It was nice to see our queens in our nucs. Here is one laying eggs.

Can you find the queen on the frame below?

Hint: she’s about 1/3 of the way down, and 2/3 of the way over to the right.

Below are more photos of the overwintered frames of bees from our two nucs, as we put them into their new homes.  More in a few weeks when we see how they’ve expanded. We are giving them each 4 frames to grow into and lots of supplemental sugar to grow on.

We have two new nucs from Wildflower Meadows to replace the hives which died at the end of last summer (we think from being robbed of their honey).  Ants were attacking the nuc in the lower garden, so we quickly got on that and put tanglefoot around the legs of the stand.  Next Saturday, after a week, we’ll move the frames into our supers.

6/4/13

Opened hives and re-hived into large size supers

Hive 1

1. did not see queen
2. 6 large old frames

Hive 2:

1. 6 short frames

Hive 3:

1. 2 long frames from old nuc

Beekeeping is a family affair:

6/5/13

Hive 1:

humming

Hive 2:

humming

Hive 3:

1. Saw queen,

6/24/13

Hive 1:

1. Queen in good health
2. 15-20 drone cells

6/25/13

Hive 1:

1. Bearding started at sunset. At max, was 500+ bees at 3AM. Reduced opening to 4″ and made 1/4″ lift on top for ventilation
2. Bearding subsided after 2 days

6/2/13

Removed bees from RSF Community Center in rescue.

Hive 2:

1. 6 short frames

Hive 3:

1. 2 long frames

5/31/13

Hive 1 (we picked up 6 frames of bees with a queen from Otto at Safe Live Bees. He thinks they are Italian)

We saw a queen in the colony and installed the frames in a super. Ottos frames are very dark and old and we hope the bees will move into the new frames in the super.