San Queens

Blue, 70's. Trying to figure out whether to feed her or not. Saw a drone at the entrance. Late in the season.

Four supers.

S4--7 frames, a lot of bees toward the middle. All looking healthy

• F1: empty
• F2: Empty
  
• F3: some comb getting drawn out
  
• F4: drawing out, L uncapped honey, R capped honey 2#
  
• F5: 5# mostly capped, medium color
  
• F6: 4# L half and half capped, R uncapped, medium color
• F7: Drawing out on R.

S3

• F1: L is empty, R c. 1# capped honey
  
• F2: Heavy, uneven but dense and capped. 10#
  
• F3: L looks full capped honey. R same
  
• F4: Capped, c. 6#
  
• F5: 10#, capped
  
• F6:
  
• F7: 10#

S2--the recorder stopped recording. But there was nice steady brood in here. Even lay. I don't think I'm going to feed them this year.

Petaluma

Clear blue, afternoon, mid-70's. 2 supers.

S2--still collecting in there

• F1: honey to right side--4#
• F2: all capped honey (8#)
• F3: 5#
• F4: 5#, a lot of uncapped honey
• F5: 2#
• F6: 1# all open on the left
  
• F7: empty

S1

• F1: R empty, L top sealed, bottom uncapped 1.5#
• F2: R--lot of open brood, some sealed, pollen, More so on L
  
• F3: Solid capped laying pattern both sides
• F4: Lots of capped brood, pollen
• F5: More brood and pollen, Honey, pollen still coming in
• F6: L uncapped honey, R nothing

Before putting S3 on with 7 undrawn frames, I took F6 and 7 from S1 and put them in the middle of S3, bees and all.

3 full frames of brood. She should be moved soon.

San Queens--8/31/08

11:30am. Clear blue, light wind, c. 70º. SQ has 4 supers. A lot of pollen coming in

S4, they've started drawing all the undrawn frames out. Some honey.

S3, honey. Couple frames about 10# each, capped, and lots open. Pollen in the middle, some of it not packed down but loose kernels. A little bit of brood comb on the bottom.

S2, Worker brood that was pretty good, but it was starting to get spotty. No open brood. No sighted mites.

Saw one wax moth in the hive. Put on obs board. All told in the top 2 supers, there was about 58# of honey.

Petaluma--8/31/09

11am, Clear blue, 70º.

Put Obs board on it. S2--only has 2 supers--Filled from f2 to f5. In the middle capped brood, even pattern. Need another super. Still see pollen coming in.

Los Gatos--8/30/09

Went in about 2pm, little bit of wind, c. 80º.

At the entrance, not as much activitity as I would hope, but comparing to San Queens, which just is a bigger hive. Put on observation board, need to come back soon and check that.

LG has 3 supers.

In Super3, nothing on frame 1, little honey on F2, F's 3 and 4 are about 10#s each, F5 has a good amount, F6 good amount. Guessing about 28# in S3. Good amount of bees, no mites sited.

S2: about the same amount of honey, on F's 3 and 4 saw drone cells at the bottom (clearly outer ring of the brood chamber), and possible queen cup. No mites.

S1: Looking for the central brood chamber. More drone brood, and very spotty laying. Saw a reasonable mix of workers and drone, but clear the drone had not been kicked out. Saw the queen, who looked fat and happy, but didn't have too much of a court, she was sticking her head in cells, but wasn't sticking her butt in anything. No new eggs. Wondered if she stopped laying with the heat (some 100º days the week before). Should I start to feed them?

Petaluma & San Queens

Sunday Morning, about 10am. 70º, clear skies, no wind.

Petaluma: Put the observation board on before I started. I'll check it later on today.

Rachel and I have both noticed that this hive seems to have changed its flight pattern--rather than flying generally south across the lawn at about eye-level to a 5 year old (something that has effectively kept small children off that back lawn for most of the summer).

Opened the hive, and see they have a couple of frames of uncapped honey in the new super I put on. They still seem to be building to the right. When I went to Super1, I saw pollen, capped honey and capped and uncapped brood--they still seem to have a preference to make the center of their nursery on that one frame in the middle that has no foundation, the one they made themselves. I saw no drones, no mites, but I might have seen the queen on that nursery frame I was talking about. But they are still building toward the right. Wonder what that's about?

San Queens: The top super (Super4) has bees passing through it to hang out in the feeder/attic, but there is nothing built that I can see. The only thing they have done is to propolis together all the frames--I seem to remember that this means something about upcoming weather, but I don't remember what.

In Super3, they have 4 of the 7 frames filled and capped with honey. one of them I swear must weigh 10 pounds. The only thing wrong here is that they are building comb and filling it w/ honey between Supers 3 and 2. When I pull Super3 frames there's a mess underneath--are they getting congested in there?

San Queens & the Drones

Got back from the East Coast today and was in my office, where I can see San Queens out the window. I noticed a blue jay we call Blue Max hanging out on the fence by the hive as if he was expecting something. I've seen him doing that before and wondered, but never saw why.

I keep a pair of binoculars by the window to watch the action on the landingboard. I started checking out the hive entrance because I wasn't seeing any pollen going in. I noticed an odd uniform line of bees ABOVE the entrance and looking down toward it. I had just thought, "Are they bigger than the others? Are they drones who are trying to get back in?" when I saw a flash of blue across the lens.

This is what I think is going on. Nectar flow is finally done and they're kicking the drones out. Blue Max has caught on to this action, knows the drones don't sting, and is eating his fill of the big boys. I'll check it out some more tomorrow.

I have to get a camera.

Petaluma & San Queens-July 23

Been meaning to do this for a week, but had to fly out to the East Coast the next day for family. And then things were all hectic out there, internet and otherwise.

I'm pretty sure the weather was what it has been pretty steady--in the low 70º's, low wind. In the afternoon I geared up and opened Petaluma--we are all still a little gun shy of her after I took out all kinds of crazy comb and they got all protective, followed anybody who came into the back yard around until they left, stung Rachel twice in one day. They have really calmed down, but the others are nervous and she's definitely in the wrong place--central to the garden, and the bees' flight path out of the hive are just about eye-level to a six-year-old; I am building a bamboo screen around it this weekend to see if I can vault them up higher. Anyway, I geared up and opened her with smoke. The crazy comb was pretty under control. what was interesting was that they seem to be building hard to the left of the hive, beginning honey in the far left frame even while there were 2 open frames on the right side. Other than that, she had room, but there was open brood, good laying patterns, interestingly nearly all in the free-form bumpy frame in the middle of the brood box.

Then I went into San Queens, who continues to be my star. She looked great and I put another super on her. I hadn't expected her to be so full so I had to build it fast. It's unpainted and they got all unbuilt up frames. I'll be curious to see what they do with it.

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Los Gatos Yesterday

Weather: 70º, clear.

opened about 4pm. For some reason, I set up a 7 frame hive like w/ San Queens. Huge amount of propolis, looked like a porcupine in there. I need to get a good camera. I noticed this the last time, right after I got back from the East Coast a week ago. I'm pretty sure they built it up during the heat wave. I added a 7-frame super w 2 of the frames from the extraction I did on San Queens. You can now see the hive peeking up over the grass when you drive up the driveway.

San Queens

Beautiful day, light wind, mid-70's, clear most of the day, some lingering smoke.

Just went into the top of SQ, took out the bowl the cappings had been in and took of the super I had the two frames hanging in on top of the feeder. They had scattered the cappings all over the inside of the feeder, and have started some minor building. I left it to them but will watch it. The frames they cleaned out were beautiful, was showing them to everybody--creamy white, picked clean. I'll use them on LG when I go put a new super on them tomorrow.

Los Gatos Yesterday

Visited it yesterday for the first time in about 2 weeks. 70º, clear low wind. Nice activity at the entrance. I put the entrance reducer back on to discourage robbers, but there was no sign of such. There had been a heat wave since I last opened it, and I could tell w/ all the propolis. I had added a medium super on my last visit--7 frames, like I had made the rest of the hive for some reason--and it was just about full, w/ one line of open brood on one side of one of the middle frames. Nice and healthy. And a sweet tempered hive. It was after 5pm and I could have used no smoke.

Add a super this week.

San Queens & Petaluma

Slightly overcast, c. 70º, no wind. Used no smoke.

San Queens--put cappings from harvest of 4 frames into the feeder. Left the little bowl in there also. Put a medium deep on top of the feeder and two of the 4 frames from extraction in it. 7/14--clean up everything.

Petaluma--Traded out two empty medium frames from the top medium super and replaced them with 2 other frames from extraction.

Rinsed out plastic box, that I stored honey'd frames in, on the front lawn and dumped in the bushes. Yesterday I rinsed the extractor on the back patio and we had hostile bees all over cuz of the honey water in the cement.

New Hive--Los Gatos--4/19/07

Yesterday, set up new hive at the Byrne's house. All went well, except the temp was a little low and the wind was too high. It was okay when I was doing it, but the wind got worse afterwards and into the night. I'm worried--maybe beyond reason--about bees getting blown from the hive and not having a sense of where to go. Hopefully most just stayed in the box.

Boxes of Bees

BeeKind had me scheduled to pick up bees today, then I got a call from them a few days back and they said I could pick them up either Friday or Saturday. I had seen that the temp was supposed to drop for a few days starting today (Saturday) so I decided to go out yesterday and get them. Picked up my two boxes plus:

1. A Serge inner cover
2. A telescoping outer cover
3. a number of large and medium follower boards
4. an entrance reducer
5. Cork board for the feeders
6. A baseball cap w/ a skep on it that says, "Honey For Health"

I could have done w/out the baseball cap, but in for a penny, in for a pound. I had two hives last year, and while I had some extra hardware around from nucs and having built my hives up, I needed stuff for this year's third hive. I had had Rachel pick me up a new screen bottom board and a feeder earlier this week then I realized I needed more, like a cover.

But I need to learn how to make some of this stuff, or it's going to get too expensive: good bottom boards are nearly $50 dollars. And I could definitely learn to make follower boards.

Before I went out there, I set up the hives:

First one where Carmel was last year, under the trees, but facing south this time. Pro's: on our property and easy access, dappled light in the summer time, bees seemed happy last summer. Cons: Probably a little too shady for the winter. But I'm telling myself I'm going to get them strong this summer, not make last year's mistakes, so they'll go into winter strong. This one will be named Queens, after where Rachel was born.

Second will be on a little hill behind Stacy and Peter's house. Pro's: Open space, sunny in the winter, room for another if she splits. Cons: May end up being too much sun in the summer, and should look into creating a visor over the entrance a la Serge LaBesque. This hive will be named Los Gatos, after the town I was born.

I installed Queens yesterday. Put the queen in then just put the box on top of the frames, put an empty deep on top of that. I've been told that they'll just march out after the queen and then in a couple days I'll take the box out. We'll see. No sign of flight yet today, but it has a chill in the air.

This afternoon, I'll go put Los Gatos in the same way.

Checking San Francisco--4/10/08

Running late again. Luckily I recorded this hive entry. Looking at general fitness, brood, queen, hive build up, mites, observation board.

Looked at board first. It had about a hundred dead bees on it. I later figured out that this was because I had put the board in when the bees were still getting oriented, and many of them had been trying to enter through the screen, where they smelled the hive. When I'd put the board in place it had trapped them in. Bummer. There was pollen on the board as well, sign of preparing for brood.

A lot of bees drinking the syrup. Building spur comb.

Went right to brood box. Nice centered pattern of bees on the top bars. Looking at the middle frame, I see a little bit of queen cup (this should be checked on at next inspection), uncapped honey/syrup, pollen, capping honey. Then I saw eggs. Probably all fine, but need to check in ten days on the capped brood, make sure it's worker and not drone brood from a laying Queen. Pollen up against the eggs.

They hadn't yet filled out the seven frames I'd given them. Just fine with what they have.

When I take a box off, always remember to know which is front, which is back.

These bees seem small to me. I wonder if they came from a small-cell hive. They ARE Marin bees.



No sign of mites.

San Francisco-First Inspection

The Hive's name is San Francisco, by the way. The first 2 hives were named Carmel and Chicago after the towns my parents were from, and Esmé asked me to name the next one after the town she was born in.

Sunny, medium mid-60's, windy.

I saw pollen going in today, and a bee wrestling another bee out of the entrance. Both good signs. Also they had drained one side of the feeder and were working on the other side.

I had set up the hive like this: one deep with 7 frames and follower boards, one medium with the same, then feeder. Entrance reducer on large.

Inside--nice to start the smoker--I took off the medium and saw a nice clump centered on the top bars. Checking those frames, I saw syrup/nectar stored, pollen. I saw a drone in there, who I assumed was a visitor.

I saw no eggs or brood, though. No queen.

I will check back on Wednesday, 4/9.

I also put in the observation board on the bottom, and I'll take a look at that then too.

Didn't notice mites, but I forgot to look.

New Hive--San Francisco

I caught my first swarm the other day, Thursday, 4/3. I'm on the beekeeping association's swarm list, but I hadn't known. Going into Esmé's violin lesson and I got a call from Corte Madera that there was a swarm in the neighbor's yard. They confirmed w/ the neighbor that it was okay to go in the yard and I went down after the class. Swarm had been described as about as big as a football, and I would say it was a little bigger. The woman who called me--Cynthia, I have her contact info--told me that another swarm had landed in the same yard a couple years ago. It was on a branch about 10' up in a tree. I borrowed Cynthia's ladder, put the swarm box on the ladder platform, gave the branch a shake and they dropped on down. I got off the ladder, slid the lid on top and put the box on the ground, opened the entrance and a little slit on the top of the box--an old nuc box with a frame of comb w/ some honey in there (I think my bees died of "first year beekeepers disease and too much rain. Hope I'm right and not giving the new ones some disease). A couple minutes later, bees were lining up at the entrances, fanning with their butts in the air. Textbook. I felt great. I ended up giving a couple more shakes, and made some useless attempts at trying to scoop up the last little handful. I was going to leave the box and come back the next day, but by the end it felt like I had most of them, and it was too far to go and I had too much work on my professional plate anyway. Got them home. That night me and Esmé and Rachel went into the garage and just listened to them humm like a motor. The next afternoon--about 22 hours after I had caught them--I put them in their new hive, and gave them 1:1 syrup. I'll feed them for about 2 weeks or until it feels like solid new brood.

Catching up.

Both Hives died over the winter. Disappointed and sad, but if I take too much time on it now, I'll never use this blog as my log.

Chicago & Carmel--First of the Year

Clear skies, I didn't look at a thermometer, but I guess it's in the low '60s. It's been my commitment for this, my second year of beekeeping to keep better records, then the January issue of Bee Culture Magazine had an article on keeping records--I haven't read it yet, but the title was enough to remind me. I thought I might as well do it here as anywhere. Beekeepers are curious about each other's work, and maybe somebody might be interested in this.

I have two hives: Chicago and Carmel. Named after the towns where my parents were born.

Chicago: is in the sunniest, but the lowest spot in the yard. During the big storms last week, I saw that the cinder blocks she was sitting on were islands in a pool of water. A few days ago I noticed that she seemed to be listing. Went out there today with a level and some shims, shimmed her up. The front is still a little higher than the back--not too bad--but side to side is good. Decided to take a quick look inside.

She is a brood box and a medium super. She's got some ants but not too bad. There were a few uncapped frames w/ nobody on them on the side, and an empty frame near to the middle that had a lot of action. I pulled one of the full frames, scraped it open and swapped it over to the center where they'd find it. Poor bugs. But activity around the front, saw some cells of pollen, didn't go down to the brood box. I've got hive top feeders on both hives, but they're more like attics right now--I have them filled with branches of rosemary to give the hives insulation during the cold weather. Today I pulled out the old rosemary and filled the feeder w/ new branches. I saw no mold, I'm pleased to say. But there was more honey than I would have thought. I've been seeing flying every sunny day, and I hope they're getting enuf food.

Carmel: She is a brood box and two medium supers. It looked like the top super hadn't even been touched. and things seemed quiet inside. But I went down to the middle box and there was activity and even new nectar in a middle frame. Again, didn't go into the brood box. I'll wait till it's warmer.

Blooming: Rosemary (all winter), borage, calendula (but I don't think the bees like that)