Regrets and Fear

Last Thursday, June 3rd, I checked on my hives after leveling them on May 31st. They were level to begin with, but settling and the amount of rain we’ve received made one side of my hive stand sink a bit. I think that has had a lot to do with the wonky comb they’ve been building. The new stuff seems to be better. Yay. I will periodically check on that. Now, on to Thursday. I opened the top to check the feeders. Everything is sticky, so sometimes when I check the feed levels, it moves the feeder and the inside of the hive see sunlight. This does not bother Frigga, my Italian queen hive. Galadriel, on the other hand, has a conniption fit if they see sunlight. Even after getting Galadriel closed up, one girl would not let up on chasing me. She ended up stinging me on my left hand, less than a centimeter from my pinky knuckle. It hurt so much that I could not wash my hands or bend that finger without screaming in pain for the day. It wasn’t pleasant.

I was hoping to do a hive inspection on both hives this past weekend. However, that did not happen. When the weather makes you believe it’s going to rain any second now, you just don’t want to risk it. However, since I didn’t see my Frigga queen during my last inspection, I really wanted to get out there. Also, I need to make sure I get second deeps on the hives if they’re needed and boy howdy are they needed!! I always start with my hot hive. I don’t know why. Probably because getting into it and over with means it’s not hanging over my head that I have to get into that hive next. They’re doing well. Galadriel isn’t bringing in as much pollen, but they’re building comb and doing well. They just hate me for daring to do what I can to take care of them.

At least once I had the hive closed up and their feeders filled, those girls stopped going after me this time. They calmed down and returned to business as usual. Thank goodness. Sometimes I get a real hot headed one who won’t quit until she’s gotten me, i.e. the girl who popped me on Thursday.

Now, Frigga is a completely different story. Those girls don’t get spicy unless I do something stupid like jostle a frame and hurt some bees or make them think they’re under attack. That anger I understand. Silly human upset the bees. No worries. I deserve their ire. That was definitely the case on my last inspection. This inspection, those girls were a complete dream!

I was careful about moving the feeders so no bees got caught underneath them. That is one thing I do not like about these Apimaye hives; there is no other cover to put over the frames except the feeders and then the cover. I’d really like for there to be something else I could cover the frames with. In my inspection, I found the queen. There was so much brood! Both hives have started having some drone brood. Not sure they’re going to be useful at this time of year, but they’re both doing it. I didn’t find eggs in either hive, but I found the queens and saw larva in different stages of development. I couldn’t see out of my glasses due to sweat dripping on them, so I didn’t even have them on during the Frigga inspection. I’m not worried. Everything was in order.

My only other worry was finding queen cups. Queen cups are usually just the bees practicing to making a queen cell just in case something happens to the queen. Neither cup was sealed, but they make me a bit nervous. There were enough bees in the hive that six frames were solidly covered with bees. One side of the seventh frame was covered and was being drawn out. I don’t know how many foragers were still foraging, but there was a frenzy of returning to the hive as I was writing my notes. It started to rain about half an hour after my inspection was complete.

Also in the above picture, you can see a close up of the worker bee brood. There is going to be yet another population explosion in the next week or so. In the bottom left hand corner you can see the drone brood. Drones are the biggest bees in the hive. The bees make comb that’s bigger in diameter than worker bee comb. When the queen lays an egg, she first measures the size of the hole she’s about to lay in to determine whether she needs to lay a fertilized egg, which results in a worker bee, or an unfertilized egg, which results in a drone. The comb doesn’t get drawn out deeper, so when they go into their cocoon stage, they bulge away from the comb instead of being relatively flat like the worker bee brood.

I never imagined either of these hives would be this far along and ready for more room a mere two months after starting from a mix of unrelated bees with a queen they were introduced to when they were all dumped in the bee bus. I don’t care for the temperament of one of my hives, but I went into it with eyes wide open. I was told Russian bees tend to be hotter, but produce more honey. I guess next year, hopefully, I’ll get to put that one to the test. At least I have one hive that doesn’t want to light me up every time sunlight enters the hive. Frigga is getting another deep on the next rain-free day. Galadriel is going to wait until after the next inspection. If enough bees go after me and die stinging me, the hive might not need more space!

As always, if you have any questions, just ask! I’ll do my best to answer. If I can’t, I know how to find someone who can!