They swarmed!

When I got home from work yesterday I was depressed to discover that my bees had swarmed. They settled on the garage roof and have been there ever since. (The picture on the bottom shows the swarm. The picture on the top shows two queen cells; they're the peanut shaped things sticking out of the bottom of the frame.) Unfortunately, I have no extra woodenware so I guess they're going to become a feral hive. Otherwise I'd take the opportunity to hive them. I can't figure out why they swarmed. There seemed to be plenty of room in the brood frames although the upper hive body is honey bound. I guess I'm a victim of my own success.

I opened the hive this afternoon and pulled the Apistan strips. Pulling apart the two brood boxes I noticed several queen cells had been built between the upper and lower boxes. These were ripped in half. Oops. I inspected the frames, however, and found several other queen cells throughout the frames. There must be close to a dozen all told. I saw no eggs or larvae, but there was some capped brood. The old queen must have stopped laying eggs in preparation for swarming a while back. I'll have to see if the new queen mates and begins laying in the next few weeks. I'll post on the beemaster forum to see if it's best to let nature take its course, or order a new queen. Next year I'll have to do more to prevent another swarm.

Viable Queen

Apparently her majesty is all right. Even though it was cloudy and cool I opened up the hive yesterday and found young, uncapped brood. Obviously she is still laying although, again, I couldn't see eggs what with the dark comb and cloudy sky. I did pay for my impatience with several stings on the hands so today they've blown up like balloons. Last night I could barely make a fist. The girls certainly were defensive yesterday. I removed the hive top feeder and the picture shows the large number of bees in it crawling back into the hive.

Viable Queen?

I inspected the brood frames this afternoon looking for signs of an active queen. I saw capped drone brood which I didn't see last week and frames of capped worker brood. I saw larvae in various stages of growth. I did not see any eggs, but the comb is getting somewhat dark so my eyes may not be good enough to pick out eggs on it anyway. There were no supersedure cells. The hive seems to be running normally with lots of pollen coming in today and lots of foraging going on. I take this to mean that Her Majesty is still viable, but I'll check again in a week.

Oops

On Monday the 27th I added the last dose of Tetra-Bee which necessitated removing the top hive body and feeder. As I leaned over to replace the hive body I noticed the queen on the ground all by herself. She crawled onto my hive tool, and I placed her on the top frame of one of the brood frames where she was immediately surrounded by really interested workers. I'm hoping she wasn't damaged and I will open up the hive today, pending warm weather, and look to see if she's laying eggs. She was awesome last year. Quick build up was followed by extreme productivity in the workers. I was actually able to harvest honey from a first year hive. If I do have to replace her I'll order a new queen from H&R Apiaries in Jessup, Georgia from whom I purchased my bees last year.

Spring Inspection

Finally, a warm(ish) sunny day with no wind has arrived after a particularly cold early spring. I pulled apart the hive to see how the bees survived the winter. Well, there seems to be plenty of bees. Both brood boxes are full of bees. The top box is also still full of honey, and the bottom box is full of empty cells. There is some uncapped brood visible and a spotty pattern of capped brood. There is a little capped honey and some pollen around the brood as well. I did not spot the queen which is nothing new as I haven't seen her since I put her cage in the hive last June. I didn't spot any eggs but I don't know if it's my bad eyes or not. I'll look more carefully for eggs next time.

I decided not to switch brood boxes as there seemed to be no point as the top is full of honey and brood rearing has begun in the lower box. The bottom board didn't look too dirty, but then again it's only a year old. I decided not to scrape it clean.

Medication: Placed two Apistan strips in the lower brood box. They can be removed on May 28th. I put two tablespoons of Tetra Bee around the edge of the lower box as well. I need to treat again on April 21 and April 26. It will be safe to put honey supers on the hive on June 7 which is a year to the day I hived these bees.

Spring Feeding

Several times during the winter the temp nudged 50 or above and I observed my bees taking cleansing flights and depositing yellow "rain" on the house and cars. Over the winter I also removed two shovels full of dead bees from in front of the hive so I'm unsure about the survival rate. Today I installed the hive top feeder, even though there are some honey stores left, and filled it with a gallon of syrup treated with Fumagilin and Honey B Healthy. I hope the weather warms up to the point where I can pull the hive apart to check the number of bees, look for the queen, and clean the bottom board.

Wintering Bees

Pulled the Apistan strips on November 4th. I fed sugar syrup until it became too cold near the middle of November. Hopefully, the bees will survive the winter though I saw numerous dead bees in the snow today and a pile of dead bees at the entrance. Nonetheless, I placed a festive holiday bow on the hive and am looking forward to honey flows to come.