Andrew’s Bee Blog

ABSCONDED!!!

The Package Hive got up and left.  Can you believe it, it was late September and they got up and left.  Emmy called me and said that there were quite a few wasps flying into the hive.  I thought this weird, but considered them just looking for food.  Dad went down to check it out, as I was at work, and what do you know, they left.  Not sure why, the hive looked very healthy.

Emmy and Will want to get on the swarm list at Jones Bees.  The Swarm Hive has done very well, and was easy to capture.  Maybe they can do the same.

From Emmy-

I was devistated when the bees left. I was mowing the lawn during the last week in September. I always like to check out the bees when I mow past the hive. I knew something was wrong when I kept seeing wasps fly into the hive and there weren’t any bees to stop them. I stopped mowing and watched for about five minutes. I saw a few bees drinking water nearby, but they  never went  into the hive.  I saw wasp after wasp fly into the box. I wanted to look into the hive to see what was going on, but I didn’t have the equipment to look. Everything was up at my dad’s. Andrew couldn’t make it because of work, so my dad came down. Sure enough the bees were gone and so was their honey. We were so sad. They were doing so well. We were really looking forward to having a strong group of bees for the next year. Now we have to start back from square one.

I just called Jones Bee Company and am getting some more Italian Honey Bees this April. They will be here on the 18th. We are really excited to have them again. Our yard last year was amazing. We had more flowers, fruit, and vegetables. I neighbors loved them too.

I got into both hives on Friday. They are both looking great. The Package Hive is just starting on the third box. They have filled up the empty frames on the lower two supers. I could see lots of eggs and larva. I think the queen is doing good. It would be good to leave them alone for 2-3 weeks while they work on that 3 super.
The Swarm hive is doing great also. They have completely filled all the frames in the second super. We added the third super to the hive. At this rate, they will have the third filled in another two weeks. I am impressed how fast they are moving. I guess because they started with so many more bees than the package, they have been able to catch up and will pass them. I have to comment on the black foundation…I love it. I was showing my dad the eggs and it was so easy to pick out the eggs against the black background. The bees don’t seem to mind the plastic at all. Its plastic from now on for me!

A week had passed since we had put the package bees into their hive.  We were all pretty excited to see how they had done.  I got everything ready to get into the hive.  I had made up a fresh batch of syrup for the feeder, put on my gloves and hat, and got the smoker going.  I took the top cover off and then proceeded to take off the inner top cover.  As i lifted it off I noticed something attached to it.  The bees had created an entire sheet of wax comb in the space where the queen excluder cage was.  I took it out and scraped it off of the lid.  It was way cool to look at.  Emmy thought it was cool also and wanted to show it to her Second grade class.

The bees were doing great.  I put another frame in where the queen cage was and refilled the feeder.  Surprisingly the bees were very docile and I hardly had to smoke them.  They were busy on the other frames and paid very little attention to me.  I think there are a lot of preconceptions that 10,000 bees come out of the hive and attack the beekeeper, at least that Is what I thought.  I had been told by Michael that they are for the most part gentle and leave you alone.  It the book it says they get aggressive around there food and brood.

long story short the package bee hive at Emmy’s house is doing great.  We added a second super about three weeks ago and they have already filled most of it.  I am getting ready to add the third super to the hive.