Getting Metpropolis Ready for Fall/Winter

Yesterday, I spent the afternoon moving bars of honey around in the top bar hive, Metpropolis. The hive surprised me. I'd been thinking that, while watching from the outside the last few days, it was rather weak. This was not the case. It is thriving with much capped honey, a healthy looking queen, and a solid population. I cannot say the same with the other top bar hive, Plan Bee... . I looks like it was weakened and robbed in some way. It is essentially dead! This was a surprise as well because in August it looked like the strongest hive I had. I fed sugar syrup and pollen patties to the other hives. They seem to be doing well just like Metpropolis.

Inspections: Top Bars Only Good

I went out late morning to inspect my two top bar hives as storm clouds started blowing into Winona.

I went to inspect the hives with a bit of fear and discouragement. I was disappointed with the langstroths the last two days and expected the same in the top bars. Fortunately, I was pleasantly surprised as both top bar hives are healthy and productive.

Both Metpropolis and Plan Bee... had stored away an abundance of honey already and the brood patterns, though not perfect, were solid. Larvae could be found at all levels of development. I did not find either queen in the hustle and bustle of workers and drones. I added an empty bar between the honey area and brood nest of each hive.

I might harvest a bar of capped honey from each hive next week.

Top Bar Inspections

I inspected the two top bar hives at noon today. I didn't think the weather was going to allow this but the cloud cover broke up and the bees decided to cooperate.

Plan Bee... is doing very well. I did not see the queen but I saw evidence she's there and healthy. There were all stages of brood in the hive and the brood pattern was solid. The bees are storing much nectar and pollen.

Metpropolis is doing well though, it seems, somewhat behind Plan Bee... The same healthy brood pattern (and I did see the queen here) but less bars drawn and less nectar stored. I am not necessarily worried about this as it seems, overall, that the honeybees are doing well otherwise.

I placed two empty bars in each hive, one on each end between the brood nest and honey storage area. I opened another entrance on each.

I also took the entrance reducers off of each langstroth.

Video: A Trip Through Beelandia

I decided to video Beelandia today. I hope you enjoy watching the bees active outside their hive.

Yesterday's Top Bar Inspection

Another scorching day in Beelandia yesterday where I inspected the two top bar hives: Plan Bee... and Metpropolis. Again the weather was hot and muggy with very little breeze.

Both hives were in a similar state.

I had worried needlessly two inspections ago about the state of Plan Bee... and the nature of its brood pattern. I am happy to report that things are going well in this hive. Plenty of brood, good pattern, and the bees have begun to store away honey on the edges. The queen looks fine. I did accidentally break some comb in the hive but wired it together a bit. The bees should repair the rest. I did add two undrawn bars to either side of the brood nest.

The same report can be made of Metpropolis minus the breaking of comb. The queen is laying well, good pattern, and the bees are starting to store away honey on the edges. I also added to undrawn bars to the hive.

Today's Mite Count

I just checked the 24 hour mite count for 4 of my 5 hives. Here are the results:

1. Plan Bee... - 3 mites.
2. Worker Bees... 0 mites
3. Lib-BEE-taria 0 mites
4. Bee Glad... 0 mites

The sticky paper I placed under Metpropolis fell out during the night so no count was taken.

Last Tuesday's Inspection

Last Tuesday, I inspected all the hives in Beelandia. While it was sunny and reasonable warm, the wind was very gusty. I have caught the bees foraging Dutch White Clover, chives and mint on my property. I was a bit concerned about the bees since we had rainy and unseasonably cold conditions the previous week.

All the hives seem to be doing well. Plenty of larvae in all stages of development. They are bringing in pollen and the queens look large and healthy.

Drones have hatched in Plan Bee..., the largest top bar hive. I did not see any in the other hives.

I took off the top feeders but did leave a pollen patty in each hive. They have been consuming it and, with the rain and cold, I have worried about the bees diet.

Second Inspection

Yesterday I did the second inspection of the season for all the hives. I don't usually do them all at once but the weather hadn't been promising all week and, for the next few days, the weatherman predicted overcast skies and rainy conditions.

All the hives seem to be doing well except for Plan Bee..., one of the top bar hives. The queens were laying and the brood pattern was excellent. The bees have consumed the pollen substitute patties I had placed in last week.

I have some concerns about Plan Bee... . Everything seems to be going well except for the brood pattern which is spotty at best. I will watch this hive carefully and I may requeen from my own stock if it does not improve. I did not see any queen cells, however.

Moving Some Stores Around

I opened up both top bar hives yesterday in order to check honey stores and move bars around. Metpropolis, my problem hive this year, has absolutely no capped honey to speak of.  Plan Bee has a little more but still not enough to make it through winter. I left some fondant in both hives and hope that the bees are able to store some nectar in the next few weeks.

Yesterday's Inspections

Inspected both of my top bar hives yesterday. Our weather continues to be very hot, interspersed with heavy rains. The Beelandia Apiary is a real jungle right now.

I inspected Metpropolis first. While it is a booming hive population-wise, I am a bit concerned about it's real lack of store honey. Just one bar is filled with honey and I have not taken any honey from this hive this season. On the other hand, this hive is quite gentle. They don't seem to mind me inspecting a few combs.

Plan Bee seems to be doing much better than Metpropolis. It has plenty of capped honey and should store even more as the late flowering plants start blooming here. I am not very worried about this hive.

Top Bar Inspections, July 25th

The weather today was  muggy, 80 degree F, and  sunny. As usual this summer, we had rain the last two days.
 I was finally able to inspect the two  top bar hives.

Metpropolis is doing OK but is playing "catch-up" after its slow spring. The queen is active and laying. Her brood pattern is good. I would have liked the hive to have collected a bit more nectar but it should collect enough for the winter by the time October comes around. I do not expect to harvest any honey from this hive. I will monitor Metpropolis a bit since I found signs of chalk brood under the entrances.

Plan Bee... is even further behind Metpropolis though again is fine in most respects. I wonder if this is simply the effect of the rainy weather we've had through spring and summer, or whether this hive swarmed without me knowing.

The Importance of Being Patient

I inspected the two top bar hives today. The weather was perfect: mid eighties temps, slight breeze, sunshine. We had another torrential downpour of rain last night, leaving one large sunflower toppled.

I am so glad I did not requeen Metpropolis early this spring. The large beautiful queen seems quite prolific. She has been laying a nice solid brood pattern, and her offspring are very, very gentle. I would be happier if they had some more capped honey in the hive but they still have collected much nectar.

Plan Bee... has much less bees than Metpropolis, and the bees are nowhere as gentle. (I was stung 3 times on the left wrist while examining the hive. ) I did not see the queen although the egg-laying evidence indicates she is doing quite well. I added two bars to this hive.

Today's Inspections After 4 Days of Rain

This spring/summer has been exceptionally rainy, and the last 4 days have not broken this pattern. I was finally able to look into the top bar hives, and Atta Bee! today. The weather wasn't perfect but I can't ever be assured of that, it seems, this summer

Metpropolis is looking so great, especially compared to how it looked at the beginning of the season. The brood pattern is excellent with brood of all stages of development. The bees are storing plenty of nectar and pollen. They have begun to build a few queen cells, so I added two empty bars on either side of the brood nest. I did see Metpropolis' queen.

Plan Bee..., the other top bar, also looks fine...pretty much the same as Metpropolis though the bees seem a little more defensive. I did not see the queen during this inspection though I saw evidence of her good health.

Atta Bee! has started building into the second box. Plenty of open brood right now. The bees are bringing in an exceptional amount of pollen.

Finally Connected

I have been unable to connect to Blogger for the last 24 hours or so due to technical difficulties on their end, so I've been late with my last two reports.

Yesterday, I examined Plan Bee.... The bees are active and gentle with only one queen cup to be seen. However, I am a bit concerned about the brood pattern I saw. It was a bit too spotty for my liking. (I did not see the queen.) The bees in this hive are bringing in plenty of nectar and pollen. I had to close my inspection of this hive early as a freak shower developed toward the end of the inspection. This hive will be watched a bit.

Today, I examined Metpropolis, the other top bar hive. Readers know I have had concerns about this hive all season. I think the hive has shown a bit of an improvement. The brood pattern on some newly drawn comb looks rather good and the population of the hive seems a bit larger. I was concerned about what seemed to be a lack of food, so I added a comb of capped honey to the edge of the broodnest.

I also examined the 6 older nucs today. I am very pleased with how 4 out of the 6 nucs are doing. Four nucs seem to have productive queens with very good laying patterns. While showing signs of laying queens previously, the two other nucs don't seem to be doing well at all.

I have not looked into the two newer nucs I set up just two weeks ago.

Notes on Beelandia Today

Just a few bits of news from the Beelandia Apiary:

• Yesterday I took a 24 hour mite count of the three langstroth hives. All seems reasonable. Worker Bee had the lowest count with just two mites. Lib-BEE-taria had 16 and Bee Glad... had 12. The latter two hives will be watched more closely.
• Two of the five grafts done 5 days ago "took". Thursday I will place the queen cells in a mating nuc.
• I checked the mating nucs and 5 of 7 have laying queens. Next week I will check to see each queen's laying pattern.
• I inspected Plan Bee..., one of the top bar hives, today. I have this feeling that this hive is in preparation for swarming. The bees are feeling up the brood nest with nectar and the queen seems to have slowed down in her laying. Only one queen cell in evidence, however. I  took the bottom board off this hive and uncorked another entrance.

And Now For the Top Bars

I inspected my two top bar hives this afternoon.

I am still concerned about Metpropolis and am tempted to simply requeen it. The queen is alive and laying but the brood pattern is really spotty, possibly indicating an inbred queen. I will give it a week or two more.

Plan Bee... is booming with bees, larvae and eggs. I was unable to spot the queen but I did find one supersedure cell. I am not that concerned about this hive. It looks healthy and active. I might split it in the near future.

May 1st Inspection

In the late morning and early afternoon, I spent time inspecting 3 hives: Lib-BEE-taria, Worker Bees of the World Unite, and Plan Bee... .While the temperature was comfortable, it was very windy which made inspections difficult at times. This was especially so when examining the top bars of Plan Bee... that had new comb. I did get through the inspection without a sting. All three colonies were gentle, considering the windy conditions.

Lib-BEE-taria had bees working in all three brood boxes with plenty of brood, pollen and honey in each. The honeybees in this hive have stopped taking syrup from the feeder so I took that off when closing the colony up.

Worker Bees... was also doing well; so well I added a third box to the hive. I am continuing to feed sugar syrup to this one since they still consume it. Both Worker Bees... and Lib-BEE-taria were dusted with powdered sugar as routine maintenance for varroa mites.

Plan Bee..., one of the top bar hives, is simply thriving. I will probably have to split this one very soon. I did cut out some drone brood and found it full of varroa mites which concerns me. Yes, the bees are healthy but this quick glance at the mites sent up red flags. I am considering treating it with Apiguard.

Later in the afternoon, Beelandia had a few visitors. Molly and Mark brought their gold fish, Lala, over so that she could spend the summer in our pond, Lake No-Bee-Gone. I received two stings at this time, though Molly and Mark escaped without a scratch. Later in the afternoon, a young child named Toby came over with his adult entourage (grandparents and dad) for a tour as well. Toby donned a small bee suit and spent sometime asking some very good questions about the inhabitants of Beelandia. Toby's visit caused not a sting.

Hive Victorious

In a routine examination of Plan Bee..., a top bar hive, I discovered the Bee Bait the mouse at the bottom of the hive dead. Plan Bee... has disposed of its invading enemy and Beelandia is safe again!

"Bee Bait" the Mouse

This morning's task in the Beelandia apiary was to clean out the egg carton winter insulation I had placed on both sides of the follower boards in the top bar hive, Plan Bee... . As you may remember, this hive had an unwanted guest this winter, a mouse which daughter Eme has affectionately named Bee Bait. You can imagine the mess I found on one side of the colony: chewed up egg cartons and newspaper, mouse feces, etc. And, of course, as I dug further into the debris, I eventually found Bee Bait, fully alive in all his/her furry brown splendor.

Immediately, Bee Bait tried to hide in the remaining paper mess but I persisted up until the mouse decided to take off underneath the follower board and into the colony. I tried to follow but the bees would have none of it. Bee Bait's visit whipped them into a frenzy (i.e. one sting, so I backed off and simply continued to clean up the egg carton mess as best I could, making sure there was no place for the mouse to nest. When the bees calm down, I shall return.

Beelandia-- 3/13 - 3/14 2010

I was busy all weekend working in Beelandia. Saturday, a cloudy, rainy day of upper 40F degree temperatures, was spent carrying out the hay bales I had placed around each hive last fall. Except for a slip on some ice, everything went well. I was also able to sow some poppy, and bird's foot trefoil seeds as well. I was a muddy, tired mess after this activity but I accomplished much.

Sunday was a beautiful day with full sun, and temperatures in the lower 60s. I took the box quilts off each hive and, on the langstroths, replaced them with feeders filled with 1:1 sugar syrup. The top bar hives still had plenty of honey and so to those I added simply a pollen paddy. As I suspected, Plan Bee... has or had mice, though it doesn't seem to have hurt that hive any.

As the above video of Bee Glad... shows, the bees were very active this afternoon. All hives were doing orientation and cleansing flights, and many workers were bringing in some off-white substance in their pollen baskets.

I think we have a winner in the Name That Nuc Contest. David Hinck, SMU student, suggested I name the hive: Worker Bees of the World Unite. Thank you David!