Jan 26, 2009 - 4:30pm

Since the temperatures are warming up, I started feeding the bees a 1:1 sugar water mix with fumigilin-b. Today the first quart jar was put on the hive. Although it was late in the day, the bees were still busy bringing in pollen. I took a few photos, I'll post them later.

Jan 17, 2009 - 6 pm

The jar of sugar water that has been on the hive for a week has finally been removed. The bees didn't drink much of it.

The hive woodenware for the second colony is painted and ready.I finally acquired a fogger! Hopefully this will keep the mite population down.

The frame foundation for the second hive will be the 4.9 cell size. I thought I would try raising bees that are that size and see how mite control would work. The bees are also of the 4.9 size. The bees are from K&M bees and will be a 5 frame nuc.

This year I thought I would use wood pellets for smoker fuel. I bought a 40# bag from Dadant & Sons.


New Fogger...




Colony # 2 woodenware.

Jan 9, 2009 - 6:30 PM

Yesterday my bee supplies arrived from Dadant and Sons. This year I will be adding a second colony to the bee yard. That colony will have two deep brood supers, since that type of layout worked for my first colony.

Jan 02, 2009 - 1 PM

Visited the hive today. Checked the feed jar. The bees are not very interested in it. They are consuming the sugar water, because when I remove it to see inside the hive, the bees cover the feeder lid!?!?!?!

So I will leave it on until Friday of next week.

Opened the top hive to peek inside. The bees fill 6 1/2 frames. The 3 1/2 frames they do not occupy are completely empty!

I did not look in the bottom hive super.

I took a few photos and movies.

Dec 30, 2008 - 4:30 pm

Checked on the hive today.

Even though it was late in the day and cooling off quickly I still checked the feeder jar.

The bees only consumed a 1/4 of the full jar since 28 Dec.

Since the temperature was so low there were not any bees to be seen.

The "north" side of the hive has some mildew. I guess I will have to touch it up with some Killz paint very soon.

Dec 28, 2008 - 10:30 am

Its been eight days since I visited the hive.

I replaced the jar of sugar water with a fresh jar. I will check back in 3 days, weather permitting, to see how quickly the bees consume the food. The mixture is 1:1, water to sugar.

With the temperatures in the mid seventies, the bees were very active today.

I didn't see any signs of ants so I didn't put down any insecticide.

I decided to take photos and a couple of movies.

Dec 20, 2008 - 3 PM

Last visit to the hive was 27 Nov.

Today I put down insecticide with a watering can.

Opened up the hive and removed four frames from the top brood box. The bees seemed okay to me. The bees were very active in the hive as well as around it. I did not see any signs of hive beetle or wax moth or ants. Again I only looked through the four frames of the top brood box.

Closed up the hive and put a quart jar of 1:1 sugar water in the feeder slot.

At the front of the hive there was a lot of activity. I saw bees bringing in a lot of pollen. I did take some photos but they didn't turn out too well.