"North East USA" Ladies & Gentlemen, "Start Your Engines"

So sorry Ed :pensive: …she got to feel loved & cared for in her short time.

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Queen update…

Finally, I have a queen for my queenless hive! I have not looked for eggs yet. i might tomorrow when it is warmer and I have more time.

Bad news is that in my efforts to get her marked, I got some marker on half of her left eye. i hope I didn’t ruin my new queen. Think she will be ok?

She will probably just fly in circles for a while! :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

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Pretty sure I saw my bees wearing winter hats and putting up Christmas decorations this evening… this cold weather is not making honey.

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My TBH population has absolutely exploded so i did my first split 3 days ago. I took 4 bars of brood comb from the TBH and cut them to size to fit in a standard deep frame then rubber banded them in. (Capped, emerging and larva and all covered in nurse bees.) I added a full deep frame of honey from another hive and shook in some more nurse bees from the parent hive. Yesterday I took a quick peek to see how the comb attaching/building was going and it is going well. In fact it is going so well that the newly drawn comb has fresh eggs in it… Looks like I missed the queen when searching and now she is in the nuc. The TBH had queen cups, but no eggs in them so I am assuming they will make an emergency queen from what they have on other brood comb. Am I right?
My other question is we had a cold snap where temps dropped to 32F and I noticed some chilled brood in the new split during my quick peek.This is obviously going to set them back a bit, but when can I expect to see foragers from the nurse bees i shook in?

If they have eggs or larvae less than 3 days old, yes.

Nurse bee days 0 to 18 after hatching/emerging. Guard bee days 18 to 21. Forager day 21 onwards. These times can be adjusted according to colony need. If you shook in only nurse bees, you should have some foragers the next day (not many though) and progressively more as time passes, of course.

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Thanks Dawn. I assumed some nurse bees would become foragers due to need, I just wasn’t sure how long to expect that to happen.I guess we will see!

That’s a great thing to know, thanks Dawn :blush:

All outlined in this book, which is pretty good:
http://www.wicwas.com/Honey_Bee_Biology_and_Beekeeping
:blush:

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The girls are finally using the frames and in a hurry. The flow must be pretty heavy because in just a few days they have 25-30% of the flow frames filled. Lots of clover blooming right now and Locust trees. Honey looks very light in color.

Unfortunately this is also one of my hives about to swarm. Hoping to do the Snelgrove modified split tomorrow if they wait for me.

Joe

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I just went through that area (I think) on my way to Indy and back this week. The trees along the PA Turnpike/I70 were in full bloom. It looks like a good year for Black Locust and if so, boxes will fill up really fast. Add more boxes!!

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Last year was so dry Locust tree never bloomed. This year they are impressive.

Hopefully my swarm control this weekend doesn’t hurt their honey activies too much. The pic of the end of the frame showing some honey was not there 3 hours before. Heavy flow :+1::honeybee:

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Almost perfect time to do a split then, and very high risk swarm season. :blush:

My 2 strong hives both have Uhaul trailers parked out front making me nervous. I hope they wait until I can do the Snelgrove split tomorrow. :pray:

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I consider swarming to be part of successful, natural beekeeping.

Bees live to swarm, it’s how they reproduce: The accommodations I’ve provided have helped them achieve their goals. I may actually end up with more honey since when they swarm, while I lose foragers, there is also a brood-less period where there are no mouths to feed and the only thing the bees have to do is store honey :slight_smile:

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ROFLOL! Sending bee wheel clamps and traffic enforcement your way. :smile:

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I did the split. The one I am not sure if it already swarmed or not. Seemed like fewer bees than yesterday but not super obvious so I am not sure. I did not see the queen but I didn’t look everywhere for her. There was one capped queen cell. Saw eggs.

The other hive seemed normal. Did not see the queen but saw eggs.

I did the snelgrove split for both.

My carniolan package is getting ahead of me. They have their first box full. Will add a second box in the morning. After reading the wbka manual for brood management, I am going to add the second box on the bottom. I was backwards in my thinking. I tried to keep moving the queen and brood down. Apperently it is better to keep moving the brood area up to keep enough space for the queen.

Hoping to taste my $1,000/lb honey in a week or 2 :pray::grin:

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Joe, great news! Really interested because I hadn’t previously considered the situation you describe, where your hive is supered but also in need of splitting due to swarm prep. I think both my hives are on the same verge, and I know we are in similar seasonal moments :sweat_smile::+1:

Unfortunately it’s raining here today unexpectedly. Now it’s me hoping they’ll wait til I can slap wheel clamps on & build storage space!!

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It was a busy Saturday night :slight_smile:

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Looks like Momma goat is saying, “I love you SO much, I could EAT you!!!” :smile:

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