Hive inspection and box reversal

[Happy Chooks]

Yes, this particular farm has about 30 hives. Where MIL lives is HUGE mandarin country. She told me a few weeks ago she was driving home and saw "a big cloud of bees" and I thought dang it, I should have caught that!

I hear ya on needing more time. I'm still trying to get my garden in. I think I'll stay home today and get it done. Think of the honey you could get!

 

[Happy Chooks]

I opened the split briefly today to add more sugar syrup. No queen piping yet. The wonderful honey aroma is coming from both hives, and a lot of dark gray pollen (blackberries) coming in.

 

[Latestarter]

OK, my math sucks and in a previous post I miss-spoke and said 9 days when it's really 16 days for the queen to hatch. You did the split on the 16th of May. The queenless hive would have started with an egg or larva no more than 2 days old. So if they waited for a just laid egg to be a larva and then started the queen cell it could have been up to 5 days before the new queen was chosen and started. So basically, by this coming Saturday, a queen "should" emerge.... then 2-3 days of killing newly hatched rivals, 2-3 days of mating flights, and the egg laying should commence!

 

[Happy Chooks]

I've read that they can hatch as early as 15 days, so I counted from split day as the earliest day that a queen could hatch. I wasn't expecting it so soon, but I was listening anyway, just in case.

Based on this information from Bush bees, it looks like tomorrow or Thursday would be the day. Capped cells were found on the 26th.
"If you find a capped queen cell, how long before it should have emerged for sure? 9 days, but probably eight."

I may not hear the piping at all, and that's okay too. As long as I get a nice laying queen, it's all good!

 

[Happy Chooks]

Went up to the hives today to refill the splits sugar water. I just stared through the little hole in the inner cover. Gosh I was dying to get in and have a look, but I kept myself from doing it. The virgin queens should be hatching anytime now, and I don't want to disturb them or worse, have them kill her. It's so hard to keep out though!

 

[Maggiesdad]

Stay outta there, but keep us posted!

 

[Happy Chooks]

Oh how I hope my queen wasn't out on her mating flight late yesterday evening. We had a heck of a thunderstorm, more than 2 inches of rain in about 30 minutes. It had the largest hail I've ever seen here. Incredible lightening.

 

[Maggiesdad]

It will be alright - they know what they are doing.

 

[Happy Chooks]

It made me wonder if they are like other animals that can sense the storm coming.

 

[Maggiesdad]

Oh yeah they do. Little aviators! They say it's awesome to behold when you have several large colonies with big forces afield and they all come piling back right before a summer cloudburst.
Looks like a swarm in reverse!