Cleansing Flight

We had an unusually nice, warm, January day. I saw a few bees going in and out of the hive, so that’s a good thing! It wasn’t quite warm enough to open the hive and peek inside. As much as I wanted to see what was going on, I didn’t want to break up the cluster.

I’ve been using a hangar with a hook on the end to clear out dead bees and keep the entrance open. Hopefully since it was warm they cleared out a few on their own.

House Cleaning

If you remember the story about the Bob package installation, you know about Bumblin’ Bee’s problem with a defective rubber band. It didn’t even last 24 hours and dumped the queen cage into the bottom of the hive. As you can see from some of the recent post, she recovered and is doing great and laying lots of eggs.

Moral of the story – Defective rubbers can cause babies! Continue reading “House Cleaning”

Week Three New Package Inspection

A beautiful mid-80’s day in Walberg Heights made our 3rd new hive inspection pleasant, smooth, and sweaty. At least for Blumbin’ Bee it was. Frau Imkerin is always cool.

Bob was at 94 degrees and noisy after a smoky entrance. The outer 2 frames are still pretty much untouched. Once Bumblin’ got into the middle it was very exciting. When he pulled out frame 7 he knew something good was going on.

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Inside of frame 7. The queen was hiding on the other side.

Continue reading “Week Three New Package Inspection”