Hive inspection and box reversal

[Maggiesdad]

That's awesome! My packages have 8 bars of comb started... can't wait until brood starts hatching.

How soon do you get your bees, Latestarter?

 

[Latestarter]

From what I understand, most packages will be arriving here around the 24th-25th. I've sent an Email to the person I'm buying them from but haven't heard back yet I hope she gets back to me soon, not that I'm WORRIED or anything... I have lots of dandelions in my field, and I see two different kinds of bees on them... the standard golden kind and a very dark almost black kind... Not sure what the black ones are, and they don't let me get close enough to really see them clearly. The upsetting thing is that NONE of them are MINE!

I picked up 2 deep frames of fully drawn comb from the VP of the bee club here. One for each of my 2 starter hives to help them get off to a good start. One of them has 1 side 1/2 full of capped honey! Really getting excited! The past several weekends I have been with bee club members checking hives and doing splits. The only protection I've worn was the veil. I did get stung one time on the inner forearm but I think it's because I bent my arm and "squeezed" the bee. Not her fault and she gave her life for it .

Chooks, that's GREAT that you're supering already! It isn't even MAY yet! Here's hoping for an awesome honey harvest!

 

[Maggiesdad]

I would set my empty boxes out with swarm lure in them just in case. Free bees are a good thing!

 

[Happy Chooks]

You tend to get package bees a little later, with warmer weather. When I got mine the first year, my manzanita was already done blooming.

 

[Happy Chooks]

I was a hair early in putting the super on. They still have room in the upper box, but it's going to be getting very warm (high 80's) and I think the bee population will increase dramatically. And when the blackberries bloom, they will fill it up really fast!

 

[Latestarter]

Better safe than sorry in my eyes... rather have it on early than late!

 

[Happy Chooks]

Better safe than sorry in my eyes... rather have it on early than late!

That's what I thought too.

 

[Happy Chooks]

I've been researching splits, and I'm considering trying it. I don't want to split the brood chamber entirely, because I don't want to lose all of the honey this year. I've been looking at a walk away split with a few frames of eggs/larva and honey and add a purchased queen. We'll see how the hive population looks on the next inspection. (coming soon with the blackberries blooming)

First, I have to make a trip to get another hive ready.

 

[Maggiesdad]

Hive sez.... "BOOM!"

 

[Latestarter]

Make sure when you do the split that you shake off one frame of nursery bees (new-borns) into the new box to tend the brood on the frame you're moving to the split. If you do the split right, before the main nectar flow, the hives should start building in perfect timing and you shouldn't lose too much honey. Especially if you have a very strong hive to begin with.

Have to be careful with the walk away and a purchased queen... It will only work if you can be sure which hive ends up with the original queen. What you can do is do the walk away and then go back in about a week and open each in turn to see which one has new eggs/larva. That is obviously the one with the original queen. Or which one has supercedure cells growing new queens, which would be the split that didn't get the original queen.

At that point, you can install a new queen (to get things moving faster) or just let that hive grown it's own from the frame of eggs/larva you swapped over. If you've been happy with the performance of your queen and her offspring, why waste the money to purchase a new queen? Let them grow their own from proven, home-grown stock!

Good luck! and let us know how it goes!