June 16-17-18, 2011

June 18, 2011

Mike came over today to check out the new hive. After pulling and examined several frames, he said that there were a lot of Drone cells on the frames and it didn't appear that the Queen was performing. Mike said we should replace the Queen in the new hive, so he first located and removed the old Queen. Since the new hive did not have any brood developed and the bees were starting to get a little 'old', Mike said we should transplant one of the brood frames from my first hive. This will allow new bees to hatch while waiting for the new Queen to start laying eggs. We pulled the middle frame from the first hive (after making sure the Queen was not on it) and placed it in the middle of the new hive. We then closed up both of the hives. Mike said to wait several hours to let the bees in the new hive realize that they no longer had a Queen. At that point I should put the new Queen cage into the new hive. In several days she should be released from her cage and start laying eggs.  Mike also suggested that due to the lack of flowering plants, I should start feeding both hives. I'll set up the feeders in a day or two.

June 17, 2011

OK, let try this again!

I really wanted to check a little closer to see what was going on in the new hive, but since my bad experience yesterday I decided to 'suit up'! I purchased a one piece painting suit at Lowes for $8. No nooks and crannies in this for the bees to fly into! Also, I modified my bee veil to make sure the straps pulled down both the front and back. The straps fit under the arms to keep everything nice and tight. I also broke out the bee gloves. Yes they're clumsy, but I ain't getting stung again today! So, fully protected, I fired up my smokers and off to the hive I went. I decided to video all this, but my battery's went dead about 1 minute after I turned on the camera! Oh well!! Anyway, the hive inspection went well this time. NO STINGS and the bees were a lot calmer since I used smoke. (Lesson learned!) I did however not like what I saw in the hive. No eggs, larvae or brood. I did find what looked like supersedure cells and a lot of the cells that were unusually 'built out' vs just being capped. I closed up the hive and decided to give Mike a call.

June 16, 2011

BAD BEE DAY!!! OK, let's just start out by saying I got stung today!

I wanted to see how things were going in the new hive, so I decided to take a look. Being complacent due to my previous successful inspections, I made two fatal mistakes. I didn't use the smoker and I didn't have the bottom of my veil sealed tight.

I opened the hive and started inspecting the frames. I wasn't seeing any eggs or brood, but I thought a did see superedure cells. Also, a lot of the cells had been 'built out' rather then just being capped. I'm thinking the Queen might not be in the hive or is not performing. That's when several bees found their way into the underside of my veil. Since this happend before, I just walked away from the hive, took off my veil and shook out the bees. After doing this I headed back to the hive to continue my inspection. Well, more bees found their way into my veil and this time they really seemed 'angry'! I decided it was time to stop the hive inspection, so I put everything back together. I started to feel the bees crawling around my head and decided to go into panic mode and took off! After running away from the hive I ripped off the veil and started smacking the bees on my head. I got several of them, but several of them got me! And to make matters worse, additional ones were after me. I ran up to the house and went into the mud room, but about half a dozen of those buggers followed me. I did finally manage to kill the bees that followed me into the mud room. Well, after all this, it was now time to sit back and figure out what went wrong......