As a hobby bee keeper try to do without any. Most, if not all larger scale bee keepers here treat them with allot of chemicals! Why?? I only guess because they can simply not monitor all 1000 plus hives as close as I can do with less then 10 hives. It's their livelihood and don't want to risk high loss. That's why I believe my honey is much better then any in the store. It's worth every penny,..even if double in price. Also because my honey/source comes from mostly wild flowers, bees are far away from huge, one sided nectar source like canola etc. For about 20 years or so, I plant lots of trees & shrubs to provide even more flavor to the honey. Don't let the combs get too old, 3 or 4 years max. give them some new one's in the middle for brood every year. I know of a smaller commercial bee keeper who doesn't use antibiotic, he's the only one around here who can sell he's honey to Germany. I'm trying to follow he's advise,...so far I cut down in treatment for mites,..didn't treat all of last year, fall check was low in mite no treatment and all are thriving, I'll have to check now and decide. You can put some shallow combs in your deep,..they build/extend the frame with drone comb preferred by mites, cut them away. I don't do any antibiotic in spring, a little in fall with Fumagilin because bees are locked up most of the time due to cold temp. from Oct. to April. With new packages you should get away with no treatement for mites for at least one or two season,..again you need to check.

Hi Karri, I haven't been growing Hoyas for very long , but I will note a few things that work for me ,in my area. All of them live outside ,hanging on shepherds hooks, hanging off the lattice fence, or on a bench. A large carnosa is on a plantstand , and there are some others on hooks in the screened porch. I don't fertilize in winter, and I keep the soil dryer at this time , with the exception of multiflora. I can't speak for hoyas grown as houseplants or in a greenhouse , but mine are not actively growing right now. When we have nighttime temperatures below 50* F , I bring them into the garage or house. The carnosa varieties can stand a little colder. I really don't mind the effort of moving them, and I have never noticed any 'objections' from the plants about being moved around. Last Sept. these Hoyas spent quite a number of days neglected in the garage , or in a stuffy house, ( no power for 9 days, then no power for 7 days ) due to the hurricanes. Growing and flowering continued as if nothing happened. I use Miracle Gro and alaskan fish fertilizer. I don't recommend the latter, for houseplants ! I can't answer your question properly , about how long for flowering. There are too many variables. I have had young rooted cuttings flower, ( longifolia, nummulariodes, multiflora ) and my largest carnosa ,which is on a plant stand has never flowered. This would likely be my fault because it was overpotted one year ago and I didn't correct this when it was small and easy to handle . Now it is all over the trellis and on the floor of the screened in porch. I asked my husband if he would please put it high up in one of the oak trees , this Spring. I am fortunate to live in a climate where I have this option. You might want to hang your Hoya outside, during the warm months. They love humidity. Be careful of direct afternoon sun. Mine get just morning, late day sun , or dappled sunlight. We can buy bags or loose sq. yards of rich well draining potting mix, at our local nursery. You can see and feel the fine bark bits in it. I love the smell of it and it doesn't rot. Good luck, Florajilly

Glad you've joined us, gayled, welcome to the NE forum! My DH and I are retired. We work together in the gardens... our spring techniques are pretty simple. 1. Clean up dead leaves and foliage and weed underneath plants... but not as early as we'd like this year. Probably not until April .... if we get more snow this week. 2. One of our earliest tasks every spring.... amend the soil. I think that's the best thing you can do for the gardens. We get free compost from our town.... dig it and take it. We've done this for the last eight years and it's really helped improve the gardens. While it's not exactly "organic" because the compost is made from garden waste that people bag and the city picks up, "free" makes it worthwhile. 3. We like to use bark mulch and I use cocoa mulch in a few special areas, but this has gotten expensive as our gardens have grown. We've found that the compost works like mulch by breaking down over the season. So we mulch every other year. 3. Fertilize? No, not even our roses. I think good soil is better than chemical applications. I learned about composting from my mother who was a wonderful gardener. Mom collected coffee grounds in one container (for her Mt. Laurels and rhododendrons) and egg shells & other wastes that she'd spread around her flower beds. Over 40 years of this gave her a yard with deep, dark soil and lots of worms. 4. My DH put in an irrigation system several years ago and he checks this early in the spring. We have a long yard with gardens down one side and around a garden shed. The days of dragging the hose around are gone for us. Molie

I get a lot of cat food donated to me. One of the reasons is I took in several cats from the humane society that were considered unadoptable. I also get cat food donated to me for the wildlife. If I buy canned food, I buy Fancy Feast Classic. I do feed cat food with gravy but I don't like it. One of the reasons, if I am feeding a large number of cats, the food with gravy doesn't fall out of the can as neatly as the food that is without gravy. You have to take a spoon and scrape some of it out. If I am opening 50 cans...that takes too long. Plus, it gives some cats diarrhea, or at least, loose stools. I always have a few hundred cans of cat food here at any one time, so I only buy some of the Classic if I am feeding one of my inside cats and I don't have any. However, it is rare that I have to buy it. Every morning and every evening all the cats get dry food. If the outside cats get canned food, it depends on how much time I have that I can open the cans. I got several cases of Sheba donated to me....and it was all like Classic....came out in a lump. Another food I like is Wellness and I get some of that sometimes. Here is a picture of inside my feed room. This is all cat food, except for the cases of food in the cardboard boxes in the corner....that is a dog food, but the possums like it. It also doesn't have gravy, and comes out in a nice block that I can chop up for them. I also get every kind of prescription diet you can think of too.