Bees: Inspection - 04 June 2007

At four weeks after installation, it was time to do another inspection. I gathered my stuff together to start working. Right off the bat, I learned something. I really need to put a shelf in my shed with all the stuff (newspaper, dry kindling, matches, smoker fuel, smoker, and hive tool) I need for an inspection. It took me 10 minutes just to get ready to begin because I had to walk back and forth and in and out numerous times. Organization is key.

I am still having some trouble getting the smoker started. My fire-starting has always been in open or semi-open places like pits or fireplaces or grills. Starting a fire and keeping it lit at the bottom of a stainless steel tube is tough. It's made even more difficult when you consider our typical windy conditions. One good breeze across the top of the open smoker snuffs the fire quicker than water. I think I am going to preset the smoker up with a layer of paper, twigs, sticks, and slightly thicker sticks now, so it's ready for next time. That should eliminate the struggle to find dry stuff of appropriate size.Also, I'm still not confident that the smoker fuel is worth much of anything. It does burn smokey, but I'm not sure how it's better than leaves or grass or shavings or whatnot. Whatever the case, I got the smoker going eventually. I found that a terracotta flower pot saucer with some kids play sand in the bottom makes a great hot plate for the smoker. It fit perfectly inside and was stable and secure and didn't burn the grass or table.

I began, like always* by removing the outer and inner covers. checked for the unlikely scenario of the queen being on either cover. I wasn't exactly sure what to expect for drawn comb. I've read accounts where people add a second box, only to find that the bees have done nothing after a couple weeks. The first frame I pulled was totally empty. The second frame, however, was full of bees, larvae and capped brood. By the fourth frame, I convinced my father to come closer to see a frame of baby bees and larvae, when who should pop over the frame but her royal highness, the queen. Apparently, I missed her on the first side, which offended her royal sensibilities. She gave me a second chance to notice though, and I couldn't be happier with her grace and charm (and egg laying).

The queen sporting her paint.

Frame after frame of this inspection showed a really prolific queen laying as fast as she can. They had a bit of nectar and pollen, although little was capped. I can only guess that they are using it almost as fast as they can bring it in. Given what my allergies are doing, I would have expected more pollen. One problematic issue that I found was that they were building bridge comb between the top and bottom frames. The last inspection showed the same thing, except that there was only 1 box at that point. I can only think that there is some impetus which I can't see that tells them they need to close the gap between the top center frame of the bottom box and whatever is above it. Unfortunately, there was capped brood in this bridge comb which tore open when I pulled out the middle frame. I had only intended to inspect the top box of frames, but that meant that I had to pull the box and scrape that comb off to prevent it from becoming a problem later.

The bridge comb between the top and bottom frames.

Two different sized bee larvae which fell out of the scraped comb. Looks like good eating... for the chickens.

The bees had drawn out five out of the eight frames in the new box. In the lower box, they still hadn't touched the outer most frames though. I swapped the lower box outer frames with its neighbor. Hopefully, with drawn comb on either side, the bees will feel compelled to draw out these frames. If this is still the case at the next inspection, I might move drawn frames down and put the undrawn comb up in their places. Otherwise, I don't know if they will ever draw them out. I'm probably going to check them in another week to see if they need another box. It will probably just be a quick peek just to see.

A couple One last things... Today (05 June), I notice the bees seem to have found a major nectar source. You can tell if a bee is full of nectar by watching them come in for a landing. They are flying in a bit lower than usual, struggling to stay in the air and just barely (or not) make it to the bottom edge of the landing board. They walk the last couple inches to their hive. Also, I have noticed that my bees have started changing from predominantly dark striped bees to a bright yellow which is indicates that my queen's hatched brood are starting to take over for the original package. If only it were that easy to transition security over to the Afghan Police Force.

Gratuitous bee photo with eggs, pollen and nectar.

* - Always meaning "like last time" since I've only done this twice.