2012 Hive #3

Hive status:  Overwintered from 2011
Hive origin:  Package in 2011
Queen type: Raised in 2012 from eggs from overwintered Hive #4 (Italian from CA package)


Significant events/observations:

3/11/12:  Laying workers:  The hive had a no brood and 1-3 day old eggs on a single frame.  They were from laying workers as eggs were not at the bottom of the frame and were sometimes present in pairs.  The hive is obviously not queen-right and was irritated during inspection with many more bees flying compared queen-right hives.

3/14/12: Attempted laying worker fix.  On a sunny, dry, warm (68 F) afternoon I dumped every last bee out of the hive 25 yards from it's original location.  The laying workers are young nurse bees oriented to the hive, so they should not be able to find their way back while the adult foragers just fly home to an empty hive.  I added two frames of eggs from Hive #4 so they can hopefully raise up a new queen, which is tricky this early as there are not yet drones for her to mate with.  Maybe in 16-20 days there will be?  I cannot get a mated queen until mid-april and that might be too late.  During the process I was surprised to find the old queen.  I pulled her out and 2 frames of bees (frames with laying worker eggs)  to start nuc N1, just in case she should resume laying (longshot!).

3/21/12: Added a second deep hive body on top with drawn comb and removed entrance reducer.  It was too dark to inspect for queen cells on the two frames of eggs added.

4/1/12:  Found a new queen, some remaining capped brood and no eggs.  Hopefully she will find some drones and mate.  The hive was much more tame and well behaved as it is now queen right.

4/15/12:  No eggs yet, did not spot the queen.  Hopefully she has mated and will begin laying soon.  Still lots of bees in both deeps with plenty of room for the queen to lay.  The bees are well-behaved, probably still queen-right.  Just in case I swapped two empty frames for two frames with eggs and brood from hive #4.

4/29/12:  The early queen must have failed, perhaps not enough drones to get mated.  I found 3 queen cells nearly capped on one frame, one on another.  Moved the frame with 1 queen cell into H2 which was newly queenless.  Astounding quantity of bees for being queenless again.

5/6/12:  The saga continues.  Spotted 4 capped queen cells.  Could they be new or the ones from 4/29 have not hatched out?

5/22/12:  The hive is dying.  No queen spotted, though 3 early stage supercedure cells were observed.  Did a new queen lay 3 eggs each on a different frame and disappear?  I combined the deeps into a single deep and added a frame with an almost capped queen cell plus one frame of food from Hive #4.   Perhaps now they'll get a decent queen?  This will be a candidate for further boosts/combines.

6/5/12:  Still not queen right, no queen or eggs spotted.  Moved ANOTHER frame of eggs from H4 over to try to get a queen in place.

6/14/12:  About 4 queen cells present on the brood frame, all capped or nearly capped.

6/22/12:  One capped queen cell present, others torn down.  I'm surprised the queen has not emerged yet.  If this one does not work out and Nuc #3 gets a laying queen, I'll combine them.

7/8/12: Tiny brood patch and queen removed to N4, combined with N3

7/30/12:  After combining with N3 the upper deep is all honey.  The queen is not doing well with spotty brood limited to only 4 or 5 frames in the lower deep.  Need to re-queen.

8/25/12:  Found this hive queen right and the queen laying fine, which was a surprise.  Actually moved 2 frames of eggs to Nuc #5 and loosened the entrance reducer.  Lots of bees in the two deeps, may actually finally get a super on this for the fall flow.

9/29/12: No comb drawn in single super.  Queen laying well in upper deep, did not inspect lower deep.

2012 Nuc #3

6/5/12: Started a new Nuc #3 with a frame of eggs from Hive #4 and two frames of bees from recently combined hive 3.  Originally it had the old queen from hive #3 in it but she was not laying and was not found after relocating to the nuc, so I moved the eggs over.

6/14/12:  I combined this Nuc with some "found" bees into a single deep, still calling this Nuc #3.  (A note about the "found" bees:  I found what was supposed to be an empty single deep hive actually had 2-3 frames of bees in it!  I tried to seal up this empty hive from any returning foragers after a combine by closing the entrance, but they found a small gap due to a knot-hole in the entrance reducer.  Returning foragers found no queen, but plenty of comb and space and never sought out the relocated hive with their queen.)  There were about 5 capped queen cells on the frame of brood.

6/22/12:  Queen cells uncapped and torn down, no eggs.  I did not spot the queen, who is hopefully mating. Will look for eggs in July.

7/8/12:  Combined with Hive #3.

7/25/09: Eighth Inspection

Conditions: Don't know, wasn't there
Present: Just Bud
Equipment: Removed bucket feeders from both hives. Removed new queen cage from the re-queened (formerly Italian) hive
Activities: Smoked hives at unknown time (I wasn't there and forgot to ask). Inspected all deep frames.
Observations: In the "Italian" hive, the queen cage was empty. Observed in the brood chamber were eggs and young larvae (5 days old?) as well as CAPPED BROOD. Really? This means the Italian queen we were concerned about must have started laying before we moved the new Russian queen in! So, essentially we re-queened even though we didn't need to. See if you can follow the timeline here: There must have been eggs present during the 7/18/09 inspection (where we found none and decided to re-queen). We know the new Russian queen was not released until 7/21/09 when I "popped" the cork on the queen cage, and this inspection was only 4 days after that. Worker brood are capped on day 9, so those eggs (which became capped brood for this inspection) were there on 7/16/09 or earlier, 5 days before the Russian queen was ever released!

So we put a second queen into a hive with another fertile, laying queen. The question is, what happened? The hive is not big enough to support two brood chambers, so we are likely down to one queen again. Either the hive rejected the new Russian queen, killed her, and disposed of the body OR the two queens had a duel. Is the reigning queen Italian or Russian? We won't know until we spot her again. So the experiment with one Italian hive and one Russian may exist yet.

I'm convinced now that bees will always keep me guessing. It's what makes this an interesting hobby. Hopefully I get better at spotting eggs, though, and don't repeat this particular mistake!

But that is good news, that there are baby bees in that hive once again. There will soon be a dip in population, but they'll rebound for a fall nectar flow and have a shot at making it through the winter. The colony will be ok.

In the other hive (the original Russian) the first super (above the bottom deep) was pretty full and even had a small brood area surrounded by honey. So the queen had taken a brief trip up there to lay, <100 eggs or so, and then returned to her deep. They are going like gangbusters.

Time to add the first honey supers. I need to nail together 20 frames and insert the wax-with-wire foundation we bought (before we knew plastic fits just fine in split-bottom frames) and Bud is picking up the retaining clips. Should super before the weekend. If they build out the comb and fill it fast enough, we'll get a small honey harvest this year.

7/21/09: Re-queen step 2 - popping the cork

Conditions: Overcast, Thunder, 80F and falling fast
Present: Just me
Equipment: No changes.
Activities: Smoked the hive with the new queen about 5:00pm. Tried to pop the cork on the queen cage.
Observations: Tried to remove two frames simultaneously to check on the queen, to make sure she was still alive. It was very awkward by myself and I gave up. The queen cage started to slip between the frames and I didn't want it to drop. I decided just to pop the cork and get out. While trying to pop the cork, it collapsed INTO the queen cage. If she survives all this, it will be a small miracle. I can't imagine it would crush her or obstruct her exit, but I still feel like I botched it. We'll check back, probably this weekend to remove the queen cage and hopefully spot some eggs.

Also noticed the Russians are out of sugar syrup again. We might be ready to put the first honey super on them soon. Time to get some shallow frames assembled for that.

7/18/09: Re-queening the Italians

So based on inspections six and seven, we decided to re-queen the Italian hive. Immediately after finding no eggs or larvae, I put in a call to the closest bee guy. He's the one who sold me the packages and he had one queen available. A Russian he's had for a week. I guess the experiment of one Italian and one Russian hive is over before the first winter. Look out, Europe. The Russians are coming!

We don't even know what happened to the Italian. She was a strong layer who just stopped after we prevented a swarm.

Meet the new Queen and her lone attendant:

We experimented with a queen installation that does not involve removing a frame and installing the cage in it's place. This SHOULD allow for easy release of the queen without building lots of brace comb or the hassel of having to take out a frame that covered in bees and not put it back. Here's what we did:

We removed a bit of wax from two locations at the top of two adjacent frames.

We placed the queen cage in between the adjacent frames and nested them down in the lower hive body. Since there was not enough candy to sufficiently delay the removal of the new queen until the hive had accepted her, I left the cork in. In two or three days I'll sneak back in and remove it with tweezers. The next inspection will be in a week, looking for eggs from the new queen.