Added a 2nd story to the bees hive

This last weekend was the big weekend, I opened the hive and looked around. The bees seemed to be doing well and building out the new frames. I decided even though they had not built out all of the new frames that I would add another box on top of the hive, with 10 more frames.

This was very fun, I didn't feel any pressure this time and was able to relax and enjoy working with them. I did get a video of it but the sounds wasn't working well and so it is boring to watch (even for me and I was there). I am going to get some of the pictures off of it and I will post them here.

One thing that has happened that has been fun is that Mary Lou and I have become bee watchers. It surprised me how relaxing, yes I said relaxing, it is to sit and watch the bees going in and out of the hive. Sometimes we just sit there watching the bees and talking about the day. It is like sitting by the campfire and watching it burn, kind of hypnotizing.

The plan now is to leave the hive alone for about a month, except to fee them, and let them build things up. Then hopefully it will warm up here and I will be able to put the queen excluder (a grate that keeps the queen bee from getting to the upper boxes) on and then start putting on boxes that they will put MY HONEY in. If all goes well I will be harvesting honey in August or September.

Home at last

Today was the big day! I was able to transfer the bees to their final home. I donned the bee suit in anticipation of opening the lid to the nuc and seeing how many bees there actuality were in that box. The new hive was ready, the bee suit was on, and the camera was rolling, the moment had finally arrived. I opened the lid and wow, there were A LOT of bees, and this was in the middle of the day when many of them were out and about.

What a cool thing, the transfer went smoothly and I was able to see the queen bee on one of the frames. The hive looks healthy and well established, so we will see in another week how they are adjusting to their new home. At least I get to open the hive top every couple of days to feed them.

You can see the video at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPSUzV9o4Og

Guess who came to dinner

I decided it was time to feed the bees and because they are the only ones in the area (or so I thought) it would be ok to use an external feeder. I was amazed when I looked at the feeder and saw all of the bees. There were hundreds of bees and all of them hungry. I filled up the feeder in the morning with about 2-2.5 quarts of sugar syrup in the morning and by five pm it was bone dry empty. I couldn't believe how many bees there were and how fast they went through all of the food. It wasn't until later that day when I found out that they had put bees in the orchard (less then 1/4 of a mile from the house) that it made sense what was happening and I learned that I need to wait until I get the bees in their hive and then feed them using an internal feeder so that the food will not be available for other bees.

I guess I still have a lot to learn.