Just Checking In

Not much happening with the bees. We’ve had rain every day for seems like forever but probably more like two weeks. I opened the hives today and both Ovechkin and Crosby are doing well. Ovechkin’s pace has slowed, but I’m thinking that’s to be expected three weeks post swarm. They are busy building comb in the super though. Crosby still is staying to the same five frames only they’re building up now. I alternated some empty frames with full ones and found large cells between the top and bottom frames. Queen cells? Maybe. I’ve backed off a little on the sugar syrup because I have a suspicion that’s what caused Ovechkin to swarm – overcrowding and ample food. But all the bees seemed happy and not aggressive at all.

On to the garden news: I found a black swallowtail butterfly caterpillar out among the tomatoes. It was happily munching on some Queen Anne’s Lace that is still abundant no matter how much I weed (which isn’t that much, so I shouldn’t complain). We popped it into a jar and have been giving it a steady supply of new leaves and it seems happy: eating and pooping. I’m hoping we can keep it that way until it forms a chrysalis. I also found my hay bale is pretty nasty so I didn’t throw it on the garden. But I did find some camel crickets so that was kind of cool. And the bumblebees are out in full force. Check out the cute girl in the photo who stopped for a rest in the garden. Lots of native pollinators around my garden – my honeybees don’t seem to linger here. They must be attracted to the exotic flowers at the neighbors!

Somethings's Afoot

I went out to check on the bees today and give Crosby a new jar of sugar syrup. Both hives were busy; it was a sunny day with just a few clouds so the bees were out taking advantage of the good weather. It’s supposed to rain tomorrow and it poured last night. I watched Crosby for a little bit and then turned to find out what Ovechkin was up to.

I noticed there were many drones flying in and out. I’m assuming that this means one of the queens has hatched and went on her mating flight. There were still a lot of workers up in the top super and the comb is being built right up against the inner cover. Dave says there were a bunch of bees flying around last week on one of the nicer days. I’m hoping it was just because it was nice out after so much rainy weather. This has definitely been quite an experience. I’ve reached the end of my semester at school – congrats to everyone in my group. We worked really hard and now we have a short break before the August semester starts. Also -- many thanks to my advisor, Tatiana. She has put up with my many projects for the last year and given me excellent gardening advice!

As for the garden, I had my biggest strawberry harvest today (see pic above) and my potatoes are growing like crazy. Still no sign of the corn or the pumpkins, but I think they’ll be sprouting up in the next week or so. They certainly have had a lot of rain.

Hive Check

I opened the hives today to get an idea of where they stand post swarming. Crosby has many bees, but they are still in the first five frames. They had built a fair amount of comb on the inner cover. Unfortunately, it ripped open when I took off the cover and this upset the bees tremendously. I got a couple of good pictures of them gathered around the open cells in ever widening circles. I decided to put the next brood box with empty frames on to satisfy their vertical urges. I think if I was braver, I would have taken out the bottom frames and alternated empty with full ones. But I’m very nervous about squishing the queen seeing as this hive re-queened itself less than three weeks ago. They are eating the pollen patties I’m putting in, which is better than they were doing in April.

Ovechkin is humming and busy. They are still off the sugar syrup so should be making honey. The multiflora rose bloom is in full swing in the neighborhood so they shouldn’t have any problem finding nectar sources. After half the hive swarmed, we had rainy weather for four or five days. They probably succumbed to hypothermia if they didn’t find a home within the first twenty four hours after leaving. The remaining bees are busy in the first honey super making comb. I noticed that these bees are starting their comb in the middle of the box. I wonder if that makes a difference to how many frames they fill.

Garden update: I’ve been picking strawberries and I have four cucumber seedling started. I’m almost ready for another tire on my potatoes. It’s coming along nicely, I hope.

Holy Honey Bees, Batman!

I took the jars out of the Ovechkin hive last night and this is what I found this morning. All able bodied foragers out looking for nectar. Pretty awesome sight! I hope Dave doesn't want to mow the lawn today. I'm hoping they didn't swarm. I have to go check them today. Stay tuned...

UPDATE: Yep, they swarmed. Half of Ovechkin - gone, with a dozen queen cells in the second brood box. Damn.

Oh well. Let's see where this goes now.

More Crosby Bees

Warm Summer Morning

I felt so bad about not posting any pictures last night, I went out this morning and took a few shots. These are the Crosby bees around their sugar syrup feeder.

Big Doin's

So, as promised, the post. If you remember, the Crosby hive was not living up to its full potential and was being outpaced by Ovechkin. We decided that a look see was needed to find out exactly what Crosby was up to.

Saturday was a beautiful day, a bit breezy but no matter. I donned my bee suit and Dave got on his hat and gloves and fired up the smoker. After taking off the inner cover we saw that Crosby was still working on the same five or so frames as the last time we looked. I found this a bit discouraging, but proceeded to pull out the frames, looking for some kind of clue as to exactly what the heck was going on. When I pulled out the first really full frame of comb and bees Dave said “There’s a blob of something on this side.”

I turned over the frame and low and behold, a thing I’d only heard about: The Almighty Queen Cell that you can see more about here. The books all say it looks like a peanut and, by the gods, it does. A really large peanut, but certainly nothing like the rest of the cells. There were also eggs and open cells of larva. I’m assuming that something happened to Crosby’s queen that necessitated a new queen be raised up. If all went well, the queen should have hatched by now – or be really close to hatching. That means she’ll go on her mating flight in the next week and be merrily laying eggs soon. In a month there should be a new hatch of bees flying around Crosby. On the down side that means I’ll be feeding Crosby for a lot longer than I wanted to, but those are the breaks.

I went into Ovechkin today and found that the second brood box is almost filled. I added a super with ten frames and will remove the sugar syrup jars for the last time once they’re empty. Ovechkin will be officially self sufficient. Just in time for the multiflora rose bloom.

In the Garden: the corn is growing, I’ve lost one of the cucumber plants so I planted some more seeds, and the eggshells seem to be working keeping the slugs away from the basil. I retested the soil for nitrogen and there appears to be high levels (yay!).

Apologies for lack of pictures… I should have taken some of the queen cell, but my gloves were all syrupy and nasty and I didn’t want to muck up my camera.

A Quick One

Lots of exciting things happening with the bees and the garden. I promise I'll get back with a real post soon. Just as a tease - Ovechkin is fabulous and Crosby gave us a surprise last Saturday when we checked it...