Hive Inspection 4/2/12

All Hives (six)
65°F
Sunny
Calm

Didn't mean to do them all but that's the way it goes sometimes.  It has been almost a month during an early Spring since we last looked in the bees.  Not a good idea but we have been terribly busy around here; did i mention we have chickens now?

Melissa has six brood frames in the top box and four in the bottom box.  Good brood pattern and a high population.  The bees are calm.  Saw Wax Moth larva in the detritus below the screened bottom board; that's a new one.  The moth larva posed NO danger to the hive and were fed to the chickens.  The bees finished off the last gallon of syrup.  The feeder was removed and a partially filled Honey Super from last season was added.  In a day or so an undrawn Super will be added as well.  Did not see the Queen but plenty of fresh eggs.

Nuc #6 (Gumption) also had a Moth larva under the Screened Bottom Board.  That too was cleaned out.  Her bees have not yet begun to draw out the new Medium brood box.  They have, however, finished their syrup.  The population is good but her productivity is low.  There is a Supersedure cell being drawn out on frame #5.  I left it in.  The bees know best.  It wasn't planned but her still empty new brood box was hastily donated to Nuc # 5.  I'll make her two new ones this week.

Nuc #5 (Mab) is on fire when it come to making bees.  The three week old New brood box was fully drawn & filled with capped brood, drone cells, pollen, & honey.  The best looking Spring frames i've ever seen.

All five new frames, front & back

The population is still heavy now that they have used up the new box.  As previously mentioned i borrowed the empty box from Nuc #6 to give this one room.  However, it is to late!

OOPS! First Swarm Cell of 2012.  Three weeks in a new undrawn box

The Queen cell was cut out and placed in Myrina who needs to be requeened anyway.  Many believe that once the Swarm cell is capped the bees will swarm no matter what.  I've done this before without the bees swarming so i hope to do it again. As soon as these bees fill up the new box they will be hived in a regular medium two box hive.  The feeder is still on and they'll get some more syrup.  So i'm guessing two more weeks.

Heléna has twelve of twenty frames filled with brood.  Her population is high and getting higher fast.  The Queen was in the bottom box as the top box was full.  So her feeder is gone replaced by a drawn honey super.  More Wax moth under the Bottom board but they were handled.  The brood frames are picture perfect.  Sadly it was late and too dark to get the image.

Mary is a surprise in non-productivity with only four of twenty frames having brood.  Her population is only fair with very little Drone comb.  The top box is practically honey bound.  So i will spin several frames to give them room to grow.  If she doesn't take to it she'll be requeened.  Her feeder came off too, but she hadn't finished the syrup in it anyway.

Myrina has only taken half of her syrup.  The population is fair with only three of ten frames in brood.  A Wax moth was found in the hive on a frame; one worm which was dispatched.  This colony is Very weak.  She began the downward spiral last Summer.  Then entered Winter diminished.  She got through Winter but she's going nowhere fast.  To remedy that the Swarm Cell from Nuc #5 was placed in this hive (frame 5) After i pinched Queen Myrina.  I'll check the hive again in a few days.  The Queen Cell was capped and due to hatch soon.

Note the Spotty brood of the previous Queen

This weekend i'll make a few more brood boxes and sufficient frames.  I'll put more undrawn Honey Supers on Malissa & Heléna too.

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Inspection 10/11/2010

Myrina
85 f
Sunny


Time to look into Myrina and see if she's ready for Winter.  This was very different.  As soon as the cover was off I could tell everything had changed.  They weren't angrily attacking the smoke.  They were all the same color.  They didn't even mind when I shook my hand back & forth over the open box.  These bees were no longer evil mean bees but, dare I say, regular bees, Hallelujah! 

Top Box Frames:
10.  Thin drawn, 1/2 capped honey - 2010 Crimped-Wire (CW)
 9.  3/4 capped honey - 2010 CW
 8.  Full capped honey - 2010 CW
 7.  Full capped honey - 2009 Plasticell
 6.  1/2 honey, 1/2 brood (eggs), Marked Queen -  Old CW
 5.  1/2 honey, 1/2 brood (back filling w/honey) -  Old CW
 4.  1/2 honey, 1/2 brood (back filling w/honey) -  Old CW
 3.  3/4 capped honey, some pollen - Old CW
 2.  3/4 capped honey, some pollen - Old CW 
 1.  3/4 capped honey, some pollen - Old CW

Bottom Box Frames:
10.  Drawn, empty - 2009 Plasticell
 9.  Drawn, empty - 2009 Plasticell
 8.  1/2 capped honey - 2009 Plasticell
 7.  3/4 capped honey - 2009 Plasticell
 6.  3/4 capped honey, some pollen - 2009 Plasticell
 5.  1/2 capped honey - 2010 CW (Depleted)
 4.  1/2 capped honey & pollen -  2009 Plasticell
 3.  1/2 pollen & capped honey - 2009 Plasticell
 2.  Undrawn - 2010 CW (Depleted)
 1.  Undrawn - 2010 CW (Depleted)

Depleted means the bees took wax from these frames and used it somewhere else.  It's ugly and looks like this.

Drawn Out
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Undrawn
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So the top box is heavy and the bottom box is light.  There is about 1 more month before cold weather sets in.  I'll continue feeding, but at an increased rate.  As usual I add Apple Cider Vinegar to the syrup.

Queen Myrina was found on frame 6 in the top box.  She looked busy.  This was the first time I've seen her since the requeening.  

Even if I hadn't seen her there were plenty of eggs already on the frame.

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The Hive Top Feeder has been tricky going.  The bees keep propolising the vent holes closed.  It takes about a week for the bees to do it.  I clean it off when I feed but it's getting old.

Every week

This is new to this year.  They never did it last year.  I'll need to ask around to see if this is good behavior or not.  Also the syrup keeps crystallizing.  Again, that never happened last year.  I don't know what's so different now.  More studying then...

2:1 Rock Candy

Myrina's population looked good but not heavy.  The two requeenings probably didn't help (one on her own before I introduced the later queen).

The only question I have now is what to do with the handful of Varroa mites in the hive.  I never saw them during the inspection.  Only after looking at the photo's could I find any.  Very few indeed.  I'll talk to some older beeks and see what they recommend.

Oh, and here's something we all want to see this time of year.

Fully Capped CW

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New Queens Installed

This morning I drove to Farmville to pick up 2 VSH Italian queens from Bobby Oakes.  While there Bobby showed me the hives the queens came from.  Their brood patterns were perfect.  Surrounded by a ring of sweetcorn pollen & capped honey.  Plus, the calmness of the bees was impressive.  I'm not used to such relaxed bees.  But then Bobby's been with bees for decades.  I have so much to learn yet.

 Introducing the new Mary & Myrina

I brought the bees home and gave them a drink.  Then down to the hives I went.  Popped the cover on Myrina & Mary and installed the queens.  Didn't use smoke since it was like a hit & run.  I closed up the hives before the bees could really start flying.

In 5+ days I'll check the queen cages.  If both of these colonies turn out as well as Bobby's colonies it'll be a great year.

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Requeening Begins

The time has come to requeen both Mary & Myrina.  Mary has been weak since last Summer.  I didn't requeen her then because I didn't know about that kind of stuff.  By the time I figured it out it was November and to late in the year.  Myrina was strong, productive, but old.  This is a good time to do her as well.  However, last inspection I could not find queen Myrina & the bees weren't acting queen-right.  Both Mary, since last year, & Myrina, from the last inspection, have had spotty brood & chalkbrood. 

I had meant to requeen in April but the local queen supplier didn't have any ready just then.  After which a bear shredded his apiary.  I've been waiting on his next batch to requeen.  When Myrina went south I decided to do it now.  Unfortunately I could not locate any queens.  So I had to wait some more.  Then last week the email went out that another beek had available queens.  I made the call & will pick up 2 VSH Italian queens Tuesday morning.

Which means i need to pinch any queens in the targeted hives.  Both have marked queens and Myrina should be queenless.  Or so I thought.  First into Myrina.  I wanted to make sure she was without a queen.  Suiting up in 98 degrees and inspecting 20 deep frames is no picnic but it must be done.

I had a Medium honey super on Myrina but they hadn't touched it.  So off it came.  Her population was down too and I noticed the Chalkbrood had vanished.  The amount of frames with brood had increase as well.  And many 'Eggs'.  Uh oh. Continuing the search found the capped brood to still be spotty but lots of eggs & larva.  The residing queen was eventually found on the second to last frame in the bottom box.  UNMARKED!

So apparently they had replaced or superseded the last marked queen.  Enough time has gone by.  I never did find any queen cells though.  I did watch the new queen for a bit.  she was scrambling around the frame randomly dropping eggs out her hind end.  Not putting them into cells at all.  Are they supposed to do that?  Well enough for me.  Myrina has always been very defensive.  Even if she's been trouble free I'm tired of putting on armor every time I want to look at her.  This daughter of her's would likely bee a good queen but still as mean as her mother.  So I removed her from the hive.

Mary was much easier on me.  She was on frame #2 in the top box.  She was easy to spot with that big blue paint dot on her back.  She was pulled from her hive as well.  Though I saw no signs of chalkbrood in Mary either.  Which is strange since she's always shown some sign of it over the last 2 years. 

So 2 queens out of their hives and into the freezer.  The freezer because I had no heart to mash them.  The bees will realize they're queenless tomorrow.  Tuesday I will place a new queen in each hive.  If all goes well the break in brood will only be a week.  Which Myrina has already done when she made the last queen.  Each will be back up to par before August, so should be set for Winter as far as population goes.  I'll update as the requeening progresses.

Also, Myrina's Bottom Board was replaced with a Screened Bottom Board.  That should help with keeping the hive cool.  The temps this year have been way up in the 90's each day.  3 old crimped wire frames in box 1 & 3 plasticell frames from box 2 were replaced with undrawn crimped wire frames.  The old frame because the bees had stopped using them; they were completely empty.  The Plasticell frames because the bees were also ignoring them; never drawn out.  The crimped wire wax foundations should entice the bees back to using the frames.

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Buying a Queen

If you've been following this blog you'll know I desperately need to requeen Mary.  And that I'm waiting for a local queen breeder to have queens ready.

Today I got an email from the local breeder.  In it he said,...

 "Bear ate the first batch.  Next will emerge at the end of  May"

I swear anything that can go wrong will go wrong when it involves Mary!

*

Mary in the Intensive Care Unit

Mary is failing. Her population is to low to survive another month. She has plenty of stored honey & pollen but the cold is killing her. From occupying a double deep she's down to a corner on 3 frames. There is only a couple hundred bees left. Why she's crashing is anybodies guess. Bad genetics, poor hygiene, Nosema, Tracheal mites, who knows. I'm not giving up on her just yet though. So it's time for extraordinary measures. On Tuesday i brought Mary's entire hive into the garage. She will stay inside this improvised Intensive Care Unit until the colony improves or it dies out.

Containment,
First, being inside the house she will need a new entrance to the outside like a Observation Hive has. I fit a stretch-tube to a plank of MDF on top of the hive then ran it to another plank set in the window. Now the bees can go outside when they need to. It's longer than I need but the extra length allowed for a heat trap. Just a bend in the tube to keep the cold air out & the warm air in. It's 20 F outside at night. I'd like for that cold air not to flow over them from the new window entrance.

Not a Dryer
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New Window Entrance

Also I closed off the hive's usual front entrance with #8 hardware cloth. They need to be outside, not in the garage. I may need to close it off with a solid block. The bees have ganged up on it once or twice. Trying to get out and fly I think. Right now it serves as a useful window into their activities. They may forget about it after they discover the new entrance up top.

Have a peek

What I'm doing Now...

Heat,
Now that the hive is in a controlled environment I hope to help the colony back from the brink. As I see it the main issue is heat. To that I turned on the space heater in the garage and placed it near the hive. If the area can stay at about 50 F the bees should not cluster. Out of cluster they can roam freely to get what food they need. Their energy can also be put towards working the queen. Getting her to lay eggs is the one thing that will save this colony. If not they're dead. 50°F is also cool enough to keep them from getting too antsy to fly since it's still 30 F outside. I hope.


Syrup,
In the garage moisture won't be a problem so I'm feeding them with 1:1 syrup. The light syrup promotes brood rearing so they're going to get a lot of it. I'm using the Boardman feeder in the old (original) entrance. I wanted to use the hive-top feeder but that would interfere with their New entrance. I'm not sure if they've found it yet. With so few bees it would take a while for the syrup level to drop enough to notice. There were signs of possible Nosema during the last inspection. If I see more of it I'll medicate the syrup.

Food,
The bees have not wanted for honey or pollen. When they weren't to cold to get any that is. Empty frames have been rotated out for filled frames all Winter. Yet at this point everything must be tried. Though the frames are filled I will start adding pollen patties immediately. Pollen starts the queen to laying so the more the merrier.


Light,
The amount of Sunlight available to plants & animals is dependent on what time of year it is. The bees thinking it's Spring instead of Winter might be further spurred towards brooding up. Plus bees love the sun so I've put 3 shop lights on the hive for 15 hours a day to mimic later in the year.

Population,
When it gets warm enough to go into Myrina, still outside & doing fine thank you kindly, I'll rob some of her brood or bees and place them in Mary. The beeks I've talked to said 2 frames of bees or brood, with nurse bees, should do the job. The boost in numbers will significantly help this colony survive.

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The point of it all...

If this colony dies out I'll have a nicely primed hive ready to accept a package of bees this Spring. They'll be way ahead of the curve if they start with a hive filled with honey & pollen. Honey in spades for sure. So why all this trouble then. For starters a package costs money; minor but important. The big reason is that I can take a swarm cell out of Myrina and put in in Mary. If Mary is still here that is. Then all the problems of Mary can go away as the new queen produces more bees. Replaced with Myrina's superior genetic traits that have kept her healthy & strong for 2 years now. Also gone will be drones carrying Old Mary's genetics to other colonies polluting them with lousy hygienic tendencies. I know first hand that Myrina is a master at dealing with all local climate & pest issues. I'd have to guess, fuss, & worry about a package from somewhere else.

They say breed your own local queens. That's what I aim to do.

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Oh, did I mention I saw a bee come out, fly around, and go back in the window entrance today. Hope she tells the others.

Queen for Mary update 1

Three days after I put the new Queen into Mary It's time to take out the Queen cage. These bees have seen more of me lately that I'd like them to. So I pop off the top super, reach into the hive, grab the cage, & close it all up. Well not that simple. I did not secure the cage well enough so it was on the bottom. Plus they had made some nice Natural comb in those few short days.

Did they bees act any differently? To soon to tell. It will be two weeks before I check them again. Hopefully I'll find lots of brood when I do. So now I'll keep feeding both hives with sugar water & pollen patties.

I noticed the natural comb was not made of new wax. Not a surprise as there are so few brood. They recycled the wax from else where in the hive. It was yellow & filled with flecks of hive debris. I don't think it means anything much. They had a big space to fill and they're supposed to do that.

Next week I'll check to see if Myrina has finished filling her super with comb & honey for Winter.

New queen for Mary

With what I've learned since Spring I now realize I should have done this sooner. The colony showed signs of being weak from the first inspection. Unfortunately I didn't know what I was looking at then. It came out of Winter with a weak queen. It seemed in May that a new hive bred queen swarmed with half the hive. I was ready to buy a queen then but the colony made a new queen before I did. Chalk that up to inexperience. They did well after that so I thought all was fine. Alas two months later the colony was showing signs of weakness again. I don't know what happened but something did. They had plenty of room. Two hive bodies & two honey suppers. The top of which they never fully drew out. I've seen no evidence of diseases or pests, except for the recent minor Wax moth infection. In the end though I still have a colony that may not make it through Winter.

So I ordered a new queen. Italian, and marked. I'm not sure about clipping them. Still reading on that. She got here a day before I thought she would. Good service from Rossman. A drop of water, a drop of honey. Pop the candy cork and in she goes above the few brood left.

Was there a Queen in the hive? I took out every frame and looked for her. Not only did I not find her but I found no evidence of one. A handful of capped brood and a few uncapped. No new eggs. I'll check on the condition of the new queen on Sunday and remove her cage.
Crossing my fingers.