A question about robber bees.
We live in the hills of Melbourne Australia and comming into Autom we noticed some wrestling going on but not any dead bees. Later that week in the morning we noticed there was a lot of fighting taking place. Convinced that this was a robbing situation as the dead body’s from all the fighting just piled up all across the front of the hive.
We took action right away closing off the entrance to the hive too 3 bees and also placing a native grass in front of the entrance. It seemed too have done the trick! A few days later we removed the entrance block age and removed the grass. Everything seemed normal to our knowlage but in these moments of robbing we lost our thoughts on what is normal.
In the comming days we made a robber screen due to a large number of bees hovering around the entrance of the hive.
Are we being robbed still?
Our bee mentor is comming for an examination next week but any thoughts on the situation would be appreciated.
Received the flowhive early January. Fully set up with a family of bees into flow hive mid January.
Notes: over the past month the hive is smelling more and more like sweet sweet honey.
That did cross my mind but I wasn’t sure as the second time around that I though robbing was taking place and made a smaller entrance the bees were notably agressive and on edge.
Did you check the eyes of the dead bees are they drones?
Have you emptied Honey out of the frames recently? - they look used but empty - I notice you live in my Little sister’s part of the world are you far from the You Yangs? Nice area
Located in the yarra ranges about 1 hour 45 mins from your sister.
Unfortunately no we haven’t emptied any frames sence having the hive up and running… 2 and a half - 3 months. The garden has lots of flowers around too keep the bees busy. That’s why I was surprised to see no real honey in the frames in the viewing window.
I didn’t notice bigger eyes on the wrestling bees but I was looking for that.
