn't going to fork out $500+ for an emergency room visit) and one shot and two bottles of medicine later, I finally started to feel better. So much better that I stayed up on New Year's Eve to watch 2011 leave for good.  It was a really bad year and I'm glad it is gone forever.

I'll spare you January and February of this year other than to say they were pretty good months overall.  And March has been pretty darn good too.  My area of North Carolina was in spring weather way before it arrived officially on the calendar.  Luckily all four of my bee colonies survived the winter although I probably wasn't as attentive to them last fall as I should have been.  Over the last month, hardly a day goes by that I don't see a flurry of bees in front of each hive although one of them appears to be weaker than the rest.  I plan to spend some time over the next few days with them and see what is going on internally.  But as you can see from the picture, my girls are definitely taking advantage of the nice warm days of spring.  

So yes friends, I'm back.  I plan to try to post regularly and let you know what is happening with me and the bees at our humble apiary in the Triad area of North Carolina.  And once again, thanks to everyone who sent a message to check and see if I'm still around.  It means so much to know that even though I haven't met many of you personally, you still care.  Beekeepers are like that!   We're a special lot!

Bee good!

-Mark

SNOW! My area gets the first snowfall for the fall/winter season of 2010-2011!

Its the beginning of December, but Santa Claus would be proud of the first snowfall for the fall and winter of 2010-2011. And hey, according to the calendar, its not officially winter yet!  The snow started around 2 o'clock on Saturday afternoon with huge flakes falling, then light snow, and then back to huge flakes.  Throw in a light sprinkling of some sleet too and we got a nice wintry mix.  As you can see though, the concrete and asphalt were warm enough to not cause problems until night fell, but the roads started getting slushy late in the evening.

North Carolina is the home to the University of North Carolina Tarheels, the North Carolina State University Wolfpack, the Wake Forest University Demon Deacons and the Duke University Blue Devils.  Since this bird house is Duke blue, it would only be appropriate that a blue jay reside there in the warm summer months!




A sleeping Dogwood tree.  This is a beautiful tree that borders my property and is covered with dark pink flowers in the late spring in time for Easter.  Snow flakes covered every limb!







One of several camellia bushes in my yard.  Mind you, they're all covered by snow now, but they're loaded with buds for the spring of 2011!  I don't think that bees are attracted to camellia flowers because I've never noticed them on mine.  But my neighbors keep beautifully landscaped yards so they have plenty of other flowers to choose from!    




No album of a snowfall would be complete without a snapshot of my bee hives.  Yes the girls are all snug as bugs inside their hives.  But as you can see, the snow covered up the entrances to all three.  While it sometimes acts as an insulation barrier to keep those icy winter winds out, it also keeps the bees from going out when temperatures rise.



To help the ladies, I opened up their entrances so they wouldn't have to wait for Mother Nature to do it for them.  Now they can quickly and discreetly go outside to do their business when nature calls.  By the way, the bees in the yellow hive are still taking 2:2 syrup from the Boardman feeder.




The snowfall of December 4th covered everything.  It was truly beautiful.  And thank goodness it happened early enough in the day that everyone could enjoy it.  With the Sunday temperatures forecast to be sunny and in the 40s range, you will never know that a snow event even happened here.  But with photos, we'll always have our memories.  Hope you enjoyed it as much as I did!

A "sting" operation with a colony of bees and a North Carolina deputy sheriff!

(Wake County, North Carolina): A sheriff's deputy was trapped in his car for three hours as tens of thousands of honeybees swarmed his vehicle.

Wake County deputy sheriff, Brandon Jenkins, answered a distress call of a disabled truck in the middle of the night. The vehicle was pulling a trailer of honeybee hives. As he helped load some of the broken boxes of bees back on the truck, they began to get irritable.

Jenkins, who took refuge in his squad car, could only watch as about 50,000 of the stingers swarmed over it. Wake County sheriff's spokeswoman Phyllis Stevens said: "They were confused, without their queen, they swarmed the police car probably because that was the biggest thing around that they could find."

The deputy even had to resort to deadly force when a few of the intruders got inside. "It was more or less self-defense," he said. " There were a couple of bees in my personal space, my comfort zone, and I just wanted to get them out."

Jennifer Keller, a beekeeping expert from North Carolina State University, was called to help and sprayed sugar water on the insects so they would lick each other and regroup, making it easier for the insects to be returned to their hives.

"I had never seen anything quite like that," Keller said. "The bees had nowhere to go. I guess they used the car as a resting spot ... I got one sting. I struck a bee, so it was my own fault."

Wake County surrounds Raleigh, the state capital of North Carolina.

Merry Christmas to all...and to all...a good night!

I want to take this time to wish everyone the Merriest Christmas ever! And may your 2010 be the most prosperous year in so many ways.

When I started beekeeping this past summer, I planned it as a small hobby..something I could do to help the dying bee population..and entertain myself as well. Little did I know that I would be blogging about my experiences, and all the while, meeting some of the nicest people around the world who share my love for this fascinating hobby. 

Whether across my state of North Carolina, this great country, and in distant lands like Ireland, England, and even Greece...through the Internet...I've met some of the greatest people around.

When I've been perplexed by the behavior of my bees (who just happens to be a lot smarter than me) or gushing over some success I've experienced, you all have been here for me to share the glory or offer your help. I've learned that you don't have to have people with you in the physical sense...friends are everywhere...across town, in the next county, or maybe thousands of mile away. Friends are friends wherever they are. 

With that, I would like to thank you for your friendship and your support. At this festive time of year, when we're feasting and opening presents and spending time with our family and friends...I'll think of you all, my fellow beekeeping friends. Wherever you are, I'll think of you and send my warmest wishes for peace and joy in your lives.

On behalf of my colony of busy bees, I wish you and your family a Merry Christmas...and may 2010 be your best year ever!

Happy holidays to all!

Mark

Yes, Virginia! There is a Santa Claus...and bears in Rockingham County!

This story is from this morning's News & Record (Greensboro, NC). It is about a mama bear and her three cubs (pictured to the left...yes, that's some of them) that scampered up a tree over the weekend in Madison, which is in the western section of my county. Reason they were there? Oh...I don't know...could it be...HONEY? Read on. By the way, I'm glad that I'm a city beekeeper!

OH POOH! NO HONEY FOR THESE BEARS!

The family of bears likely came looking for honey but instead found themselves up a tree, held hostage by neighbors near Old Wagon Trail.



The first sightings of the bear and three cubs came about dusk Sunday, and by Monday morning, they had an audience.


But by 1 p.m., the bears had enough of the show and decided to bid their temporary refuge goodbye.


“I guess they decided to take a chance and run,” said Josh Brim, who lives on Old Wagon Trail.


The Rockingham County Sheriff’s Office said it began receiving calls about the bears Sunday evening. Sheriff’s office spokesman Dean Venable said deputies, animal control and wildlife officers took a look at the bears but hoped they would come down on their own.


When the bears didn’t, the officers returned Monday to see what could be done to coax them.


“It’s not uncommon to see a bear in some of our rural areas,” Venable said. “We’ve lost a lot of our timberland, and they’re coming in to hunt food.”


The area where the bears were found is rural, located off U.S. 311. Old Wagon Trail is a gravel road with just a few homes.


The bears climbed up trees on the property of DeWitt and Darlene Brown. The couple thinks mama bear may have smelled honey for her cubs.


DeWitt Brown raises bees and said bears will “tear your hives all to pieces.”


Darlene Brown thinks the bears’ quest for food was derailed by the barking of her dogs, a black lab and a collie.


The dogs’ lot is next to the trees where the bears sought refuge. Had it not been for them, Darlene Brown guesses, the bears would have had a field day with her husband’s hives.


The sheriff’s office reported seeing a mom and two cubs, but the Browns and Brim said a third cub was in a second tree.


In the end, Sheriff Sam Page said it only took giving the bears a little space — and quiet — to get them to descend the trees.


The barking dogs were moved, and someone operating machinery nearby was told to turn it off, he said. Onlookers were kept back as much as possible.


DeWitt Brown said he’s not worried about the mom and cubs coming after his honey again.


“She’s had so much excitement,” he said. “I think she’s gone from here.”

Greetings from Coastal Carolina, USA! Wish you were here!

Greetings all! This is Mark, coming to you from beautiful, scenic Oak Island, North Carolina! 

The vacation is coming along...swimmingly (sorry..couldn't help it) although it was rainy all day Monday. It would rain, clear off, then rain some more. During one of the clearing spells, I got out on the beach -- thinking there wasn't that many strong UV rays. WRONG! My face looks like a beet, but I know that once it sinks in, I'll be all nice and golden brown. And you should have seen me trying to cook Italian chicken on the grill in the rain. It wasn't a pretty site..but the food was fabulous if I do say so myself. A crowd pleaser for sure!

I snapped this picture with my cell phone just this morning. It looks really cloudy, but the clouds are leaving and the weather forecast calls for mostly sunny the rest of the week. With a nice sunblock lotion in hand, I plan to get out and enjoy the beachfront with some of my good friends from home who are here for the week too.

Two huge cargo ships were anchored off the coast in front of our cottage all day yesterday, but they steamed off at midnight last night -- who knows where they were going. And this morning, while drinking coffee and enjoying the roar of the waves from our deck, we watched porpoises playing not far from shore. Least I think they were porpoises. I've been a little suspicious of the ocean and things with large, upright fins ever since I saw "Jaws" the first time. Maybe this would be a good day to just lay on the beach?

Anyway, I've been keeping up with the blogs since I have WiFi, and I see that you all are staying busy with your colonies. Although I'm not wishing my vacation away, I'm looking forward to checking on my girls when I get home. Hopefully they've been busy getting ready for the fall while I've been away.

Bee good, everybody! And talk soon!

ADDENDUM: My Dad called on Tuesday afternoon after they got back home to Reidsville from the beach. He checked around the house and walked down to the hive. He said they were flying in and out of the entrance like the weekend at a busy airport. I feel better already! I'll expect good things in the hive when I get home on Sunday.   

Triple-S: Sand, Sun, and Surf! Yes, I'm officially on vacation!

By the time you read this, I should be soaking up the sun's rays at beautiful Oak Island, North Carolina! Situated between Wilmington and Myrtle Beach, Oak Island is a small family beach...a place you can relax and have fun without the crowds, but you're close enough to go hang out in Myrtle Beach or Wilmington (both about 45-minutes away) and then go back to your own world of peace and quiet. My parents bought their first piece of property there when I was three years old, so needless to say, its like my second home. Maybe one of these days I'll end up living there for good and tending my bees.

Last year while on vacation there, the island took a hit from tropical storm Hanna (downgraded from a hurricane by that time). We didn't evacuate because they didn't make us...it was just a tropical storm, but if they had forced an evacuation because of a hurricane, I would have gladly packed up and left. The maximum winds were 60-70 miles per hour, and we did lose the lights for about an hour. Other than some rocking of the house, a few shingles blowing off a house across the street, and sand washing over the street, it did very little damage to the island. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we won't have to face that again this year.

The picture to the left was made by me at 6:00am the morning Hanna hit. The heavy winds had died down to just heavy gusts, but you can see that the water was extremely rough. Besides three television stations broadcasting live, and a police cruiser in the area, I was the only person out on the beach. I was soaking wet because of the ocean spray, and I also got sand blasted near the dunes. But it was amazing to me that there was no major damage to the land or to houses around us. As you can see, the Ocean Crest Pier survived without a board out of place.

Take a look beyond the pier at the clearing in the clouds. Just six hours beyond this -- at noon -- there wasn't a cloud in the sky and a group of young guys were out "hanging ten" on their surf and boogie boards. It was almost like the storm never happened. The worst part about it was that we lost cellular service, AT&T was out, and my folks went into a tailspin. But I finally got through to let them know that everything was fine and that my vacation would continue along. And it did -- drama free -- the rest of that week. 

And here I am -- doing what I said I was going to do -- finishing out my 2008 vacation. This was made the day before it ended. Yeah, I'm smiling, but I knew I would miss the beach like always.

But you know, there's something about coming back home too. Once I see my house, I'm always glad to be back. And I'm sure that as much as I love the coast, I'll get that feeling when I see my house on September 13th. Old habits die hard.

By the way, I will have my laptop with me and I'll be check my email and blog so I'll be in touch while I'm vacationing. Thank goodness for WiFi!

Take care and have a fun and safe Labor Day holiday weekend (to the American readers of my blog).      

Good News: I found my queen and added some brood!

Well friends, I have some really great news in light of the total disaster I've experienced with my three pound package of bees from Georgia. This had been a really rocky week, but what I found in my hive today made me feel much better.

As I've mentioned before, my colony started out rather small. They had been through a lot before they arrived here, stressed from heat and poor packaging, coated in sugar syrup in transit, a dead queen, bounced around, etc. It was really nasty and heartbreaking. It was so bad that I was told by an experienced beekeeper here that I should just let them go. But not one to accept failure so easily, I decided to hang on to them and see if I could keep them going and bring them back.

If I had waited for a new queen from Georgia, from the same guy who promised to "make it right" several times after that bee package disaster, every single bee I have would be dead or gone by now. After getting bad vibes about this operation, I decided to try to find something locally..and fast...so I began my search on the Internet for local dealers.

Busy Bee Apiaries to the rescue! Busy Bee is located in Carrboro, North Carolina, and when I called, Shelley told me they had Minnesota Hygienic queens for sale, and if I wanted to drive down, I could pick one up that morning. I then spoke with Betsy who told me that she would go out to the bee yard and get one and it would be waiting for me when I got there.

Carrboro is only an hour away, so I headed east for the apiary (with plans to stop and pick up some pork barbecue at Smithfield's Chicken and Barbecue on the way home...its GREAT eastern style North Carolina barbecue). When I got there, sure enough, my marked queen was there and she was healthy and buzzing up a storm with her attendants. I had the chance to meet Betsy and Shelley who are super nice, and it was great getting to meet them.

I got back home, put my queen cage in the hive (and yes, had some barbecue later) and left my hive alone for five days. Now mind you, this colony had been without a queen for almost a week (I hung the dead queen cage in the hive to keep them there since they could still smell her). But within two minutes, they were working on the candy stopper on the new queen's cage to release her.

Time passed and on the fifth day, I opened the hive again, and as much as I looked, I could not find my new queen. I looked and looked but could not find her long body and green dot. My heart sank, I figured she may have packed her attendants and hit the road -- but then I noticed something. In the comb that the colony had already drawn, I saw these tiny white specks, sitting upright, so I knew she was laying -- and she was laying in a consistent pattern. I knew from what I read and had been told by other beekeepers that I had a good queen.

It had been two weeks and I started thinking about something that Betsy at Busy Bee told me, that if I could find some, I should add some brood to beef up my hive since the colony is so small. It was a great idea, so I made the call and spoke to Jack, the owner, who told me he would sell some frames if I wanted them and that I could pick them up on Friday.

So Friday came and I made the trip to Carrboro. Betsy and Shelley brought me two great looking frames of capped brood which I put in an empty hive body in the back of my Xterra and started for home. They didn't charge me for the 20 or so persistent bees that just couldn't leave the frames! Needless to say, it was an interesting ride with them buzzing inside my Xterra while I'm driving on Interstate 40/85 and heading for home. Heck, they even stayed inside the truck while I stopped by Smithfield's Chicken and Barbecue for barbecue to go!

I made it home and and got into the hive -- and when I pulled the third frame from the super, there she was -- my proud queen! And on top of that, I was really excited when I found larvae and new eggs in the comb, so my queen is working away and keeping the hive going. I added the two frames of brood to my hive, added more syrup, removed the entrance reducer altogether (it is supposed to be 98 degrees and humid for the next few days) -- then I closed things out. And when I got cleaned up and put my tools away, I looked over my hive and the girls were flying in and out like crazy. So this was a great day for sure!

After the tragic experience I've had with my first colony of bees, it has been tough to keep positive about my new hobby. But I have to admit, finding good people like Betsy and Shelley and Jack at Busy Bee Apiaries, who really do care about beekeepers, and believe in helping people, I feel excited about the prospects for this hive. I know they're in business, but I really appreciate them being so nice and willing to go the extra mile to help if they can.

Thanks, Busy Bee! Have no fear, I'll be back. You have a repeat customer. Plus it gives me the chance to get some of that eastern style barbecue when I come down your way!