Its been a week since I started the bees back on a 1:1 sugar/water mix to see if that would encourage them to draw comb in the honey super. Well, I can report that, that little trick didn't work. The bees are not drawing comb at all in the honey super. I am going to continue to feed the bees with a 1:1 sugar/water mix for another week and see what happens.
I removed the honey super to see how things are going in the top brood super. I took four frames out to look for pests, and other stuff. The bees have quite a bit of honey and pollen stored in this upper brood box. There are still alot of capped brood scattered amongst the frames. I didn't see any wax moth, or hive beetles. So since I didn't see any signs of pests in this brood box and it smelled of honey I didn't bother checking the bottom brood box. I did check the bottom one a week ago and things looked very good.
The outside of the hive didn't have any ants or other pests.
I filled up the pvc moats with water, as well as the water troughs around the bottom board.
The grass is growing very well around the hive stand. I think I will use roundup to take care of that...
Friday, August 29, 2008
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Augst 26, 2008 - 9:30am
Checked on the bees. The feeder jar that I filled with 1:1 sugar/water and installed on the 22nd of August was emptied sometime between then and now. So I installed another full jar today. If the weather is good tomorrow I will check it to see how much they are consuming.
There were alot of bees flying around the front of the hive and alot of them flying into and out of the hive.
I checked for ants and did not see any on the outside of the hive or hive stand.
There were alot of bees flying around the front of the hive and alot of them flying into and out of the hive.
I checked for ants and did not see any on the outside of the hive or hive stand.
Friday, August 22, 2008
August 22, 2008
Its been a few weeks since I was on site.
I opened up the hive and looked in the honey super. There was still nothing being done in the super. So I removed it to see what was going on in the two brood chambers.
The top brood chamber has alot of honey. It weighs about 50 or so pounds!!! I found that in this box that every frame has alot of stored honey and pollen and not much room for brood. It looks like once the brood has hatched that the cells are being used for honey/pollen storage.
I didn't see any signs of wax moth or hive beetles in this box. But there were a lot of ants on the outside of the whole hive.
There were many more bees since the last visit and I saw quite a few new hatchlings. I also saw brood that were ready to be capped and capped brood, in the top box.
Once I checked each of the frames of the top box I put everything back together in it and removed it so I could access the bottom box.
The bottom box was very light. This is where I found the queen. She has moved down from the top box to the bottom box to lay more eggs. Each of the frames has honey and pollen but nothing like the top box frames.
I went through all of the frames and did not see any wax moth or hive beetles!!! Once I finished with the bottom box I put the hive back together and left the honey super installed with the queen excluder.
I talked with a local bee keeper and told him about what was going on in the honey super. He advised me to use a feeder jar of 1:1 sugar water to get the bees to draw comb in the honey supers. I did that today so I will see what the girls do with that in a week.
I put down some insecticide to take care of the ants. I also used a weedeater to clean up the grass and plant growth around the hive stand. Bee fertilizer seems to do wonders to the grass!
The hive, over all seems healthy to me. They are storing quite a bit of honey right now. They have stored so much honey in the upper brood box that I was very tempted to sample that honey...
My Dad took several photos with his Sony MVC=CD300, here they are...
I opened up the hive and looked in the honey super. There was still nothing being done in the super. So I removed it to see what was going on in the two brood chambers.
The top brood chamber has alot of honey. It weighs about 50 or so pounds!!! I found that in this box that every frame has alot of stored honey and pollen and not much room for brood. It looks like once the brood has hatched that the cells are being used for honey/pollen storage.
I didn't see any signs of wax moth or hive beetles in this box. But there were a lot of ants on the outside of the whole hive.
There were many more bees since the last visit and I saw quite a few new hatchlings. I also saw brood that were ready to be capped and capped brood, in the top box.
Once I checked each of the frames of the top box I put everything back together in it and removed it so I could access the bottom box.
The bottom box was very light. This is where I found the queen. She has moved down from the top box to the bottom box to lay more eggs. Each of the frames has honey and pollen but nothing like the top box frames.
I went through all of the frames and did not see any wax moth or hive beetles!!! Once I finished with the bottom box I put the hive back together and left the honey super installed with the queen excluder.
I talked with a local bee keeper and told him about what was going on in the honey super. He advised me to use a feeder jar of 1:1 sugar water to get the bees to draw comb in the honey supers. I did that today so I will see what the girls do with that in a week.
I put down some insecticide to take care of the ants. I also used a weedeater to clean up the grass and plant growth around the hive stand. Bee fertilizer seems to do wonders to the grass!
The hive, over all seems healthy to me. They are storing quite a bit of honey right now. They have stored so much honey in the upper brood box that I was very tempted to sample that honey...
My Dad took several photos with his Sony MVC=CD300, here they are...
Monday, August 4, 2008
August 3, 2008 - 11 am
I went on site to see how the bees were doing with the honey super. I opened up the honey super and found that the bees were not drawing any comb on the frames. But there were a lot of bees on the inside of the top cover and a lot of bees on the excluder. As I was going through the honey super frames I found what looked like a very small hive beetle. So I decided to look a little closer at the top brood super.
I noticed that there is a lot more honey storage happening in the brood supers. So maybe the bees will start working on the honey super.
While looking through the top super I didn't find any more hive beetles. I didn't see any other pests either. I did find the queen!
She seems to be spending a lot of time in the upper brood super. I need to look into when/if I should swap the brood supers to get the queen to work the brood supers better.
I noticed that there is a lot more honey storage happening in the brood supers. So maybe the bees will start working on the honey super.
While looking through the top super I didn't find any more hive beetles. I didn't see any other pests either. I did find the queen!
She seems to be spending a lot of time in the upper brood super. I need to look into when/if I should swap the brood supers to get the queen to work the brood supers better.
Monday, July 28, 2008
July 28, 2008 - 1:30pm
Took a look at the outside area of the hive. Didn't see any ants or other bugs.
Cleaned up the pvc moats and refilled them with clean water.
This Friday I will take a look inside the honey super to see if any comb has been drawn.
Cleaned up the pvc moats and refilled them with clean water.
This Friday I will take a look inside the honey super to see if any comb has been drawn.
Friday, July 25, 2008
July 25, 2008 - 11 am
Its been just under seven days since the queen excluder was installed. I went on site to see what the bees were doing. I only took the top cover off and looked between the honey super frames to see what kind of bee activity was taking place. There are alot of bees above the excluder milling around on it. There were not many bees on the honey super frames. I hope they are not planning on sealing up the excluder...
So far the bees have not drawn any comb in the honey super...
I didn't see any ants on the hive or hive stand.
The pvc moats need to be cleaned up a bit. And I think I will finally fix the leaks that the smaller pvc moat has so its more useful.
While I was looking around the front of the hive I noticed that the bees have been cleaning house. There were about five dead larval?! drones and about 30-40 dead workers.
So far the bees have not drawn any comb in the honey super...
I didn't see any ants on the hive or hive stand.
The pvc moats need to be cleaned up a bit. And I think I will finally fix the leaks that the smaller pvc moat has so its more useful.
While I was looking around the front of the hive I noticed that the bees have been cleaning house. There were about five dead larval?! drones and about 30-40 dead workers.
Saturday, July 19, 2008
July 19, 2008 - 10 am and 5:30pm
10 am visit
I installed the queen excluder.
There were about a hundred or so bees scattered amongst the ten frames in the honey super. They look like they are sizing up what the honey super is and they look like they are going to start drawing comb! I will wait a week before I open the hive to see what they do. Hopefully the bees don't propolize the queen excluder to the point where they can't get to the honey super...
5:30 pm visit
Thought I'd take a look at the hive. I didn't open it, I just took a look around the outside of the hive. I saw several hundred bees clustered around the opening of the hive. I took a closer look and saw hundreds of ants trying to get into the entrance and into any open areas. Adding the queen excluder seems to have attracted more ants than I have ever seen. The ants were all around the gap that the queen excluder creates when placed between supers. I mixed up a batch of insecticide and used a watering can to put it on the hive stand legs and on the ground around the hive.
I checked the hive an hour after putting down the insecticide and that seems to have significantly reduced the ant problem. That seemed to have stopped ants from getting to the hive, and the bees kept working on the ants that were trapped.
I installed the queen excluder.
There were about a hundred or so bees scattered amongst the ten frames in the honey super. They look like they are sizing up what the honey super is and they look like they are going to start drawing comb! I will wait a week before I open the hive to see what they do. Hopefully the bees don't propolize the queen excluder to the point where they can't get to the honey super...
5:30 pm visit
Thought I'd take a look at the hive. I didn't open it, I just took a look around the outside of the hive. I saw several hundred bees clustered around the opening of the hive. I took a closer look and saw hundreds of ants trying to get into the entrance and into any open areas. Adding the queen excluder seems to have attracted more ants than I have ever seen. The ants were all around the gap that the queen excluder creates when placed between supers. I mixed up a batch of insecticide and used a watering can to put it on the hive stand legs and on the ground around the hive.
I checked the hive an hour after putting down the insecticide and that seems to have significantly reduced the ant problem. That seemed to have stopped ants from getting to the hive, and the bees kept working on the ants that were trapped.
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