I received input on what's wrong with my hive and was told I need a new queen. Once I have that, things should improve.
I decided to purchase a queen rather than wait for the bees to make their own. Summers are too short here to waste up to a month while that happens. I purchased mine from Jodi Turner who sold me one of her Carniolan queen bees.
The Carniolan bees are resistant to mites and are gentle. I don't care as long as they produce honey.
I added it to the hive on Wednesday evening and am told not to look in the hive until Sunday, to see if she got out of her cage. For those of you who don't know, this little cage has a sugar plug that the bees and the queen eat through until the hole is large enough to release the queen. If they haven't done that by Sunday, I'm to help the process along. We'll see how it goes.
I know I can be over anxious sometimes but yesterday I took my binoculars out to look at the hives toward the end of the day when the bees are bringing in pollen. In the new hive (#2) bees were coming in loaded with pollen and there was a continual stream of bees going into the hive. It looks normal and good.
Hive #1 showed me a bit of promise. I actually saw a few bees going in loaded with pollen but not nearly enough. I was happy because it is more than I saw the other day. It made me wonder if the new queen was already out but I doubt it would have been that quick. And if it was that quick, the colony could have killed her as an intruder. Having time to get used to the queen is very important or she'll be killed.
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