The Queen is Free!

After work I rushed home to check on how the queen was doing. The bees were upset that I was checking in on them. It was 41 degrees F today and windy, which is too cold for my bees, so they did not appreciate me lifting the top off their house. I managed to grab the queen box however and -- hurray! The queen was out.
I suspect she was in the hive leading the bees on activities. I hope so anyway. I won't know for a few more days. When I check the hive again hopefully there will be drawn comb with little bee eggs. If I see that I can rest easy for awhile.
I am not sure how I could have avoided this blunder, but putting the queen box between the frames separates the frames and creates a big enough space to build extra comb.
Instead of making comb on the frames provided, the bees decided to get creative. The smaller comb pictured above was on the queen's box and the larger comb was hanging off the side of a frame. The bees got snarky when I took their comb away, which is understandable. I was impressed with the amount of work they did in five days, but if unchecked it would have caused big problems. In hindsight the queen was probably on the comb when I yanked it which likely led to to the colony snarkiness. I didn't get stung, but one bee really wanted to get to me through my glove.

In any case it looks like things will be better and now that I've removed the creative comb and queen box, the bees are on the right track. I will check in on the little ladies in a few days.

Queen Check

When starting a hive with a new queen the instructions are to check the hive in three days to see if the queen has been let out of her queen-box,

There is a 'candy' plug (the white stuff) that the queen and her bee sisters eat through to make a little tunnel for the queen to escape. This is done so the queen and the workers have time to get to know each other in the new hive (accept the queen).
My favorite tool so far is the paintbrush. I can sweep the bees where I want them without hurting them or upsetting them too much.
Here is the hive on day three. The queen-box is wedged between the two frames about 3/4 the way to the far end. It is where the gap-space between the frames is connected with bees.
The queen was still in her box, but it loos like they had made good progress eating through. I will give them another day and a half and check again. When I put the queen-box back I dropped it in the bottom of the hive. I used a piece of bent wire to retrieve it instead of putting my hand in the hive. I feel like a bit of a wimp about that but I think it was the right thing to do.
I was able to grab the little piece if wire-mesh hanging from the box with my wire. As you can see, the bees have already started making comb on it. I didn't have the heart to take it off.
Later in the day I got to see my bees kick-out a small half wasp half bee looking thing from the hive. I also got to see bees returning to the hive with pollen (pictured above). Which is impressive since not much is blooming yet.
Since Ilana is gone I took the liberty of moving this bush, which I have been wanting to transplant for about a year. It is a privacy bush to keep people on the street from seeing my bees... a modesty shrub. As you can see it is pretty big and and transplanting it might kill it, but I am glad I did it.

New Hampshire Bee prison

Scott keeps his bees in a big cage to keep the bears away. These pictures are for uncle Rob, who started keeping bees before any of us and wants to take it back up... but the bears keep assaulting his hives. I hope these pictures give you some good ideas.

Note the center post, to keep the top fence from caving in when the bears climb on top of the cage.

Zom -Bees

Yesterday, after I installed my package of bees, I left the box they came in by the front of the hive. This was so the bees that weren't shaken out could climb/fly into their new home at their own speed. I then took Ilana and Alden to the airport (around 3:30) and when I got back all the bees in the box seemed to be dead. It was still and quiet and none of the bees were moving. It was in the low forties yesterday and windy and pretty cold so I figured they got stressed and I was a bad bee keeper for losing around 200 bees on my first day. I brought the box inside, thinking that one or two bees might still be alive and I could reunite them with their family tomorrow. I put the box (with a cover on the opening) on the kitchen counter and over about three hours all the bees woke up and started buzzing angrily. When I turned off the kitchen light and they calmed down. When I went back in the kitchen to get a sandwich they all got upset and made their high-pitched, back-off-pal buzz. Anyway I am glad they are alive and I need to figure how to get them to their hive today despite the rain and wind storms...

Here are the remaining bees that I thought were dead . I I am calling them zom-bees. Fortunately, there was a break in the bad weather and I timed putting the zom-bees out really well. They all went into the hive by 3pm. I am a good bee keeper after all.

Bees!

Here we are Friday . I took the day off work and set up the bee boxes on their stand. Alden helps by sticking a screwdriver in the extra escape hole of the hive. On Saturday the bees arrive. I bring them home and chat with them over a cup of coffee. Alden and Ilana welcome them as well. A package of bees has about three pounds of bees in it, which amounts to about 10,000 all together, although I didn't count. They are all huddled like that because they are cold. Despite being mid-April it was only about 45 degrees F on that day. I thought we had some good video of me banging the bees out of their box into their hive, but my doing that coincided with Alden deciding he was scared of our neighbors totally friendly and harmless dog. So Alden was being wrangled and soothed and the moment was not captured. After I poured the bees into their hive I gave them some food (sugar water) and medicine and put the box outside the hive so the remaining stragglers could find their way in. Here is a close-up of them checking out their new home.

April Fools Weather

Three days ago here is the scene. Sun is out, the porch is warm, little sprouts are coming up... It is so warm Alden feels compelled to take his clothes off and streak around.
Actually Alden will take is clothes off and streak around for any number or reasons, but in this case I do believe it was because of the warmth.

Here is the picture today.
We got about a foot of heavy, wet, sloppy snow. The high today was 32 degrees.
In four days they say the high will be 54 degrees, but it is a hit to the psyche to have to shovel the driveway one last time after you thought you were done with that nonsense.

Maple Sunday 2011

Joseph came for his third Maine Maple Sunday visit, this makes three years in a row so we believe it is officially a tradition. For those not in the know Maine Maple Sunday is the last Sunday in March where local farms in Maine open their doors to show people how they make syrup and sell pancakes. On the surface this sounds great, but in reality it is usually crazy-cold and there are big lines for pancakes. Note the line in the background.

So the way it works is one person stands in line for half an hour while Alden and the other adults go look at the animals in the warm barn. The barn had piglets this time which was very cool, as well as bunnies, chickens, cows, and turkeys

I think three years ago was near the end of the free-pancake era. Most places charge for breakfast these days. I can see the business logic to that, even though folks who attend MMS buy loads of syrup and syrup-related products. The place we chose this time charged $11 for a pancake breakfast which seems a bit much. Although you do feel like a rich how-de-do eating your pancakes looking out the window at the freezing bastards waiting in line to get in.

Of course, Alden loves the food (syrup) once he is inside, and really liked looking at the animals for 20 out of the 30 minute wait.

We may just go out to see the animals and buy syrup next year and then invite our friends over to our house for pancakes... we will see how we feel 365 days from now.

Bee Keeping

This December I decided I should try being an apiarist come spring. It made gift giving for the holidays easy for folks and I am still grateful for the great books my brother Geoffrey gave me and all other bee related monies gifted from many others once I read the books and figured out what I needed.

In January I signed up for a bee class that started in late-February that would fill in the gaps in on my knowledge base. The class will culminate with a package of bees arriving April 15 (thank you to Barbara and Ben for this.)

Last week Karen, Alden and I went to a beehive factory near Coopers Mill Maine and picked up Beehive parts.
The parts we got were enough for one colony of bees . Two deep supers and one medium super, with frames and wax foundations for them all, top covers and a screen bottom board.
The unassembled hives were stored in the basement for about a two weeks until I got around to building them. It was a good to wait because it was fun to do the project with Joseph when he came for his visit.

Like most of my projects, building the hives took longer than expected. Partly because I under-estimate this kind of thing and also because I am a perfectionist about things that probably won't ever matter. (In case you're wondering, Maker's Mark makes the assembly smoother.)
The boxes now need to be painted and then they can then be placed in the backyard.

Play Date

Alden had a play date at Sophia's house this weekend. She promptly took his hand and they disappeared into her room for a solid half an hour before Alden realized that there were no adults around and started getting nervous. He took a basket of plastic food out of Sophia's room down to the living room where we had gathered for tea and asked me to play groceries with him. I think Sophia was a little hurt by the snub. We eventually convinced Alden to resume a game of hide-and-go-seek with Sophia and they got back into the swing of things. It was really nice not to have to entertain a kid constantly or to be interrupted every 30 seconds with a gastronomic demand or ploy for attention. I got to talk gardens with Sophia's folks and enjoy some wonderful dal and cheese sandwiches for lunch. Yay play dates!

First Big Thaw

I'm not saying that Spring is on the way, but the past two days have been above freezing and we have lost about a foot foot of about the four feet of snow that is on the ground. Maine does this every season, a week or two of warmth in March to get everyone excited, followed by a cold snap and a mid-April blizzard. I will just enjoy the idea of spring for now.