Been a while…
I’m still here! Bees are still here! Honestly, everything is going great. Mostly. Mostly. If I say mostly great enough, maybe I’ll begin to believe it. I feel like a first time mom all over again, only I’m not getting up in the middle of the night for diaper changes and feedings. The worry about my girls (and a few guys) feels very similar. NOT at the same level, but similar.
I have a good reason to worry about them. On Thursday, May 13th, I went out to put some food in their feeders because we’re in for eight, twelve, eighteen days of rain. I don’t know, but I do know we are getting April rain in May since we got snow in April. Get your head on straight, weather. Anyway, when I entered the apiary, there were bee parts all over Galadriel and several of the cement blocks. I kinda panicked. What would do this to my girls?
I sent a message to these fabulous people on the book of many faces. They assured me it sounds like a bird discovered the hives and had a little snack. It might look like a massacre, but it probably enjoyed, at most, ten bees. I don’t want ANY of my girls to become a snack for any birds! When I went out there moments ago, carnage is still gone! Yeah, so it rained yesterday, but I’m confident no more bees have become food.
Since the feeders are right above my frames, when I check if they need food, I move the feeder over and look down into the hives to see if they’ve started building comb because both hives are sticking to just one side of the hive. It’s odd, but they’re thriving. I’m not too worried about it, yet.
There are a lot of blond fuzzy bees in both of my hives. All that capped brood (bee larva in their cocoon in the comb) I saw in my inspection on the 13th is starting to hatch and I am so freaking excited! We have rain on the forecast every day for the next ten days, so I don’t know when I’ll get to do an inspection to see if I’m right about all the baby bees hatching. It’s one of those deals where I’ll just have to see what the radar tells me for that day.
I am really enjoying this new hobby! Any question, just ask! If I can’t answer them (and there are good odds I won’t know the answer) there are people I can ask!
