Gum trees stopped flowering?
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now that’s what I’d call a winter…
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Those red ones that I photographed are mostly over. We have also had a very dry winter, so this spring and summer may be very short in the nectar department. We will see. 
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This was round 2 in less than a week - check out the tall Cryptomeria in the background: a chunk is missing on the left side from the first round 
Round three will be here Monday 
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Things were popping today in south central Pa. My one hive I had to do a split because of a capped queen cell and several other younger ones swimming in royal jelly. Not positive it was a swarm cell but I wanted to split this hive anyway. I had given them a third brood box last week. This queen likes to go up and almost ignores the bottom box.
A different hive was not as populated but it had what I think was a supercedure cell which I am going to allow to proceed. She has not laid very agressive this Spring.
Lots of blooms starting to open up. Weather isn’t great this coming week but I think we have finally hit Spring.
Joe
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Henbit and Dead-Nettle are really popping and all of my 3 deep hives are full of brood and honey so I did some splitting yesterday. We have a week or so of cooler temps and then I hope to do about 20-25 splits. The smaller hives are lagging behind.
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Hey Chili, do you find the 3 deeps want to swarm less? I have read some say they don’t swarm nearly much as 2 deeps. I am going to try some and see what happens.
Joe
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I’d say they swarm just as much if not more because they are so much stronger and further ahead of the smaller configurations. I use this to my advantage to make splits.
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Locust trees are blooming and we have nothing but rain in our area…aargh! Last year the locust bloom was the heaviest nectar flow I saw. The open lucust are in full bloom, the ones in the woods seem a little behind so I have hope it will try off enough for them to bloom which should be any day now.
Anyone else seeing heavy flows yet?
Joe
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The Locust trees have been blooming for the past week but now we’re expecting 4 days of rain 
Blackberries have just begun to open, Tulip Poplar isn’t far behind, the Holly Trees (huge flow) should pop next week.
Locust
New babies born Monday (buck & doe) Penny is the official babysitter while momma goat eats leaves
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I had 15 hives survive winter and have made it back to 30 through splitting and swarm captures. That will be enough for this year: I want to focus on having big strong 3 deep hives vs a bunch of smaller, weaker 1 and 2 deep hives.
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I did an inspection about 2 weeks ago. All was well and no swarm cells. Yesterday I finally was able to get down to the bee yard and noticed less activity and hardly any bees in the Flow super so I knew they swarmed. (Had to work the last 4 days so missed 'em, figures… ) Opened up today and found around 10 queen cells, 4 still capped, others recently opened. Spotted 1 virgin queen. Seen 1 of the 4 capped queen cells with an emerging queen. Moved her, 2 frames with capped brood, 2 frames of nectar/honey, and a frame of pollen to a nuc. Thoughts?
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I just harvested 3 of 15 harvestable hives and got 2 deeps and 4 mediums of fully capped honey 
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Holy honey stacks, Ed!!! This season is definitely my favorite of the three I’ve had so far as a beekeeper. I took two medium frames last week and they’re already being reworked. There are about four capped shallow frames in the shallow super on that hive, and my Flow frames are about 70-80% capped!
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Got just over 200 lbs from those 3 hives. I have to harvest the other 12 this weekend or else I’m a bad beekeeper 
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Glad to hear there is still some flow going on. With all the queen trouble I had this year my hives were duds right in the middle of the main flow. 
3 hives are now strong and I am seeing a lot of activity in my flow frames but not much honey. Praying we keep getting some rain so my clover can keep feeding them.
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Thanks! The final tally after draining the uncapping tank is 240 lbs from the 3 hives. Tomorrow I’ll get an early start and harvest the remainder of the hives before the heat sets in and then I can do my uncapping and extracting in the air-conditioning
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It’s something I learned from talks at the Australian Bee Congress:
You want your hives strong BEFORE the major flow for good production.
Just now to figure out for your locality how to achieve that.
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While this is very logical, you have to be a bit careful. If you stimulate the hive to make a lot of bees too early in Spring, some very experienced beekeepers have seen them starve before the nectar flow starts. 
You may even need to feed them, as they can go through what was left of their winter stores very quickly.
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