This is my first year beekeeping and I inspected my hive yesterday. Everything seems to be going well so far however, today I noticed my bees bearding on the back top of the hive which they have never done before. I wasn’t sure if this is a swarm indication or normal behavior. It’s around 85 degrees here today.
Thanks for the help!
Hi and welcome to the forum! Yeah that’s funny, I’ve never seen a beard on the back of a hive before - guess it’s more like a bun? 
haha…anyway, swarming isn’t very likely this time of year for northern climates. So I guess it was just a hot day. But, bearding is sometimes seen when there’s a problem inside, like a honey leak or beetle incursion. Did you harvest that super recently? See many beetles in your last inspection? If the beard/bun persists in cooler weather then I’d wonder what’s going on inside.
Incidentally, it’s time to pull that super for the winter. There’s lots more info on that if you need it, just search overwintering flow super. Hope that helps!
Hi Eva thanks for welcoming me to the forum!
I haven’t harvested the super yet because it’s not full and only around half of the cells are capped so I was worried the honey moisture would be to high. Also I did not notice any beetles but I might be missing them because I’m new to bee keeping. Next time I do a hive inspection I’ll try to take some pictures and let some of you more experienced bee keepers take a look to make sure I’m not missing anything important. Thanks for your help.
The Bees appear to have sought out shade by observing the shadow cast on the hive, So id suggest its indicative to heat stress.
What has the tempretures been for you at this point in time?
This is not to rule out swarming since external observations only reveal part of overall state of the colony.
Im interested to see how the colony is going following an inspection.
