Bees: First Full Inspection

Last time, I wrote about checking for the release of the queen. While that was technically an inspection, I really didn't do anything to the frames other than slide them apart and push them back together again. Now that two weeks (May 20th) had passed, it was time to check and see how they were settling in to their new home.

When I did the queen check, I lit the smoker, got a coal bed and shoved in a fist full of damp leaves. Once it was going, I got some smoke, but it was kind of a pain. I happened to have some smoker fuel that I got as a gift from my loving wife, so I decided I would try that. This stuff looks like a packed cylinder of dryer lint. Supposedly it is cotton, but when it burned, it smelled like hemp. It didn't come with any instructions, so I began the process of building a coal bed. Unfortunately, it rained heavily the previous night so all the various twigs and sticks were wet. After a total failure to get the wood to light, I grabbed some finish wood scraps, split it into "twigs" and got the fire going in no time. The wood was so dry, however, that I got it going a little too well. I managed to keep from singing my eyebrows... just barely.

Once the coal bed was in place, I broke off a chunk of this fuel and dropped it in. Immediately, the smell of concerts (pot) filled my nose. As I said, supposedly this stuff is cotton, but it sure didn't smell like cotton. I was really unimpressed. I got even less smoke than the damp leaves and it took longer and it cost money and the smoke was warm instead of cool like it should be. After the inspection, I found something that said you just drop the whole cylinder in and light the top. I guess I'll try that next time. If it doesn't work, I guess refusing to rake leaves will finally pay off.

I gave a small amount of smoke to the entrance, plus under the inner and outer covers. I set the smoker down behind me and went to work. I carefully removed the outer cover and placed it on the ground. The first thing I noticed was that the bees decided to build burr comb in the hole in the inner cover. I'm guessing that is because their upper entrance is close and they just treated it like empty space. I didn't really care until I realized that the wax sealed the inner cover to the two center frames. Using my hive tool, I gently pushed the frames apart from the cover, hoping not to squish bees and make them angry. After removing the inner cover, I held it over the hive, carefully inspecting the bees on it to ensure none of them were the queen. I placed the inner cover on top of the outer cover at a 45 degree bias. Now that this was done, the real inspection could begin.

The first frame was relatively uninteresting. They hadn't touched it. There were probably only 10 bees on it total. Needless to say, the queen was not on this frame. To give myself space to work, I placed this frame on the inner cover. The next frame was much more impressive. It was almost entirely drawn out with comb.

The second frame mostly drawn out.

The next frame was jam packed with nectar (sugar syrup?) and pollen. It is pretty impressive. I didn't even notice them bringing pollen in to the hive until my wife pointed it out. Apparently, they have been busy as, well, bees. In the picture, below, you can see the pollen and nectar. I'm not sure where the red pollen came from. I watched them for about 20 minutes one day and saw them bring in bright yellow, light yellow, tan, and gray pollen. I'm also not sure where they are getting it from. I haven't seen a single bee on my blueberries, apples or pear tree which are all in full bloom.

Good stores of pollen and nectar.

When I pulled the next frame, I was shocked. I read that the queen would take a few days to be released and a few more days or even a week to start laying eggs. I figured I might see some eggs or even some larvae. I never figured I would see capped brood. Worker bees are capped around day 9 or 10. That means, worst (best) case scenario is that those eggs were laid four days after installing the package. There are also some almost-ready-to-be-capped larvae in the surrounding cells. Generally speaking, this seems like a good laying pattern to my untrained eye.

Capped brood.

So far, this inspection was going well. I had seen evidence of a good, strong starter colony. What I was really looking for was newly laid eggs or the queen herself. Ideally, I wanted to see both. Capped brood is a good sign, but all that really means is that 10 days earlier some bee was laying eggs. Well, on the next frame, I got one of those things. Almost every cell of both sides of the next frame had a single egg at the bottom of the cell. That means that I have a good, laying queen in the hive. I do not have a picture, however because a bee egg is about the size of a single grain of salt. I put the frame of eggs back and pulled out the next frame. One side was loaded with more eggs. As I flip the other side over, the queen is hanging out, just walking around looking for a good place to lay. She was easy to spot because I paid the extra couple bucks to have her marked. She was not that easy, however, for my wife to photograph.

Spot the queen. Look for the dot.

The next frame was as drawn out as the second frame on the other end. I didn't even bother to look at the last frame, figuring that bees build from the center towards the outside so there would likely be no difference between it and the first frame. If this were a 10-frame deep hive body which was always the "industry" standard, the bees would have drawn out 4 frames out of 10. This being an 8-frame medium hive, they were close to the 80% rule. Actually, "rule" is too strong a word. The rule I have seen says to add another box when the bees have drawn 7-10 frames of foundation out. My current plan is to inspect the hive every two weeks. Given that they were able to draw out 6+ frames in 14 days, they should have the remaining two drawn in 2 days or so. So, I quickly ran in the house, grabbed the second medium box with frames of foundation and added it on top. In the first box, I alternated between pure wax with vertical wires and black, wax coated plastic. The bees didn't seem to care which was which, so I just filled the second box with the pre-assembled black foundation. Hopefully, when I inspect the hive on the first weekend of June, they will have another 6 frames drawn out. If they do, theoretically, Father's Day weekend should be the point when I add another box.

Bees: Checking the queen

I read... A lot. I have a passion for knowledge. As such, doing new things give me a chance to learn all the different perspectives and ideas and theories around them. With "rural" things, there are overwhelming numbers of differing ideas. People are told something by someone who has always done it that way. It's amazing that there are so many different solutions.

The instructions that come with the package state explicitly that you should not disturb the bees for 6 full days after installation. I've read things that suggest 7-10 days is the appropriate length of time. I've also read things that suggest that you should release the queen immediately. The logic behind this last one suggests that, the bees will likely not kill the queen and if they do, you can just get another one.

The idea that made the most sense to me was to check for release after 4 days. That gives the bees the opportunity to get accustomed to the queen but not as much time to build insane amounts of burr comb to fill the extra space left by the cage. That was my plan. Of course, I forgot to tell the weather what my plan was.

The day I got the bees was beautiful, sunny and warm. The following 5 days were cold and windy and changed between showers and downpours. On day 6 (May 12th) it was sunny, although a little breezy. I happened to get home a little early from work and my wife had the kids at a playground. The bees were flying so I figured it was fine to open the hive even though all advice says never open the hive on a windy day.

I lit the smoker following the instructions in a book. I struggled to get it lit, keep it lit and when I finally did get it lit, there was very little smoke. What I learned is that I should rely on my instincts and skills instead of the book. The issue is that the book is written from someone who needs the smoker to stay lit all day while inspecting dozens or even hundreds of hives. I needed to inspect my single hive. I had copious amounts of billowing cool white smoke when trying to get a solid coal bed.

As it turned out, I didn't even need the smoke. These bees are ridiculously gentle. The bees didn't care in the slightest that a giant hand tore the roof off there home and reached in and stole there furniture. I know I would be pissed. I slid the frames apart slightly, removed the queen cage. Sure enough, she was free. I didn't want to risk too much disturbance to the hive, so I pushed the frames back together and put the inner cover back on. It was a little challenging, but I only squished one bee when I put the outer cover on. All in all, I would consider this a successful endeavor. Next time, I'll detail my first full inspection with more pictures. I didn't get any pictures by myself, but I'll include a picture of bee activity on the day after installation (May 7th).

The bees get adjusted to their new home and start foraging.

Bees: Package install

Well, I intended to post right when I received the bees. I intended to take lots of pics before, during and after the installation. I had nothing but the best of intentions. That said, good intentions and a nickle aren't even worth a nickle. What I have now is a story about my bees which may be of interest to someone other than me.

I ordered my bees back in January while we were on vacation in Puerto Rico. After a couple weeks, I got an e-mail with an estimated ship date of May 2nd. Now, maybe it's just my expectations are skewed by modern online ordering, but I have to say I was a little concerned when May 2nd rolled around and I didn't get a shipping confirmation. I was a little more concerned on May 3rd and I was downright nervous on May 4th. When buying bees, the earlier you order, the better your chances. If something went wrong and I got no bees, I would have had to wait until next Spring. I sent an e-mail to the company I ordered from and got a very pleasant reply which instilled no confidence in me. Here is the reply:

Things have been on schedule so you should expect them by the end of the
week.

Hope you have a Great Season!

It seemed to me that the guy who took my order had no knowledge of the guy shipping my order. As it turns out, the guy who replied to my e-mail is just a middleman. I found this out when my bees showed up on May 6th from Rossman Apiaries. I picked them up from the post office at lunch time and brought them home. Here is where I would have shown you the awesome photo of 3 lbs. of (roughly 10000) bees looks like in a tiny screened box. No idea why I didn't take a photo.

I sprayed them with a light spray of water and put them in my dark office. I read some advice that said to spray them with sugar syrup. Then I read some counter advice that pointed out that 1) they have a big can of syrup; and 2) too much syrup will kill bees but water will do no harm to them and will accomplish the same thing. After I got home from work, I got everything ready to do the install. What did I need to install them? Well, really just my hands, a spray bottle, a nail and a hive tool. I probably could have used a belt or some better fitting pants, but that was mostly to keep the neighbors from getting a crack shot when I bent over.

Bees are generally docile when in a package. I spritzed them with a little water before opening the package, but that was mostly to reduce the number of bees flying. They steps are as follows:

• Spritz the bees with water from a new spray bottle
• Use the hive tool to pry off the package cover
• Use fingernails and the hive tool to get the can of syrup and the queen cage out
• Immediately recover the package with the pried off cover
• Use the nail to pry out the cork out of the candy end of the cage
• Note: Don't try to use your hive tool to get the cork out. It will just break and you will say, "Why didn't the instructions say to use a pen or a nail or something." Then, when you go back to the instructions to make sure you did things right, you will realize that it did say to use a nail.
• Suspend or wedge the queen cage in such a way that the bees can gain access to the screen side of the cage. This is probably the most important, most critical step to make sure you do correctly. I wasn't really paying attention and faced it towards the foundation. Fortunately, I didn't press the frames super tight together, and since it was new foundation, the workers could get to the screen to feed the queen.
• Smack the package on the ground a couple times, pull the cover off and start pouring/shaking up and down and side to side so that the bees are falling into the hive between the frames. Keep shaking, pouring and smacking the package until you get most of the bees out. At this point, the bees are free to do what they want. Some will start flying. Most will just settle down among the frames or crawl around on the frame tops. That said, this is roughly 10000 bees. There were probably a couple hundred bees flying. Many were landing on my arms, legs, back, hair, and one curious bee decided my aforementioned butt crack was a good landing place.
• After the bees have settled in the frames a bit, grab the inner cover and slide it on so that the bees get the idea that they should move.
• Put on the outer cover, making sure to slide it back to cover the notch which will eventually be their upper entrance.
• Sit on the grass next to them and watch them fly.

That's pretty much all there is to it. You need to provide them some sugar water for food until they get established. Most sources suggest a 1:1 ratio of sugar to water in the Spring. I had intended (there's that word again) to get a hive top feeder but read a few things that gave me pause and then I just forgot about it. I had a Boardman feeder, which is essentially a small wooden box which hold a mason jar with tiny holes in the lid. With a new package, you need to use an entrance reducer so the bees have less space to protect. You can't use a Boardman feeder with a regular entrance reducer, so I (really, my wife) just put the feeder next to the hive.

I didn't get stung at all installing the bees. In fact, my four year old who was interested in watching didn't get stung either. As uncertain as I was about what I had to do, the only mistake I made was facing the queen cage screen towards the foundation. And as it turned out, that really wasn't an issue, although I did have to open the hive back up the next morning to make sure everything was alright.

The closed up hive and empty package at the end of the install.