Crisis averted?

After all the anxiety of last weekend I was rather surprised at just how calm I felt today as I strolled down the garden to inspect the hive.  This was possibly because I was having a crisis on another front but more of that later........
They'd been building wax so well last week that I'd already decided that I would add more frames to the hive so that if there had been the vaguest chance of the Queen having got out to mate she would soon have more space to lay eggs...... so I took four down the garden with me.
Just as well that I did as soon as I opened the hive and saw all the syrup gone I knew they'd need them - look they are already walking over the fifth frame and starting to draw out the wax there...

 

But what I really wanted to see was proof that the Queen had got out and mated during the few warm days we'd had last week.  All the books I've read seemed to be in agreement that she really needed a warm sunny day, blue skies, minimum of 18'c, and not much wind.  Personally, I was hoping she wasn't such a fussy little minx and had done the deed round the back of the compost heap with the first nice drone she's met. (clearly I'll be giving my own son's very different guidance when the time comes) 
And then I saw them..... you've really got to look carefully...... peer really far into the cell...... can you see them too?

Tiny little eggs... they look like tiny little snips of thread right at the base of the cell.  I'm not going to worry that a few cells have more than one in, she's young and she'll make a few mistakes - hopefully the workers might move them so they each get a cell of their own.
As I kept on looking and watching what they were doing I could see they were busy feeding 3 day old grubs...

 

The grubs hatch at three days old and look like a lovely milky white "C" in the bottom of the cell.  The sight of so many lovely fat white healthy looking grubs made my heart soar.  The workers will feed and tend them for 5 days before packing the cell with "brood food" - a combination of "bee milk" the nursing bees secrete from glands in their heads (hence all the heads poked down into the cells and high protein pollen.  The ones on the left are probably younger than those on the left which are fatter and appear to be floating in the brood food - probably ready to be sealed in.  Because on day 8 (after laying) the grub is sealed into its' wax cell with its final packed lunch of pollen and bee milk and left for a further 13 days to moult and pupate into a new bee...


So it would be really encouraging to find some actual capped cells ....there were only a few but Ta-dah!! 

This is such a good sign -to see there flattish capped cells.....the chances are these are worker bees and therefore she is fully mated and able to keep this colony flourishing, if they were domed cells they would be drone and therefore she wouldn't yet be mated and a colony of boy bees wont last long in this world.

And the girl that's the star of all this excitement..would I get to see her? would she have changed since she strolled up the green cloth and into the hive just three weeks ago?

Oh yes.....isn't she lovely....

No wonder they all turn to face her as she walks past.  She is noticeably longer... not so much bigger, but longer than her workers, particularly her abdomen.  Isn't she lovely?

Happy happy bee keeper - even 'im indoors came and quickly peaked over my shoulder to see her....

So now its all about keeping her happy ..her workers will keep her fed and tended and she will lay eggs - up to 3,000 a day in the height of the season, for the rest of her life.

I added all four frames I brought down the garden, removed the syrup feeder, put the roof back on and walked back to the house with a stupidly big grin on my face.

EDIT:
Those more in the know than me have taken a good look at the picture of "my queen" above, laughed quietly and told me SHE is in fact a drone i.e. a HE.  All I can say is "oooops I'm a beginner" and look at the really good drag costume he is wearing - those 5 workers to his right are clearly convinced by his act and have turned to face him.
This Sunday's inspection means I will be looking a whole lot harder for the real queen

Anxious Parenting

So one week on ....how are the girls?  
Well its a touch hard to tell... they seem to be coming and going and doing the pollen gathering

 

The only way to find out how they are really getting on is to open the hive and hope to see wax being built on the foundation frames in there...

Oooohh first signs are good - they've made some wax on the underside of the roof....

Whoever knew that bees wax could actually be white? Pure unsullied bees wax mmmm yummy 

And look plenty of bees - and they are building more bees wax between the frame and the inside of the hive... silly things... that's a waste... might have to pull that off later... 

Now this is more like it, - drawing out the comb to make cells for storing nectar and pollen, laying eggs in and hopefully.. oh yes ... hopefully making honey in sometime soon.

So how to encourage bees to make wax - ensure they remain well fed.  

As the forecast for the week was rain rain AND more rain that means feeding them with sugar syrup....

This will be the 4th litre this week - THAT'S how rainy it has been ...

Please can someone make the sun shine soon - getting worried these girls will get hooked on sugar and forget how to collect nectar!

Working from home

So there I was, quietly getting on with stuff from work, which I can occasionally do from the relative comfort of the spare bedroom, when the doorbell rang.....
Mostly expecting it to be a delivery of an internet purchase I shimmied down the stairs and opened the front door.  Only to be surprised by the sight of a rather agitated bee keeper..


You see Peter across the road, has 6 hives already, and rather unexpectedly one of his hives had produced a swarm of bees.  In all probability his one very prolific queen had been busily laying and as the colony hadn't been able to get out and fly much in the last week, thanks to all the droughty weather we've been having.  So, thinking they were rather housebound the colony had set about producing a new queen and newly hatched she had rounded up some supporters and with their tummy's filled with honey they had upped and left!
Only to land in a garden 5 doors down the road
Enter the agitated bee- keeper


Agitated Bee keeper: " Great!  you're in"
Me: " Is there a problem?"
Agitated bee keeper: " My bees have swarmed, they've landed over the road, I daren't go and bring them home  - the wife'll kill me if I start a 7th hive......have you made up that hive hubby bought for your birthday?"
me: " errrr......er....er ..this is all rather sudden...... I thought I was best waiting for another season and practicing with the hives in the training apiary this year.... and er...er.  errr.. .. no I don't know where he keeps the hammer.."
Agitated bee keeper: " Never mind ...can you make 5 frames by this evening? - I'll lend you the other bits....."
me:  " err yes.....errrr  I guess so......"
agitated bee keeper:  " Great - see you at 7pm!"
And with that ...he was off....


When I started thinking about keeping my own bees I hadn't really thought through exactly how the bees would arrive.  I'd read some articles on bait hives so I suppose some part of me thought I'd just make a hive, bait it and hope.  But you can actually order colonies and starter colonies of bees, called nucs, short for nucleus.  With increasing awareness of the value of bees to both the environment and economy and the need to keep bees healthy and disease resistant there are now bee farmers and bee keepers who consciously seek to breed healthy, prolific bees for onward sale to bee keepers.  The very best of these people have waiting lists for their colonies and having been a bit slow to start to get my thinking hat on about this I'd missed the boat for this years available nucs so had only just booked a nuc for 2013 the previous Thursday.


But here was an opportunity not to be missed
Possible free bees in 2012!
All I had to do was get ready for 7pm

There's nothing like a deadline to focus the mind.


With only the commute downstairs from the spare bedroom to deal with I had nothing to hold me back from making frames as soon as the day's work was done...


I gathered all the pieces of frame...

I found the workbench from the garage - even I worked out hammering bits of wood together on a glass table wasn't a great idea...

Nearly there...... 

Even 'im indoors helped to ensure the deadline was met...

Then 7pm arrived and the box of bees was delivered by less agitated beekeeper..

There really isn't a microwave in that box - honest!

So how do you persuade 5,000+ bees to leave a cardboard box-  where they are so comfortable they've started making wax, to the hive ?

...By the simple use of a board and a cloth....

 You open the box and let natural instinct take over...  they will walk to the place that looks warm and dark and safe ... the hive...

The speed walkers reach the front door.....

 

It takes a little while...

 

Now has anyone see the Queen yet?

Watch carefully ...see if you can spot her walking in before I do....

A few stragglers needed a helping hand to get into the hive as it was getting significantly colder as the sun dropped, but all were eventually safely bedded in..

Now fingers crossed they stay and start making wax!

Playing out with bees

The weather improved rapidly through the week so I had high hopes of being able to get my hands in a hive today.  :)  I wasn't disappointed!!


First of all - time to kit up.  There's nothing at all glamorous about a bee keeping suit, but it's suit up or be stung - so best to make the best of it - here I am happy to be suited and booted.  Yes the second least glamorous thing about bee keeping is Wellie boots, preferably not black as the bees tend to go for black clothing - being confused with a honey thieving bear is not something I fancied so I went for purple Wellies.  Just to be on the safe side.

As soon as we got the roofs off the hives it was clear the hives were full of thriving bees - there was honeycomb being built out of the crown board as the bees searched for more space and they'd even tried to build brood cells between the frames - sadly we pulled these apart as we opened the hives.

So on with the job in hand - to take out old brood frames that might be harbouring disease and the bees worst enemy - the varroa mite, and to replace them with fresh new frames of foundation wax.
So out with the old.....

And then shake the bees into the new brood box

Some of them took a while to settle into the new hive .....

Which left me with a few minutes whilst they calmed down to take a few pictures of a newly hatching baby bee....

What a lovely ending to a busy day...