Monday, June 13, 2011

New Bees Old Bees Swarm Bees

The Carniolans I hived after I captured their swarm have set up housekeeping and seem to be thriving. They're drawing comb, and since it was a little cool I didn't check the frames so I don't know if they're raising brood yet. I added a second deep hive body.

The Buckfast hive swarmed last week. I didn't see the swarm leave the hive, but I saw them leave the maple tree they clustered on when my wife said, "What's that airplane sound? Oh, my God, your bees are swarming." Yes they did, honey.

I checked on them and the new queen has been released. I didn't see her, but I did see queen cells on the bottom of the frames on the upper deep hive body. Hmmm.......Have to figure out what that means. I'll check them in a few days and see what's what since it's supposed to warm up nicely and I can have the hives open for more than a few minutes.

1 comment:

Michael said...

Hi there,

I live a bit north of Minneapolis and was going to try Buckfast bees this year. I found your blog while browsing the net...

Any tips?