Birds and Bees Archives - Creative Simple Living

white rooster coming out of a hen house through an automatic chicken door

Are Automatic Chicken Doors Worth It?

We’ve been keeping chickens for about 15 years and over the years I’ve thought about getting an automatic chicken coop door. But, honestly, it didn’t …

image of a jar of honey with a honey dipper being pulled out

Using Honey for Allergies – breaking down the evidence

As a family who keeps bees I’m often asked about using honey for allergies – mainly, does it work? The simple answer is “it depends.” …

Our first honey harvest of the year. We harvest from both a top bar hive and two Langsthroth hives. We got about 6 gallons of honey plus some honey comb.

Spring Honey Harvest

On Monday, Gabriel woke up and said, “Today is the day to check the bee hives.” We’ve had so much rain that there really hasn’t …

Image of a wooden beehive with several bees on and around it. A sign on the hive reads

What’s Up With the Bees?

The bees are doing so much better this year than they did last year. I’m chalking it up to cooler weather and some rain. Also, …

A large swarm of bees clustered together on a surface. Overlay text reads,

Relocating Bees

In case you don’t already know, Gabriel is our resident beekeeper. He’s 16 and is building quite a business for himself. It’s really exciting to …

A close-up of a chicken with black and white feathers standing near a dish. Text on a pink background reads,

Cold Weather Animal Care

I am taking part in a posting series related to the topic of “Homesteading in the Winter.” Each Thursday there will be a new post …

A group of chickens, including brown and black ones, are gathered on a dirt surface. A red building is visible in the background.

chicken update

One of the things that was on my summer to do list was finish painting the chicken house that we expanded. We had to expand …

A wooden table filled with various cooking items: a pot of fried food, a strainer with liquid, a colander, an empty metal bowl, and a spice container. Kitchen utensils are scattered around, suggesting a cooking process is underway.

Bees {an update}

We lost one hive over the winter to carpenter ants and we made plans this spring to order packaged bees to replace it and replace a …

look what the stork brought

You might remember that a few weeks ago I mentioned that a friend from church brought over some eggs for out incubator. Well, Friday …

Top view of an egg incubator containing rows of white and brown eggs. The incubator has a transparent cover with a temperature gauge and control buttons visible on the surface.

weekend blessings

Last night as we were playing a game of Spades, a friend from church called and asked Carl if we wanted some fertile eggs. Really? …