Extraction and checking on the queen

 Last week, when I added the new queen, I pulled 4 frames from the super that were heavy but not entirely capped.  I put them into the freezer until I was ready to extract.  I decided to extract yesterday.  It's always a process and messy so I wanted to just get it done and get some honey!  Those now empty frames will go back into the same super to let the bees clean them and hopefully refill again.

I went into the lower deep to see if the queen was laying eggs and she was.  I also saw some uncapped larvae so now I will let her do her work and hope to see a new batch of bees anytime now.

Because of an upcoming operation, I'll need to get them all set because there will be no heavy lifting for a while. The second deep has honey and they have plenty of time to fill it for their winter stores.  I just need to keep an eye on drones eating the honey so I try to remove them as soon as I see brood and also have the green frames in there for drone brood...except one of them is being filled with nectar. Ugh.

I do want to give an oxalic acid treatment for varroa which I plan to do next week. So far, there don't seem to be many but want to get ahead of it.

That's about it in my beeland.

Released new queen from cage - 6/11

 I released the queen today and she immediately went out of sight down into the hive.  While I was in there again (3x this week!), I pulled a few super frames that had mostly capped honey and added to the freezer.  Then I consolidated the two supers into one because they are heavy to lift from that height.  I will keep watch and pull other frames from the one super as they fill out and replace with frames that have been built out with honeycomb.

Now I'll leave them alone for a few weeks!

New queen goes into hive June 8th.

 Let's see how this goes...

June 7. No brood and no queen

 I did a hive check because I wanted to check the supers to see how they were filling up.  Then I decided to get to the lower deep to see eggs because I didn't see any in the upper chambers.  Nothing I could see.  

So I went to get a queen.  35 minutes later the queen looked half dead and sure enough was totally dead this morning.  I should have closely inspected it to make sure it was lively.  I doubt it was.  Money down the drain.

So next morning, today, I got another queen from a local person and this queen is feisty!  Also the beekeeper insisted I check it before leaving.

So, queen is in the hive in a cage and I will release her on Friday.  Fingers crossed.

Meanwhile the honey supers are getting full as are the frames in the upper deep which is honey for the bees.  Honey is the supers will be mine.  I will take out full frames and freeze them until cooler weather.  

May 25th look-see

 I thought I'd take a look at what's going on in the hive today.  I wanted to take off the top hive feeder and see if any frames in the two supers were full enough to pull out...I need honey.  But they aren't quite ready.  I found several full frames but some were only partially capped.  The top super didn't have much of anything going on so I took some fuller frames from the second super and added them between empty frames in the top one.  We'll see how they do.

What I found is a lot of comb in weird spots...not within the frames.  I pulled it off.  I also took a look at the drone situation, and the green drone frame was full of uncapped honey with lots of drones on it.  So I marched that frame down the driveway, well away from the hive, and shook off the drones, hoping they don't find their way back.  Other than that, I left the  two deeps alone.

I also removed any drone larvae where seen.  Next time I'll need to go through the two lower deeps and see what's going on.  I don't think there's much room down there because I saw capped brood in one of the supers too. So I apparently have a queen.  I may need to take a few frames of honey in the second deep.  I'll wait a few more weeks. At that time, I should be able to pull off some honey from the supers as well.  Fingers crossed.

I'm not sure about splitting my hive.  I seem to have all I can do to keep up with one hive.  I'd sort of like two, for comparisons, or to help one or the other as needed, but definitely that would be my limit if I even decide to do it. I have enough equipment to do another few hives if I want to...just not sure at this time.

Indepth inspection May 7, 2021

 I sure did disturb the bees this morning!  But I needed to give a good inspection and see what was going on in there.  I knew I had a lot of bees but knew not much else about the goings on in there.

My green drone frame was loaded with drone brood ready to hatch.  I guess my timing was good.  That full frame has gone into my freezer and later it will go back on the hive for the bees to clean off.  I put an empty drone frame into the upper deep to replace the full one.

The first super (3rd box from bottom) had quite a lot of uncapped honey but was fairly full so I added a new super. I need honey!  So hoping they'll keep producing and capping it.  I did notice they had some brood in the super too so made sure there was enough empty space below for them to use.

I almost did a split...came very close.  But the weather being so cold at night, I didn't want a new hive to get chilled. I think I just want to do a walk away split and hope for the best.  My problem is never being able to find the queen. I may need help for the split.

Lastly I added the sugar syrup to the top hive feeder and closed it back up. There was one frame that broke apart as I was taking it out of the hive so I left that out by the hive for them to clean off.  

I removed the mouse guard for the afternoon but plan to put it back on tonight as it'll be cold again. 60's in the day, 30's at night.  I'm ready for 80-60 weather.

Spring 2021 plantings

 I fed the bees some sugar syrup this morning even though they're bringing in lots of pollen.  I want to also do a split if possible within a week or two.

It's time to start vegetables in the garden:  today I planted peas, lettuce, arugula, spinach and chard.

I hope to get parsley and cilantro in as well but need to figure out where I want them.  I think they'll go into one of the raised beds.

Yesterday I pruned the pear trees, and the day before, the apple tree.  Blueberry bushes were pruned in late March.

The water feature in front was set up this morning.