The Package is Installed

New honeybee package

April, 23 2011

Chanhassen: I was lucky this year, I did not have to drive to Stillwater, MN after all to get my package of honeybees.  Someone picked them up for me, and I got them on Thursday (4/21) afternoon. Since it was gloomy, rainy and grey on Friday, the package waited in the garage. I sprayed the bees with sugar syrup every 4 to 6 hours, mostly to calm them.
The honeybees travel from California with a can of syrup, so I knew they had food. As you can see in the package they cluster, to keep themselves and the queen warm and safe.
At this point, the queen is in an individual cage, and has been with this group of bees for 4 days. The 3,000 honeybees  are not related to the queen. The queen has been raised and mated in sunny California. Now she has all the eggs she will need in her lifetime. However, by placing the queen in a "queen-cage" protects her from being killed, and at the same time, she is able to disseminate her pheromone "her specific scent" to her "adopted" honeybees. Therefore when I put them in their hive, the honeybees will accept her readily.

More on the installation later.

Partial Reversal of Boxes

April 17, 2011:
Shakopee

 We took advantage of the sunshine and drove to Shakopee where the bridge was finally open!  

Shakopee #1

Our purple hive, (now called Shakopee #1) is doing fantastic. We saw lots of brood, eggs and larvae which are a very good sign. We did not locate the queen but we know by all that activity that she is laying eggs, and is in good "spring" shape! We also observe some glistening nectar that was deposited in the cells. Honeybees are working hard. We don't see a lot of flowers yet but the bees collect tree nectar right now, and the flow is very good at the moment.

Taken from: Beekeeping in Northern Climates by Dr. Furgala, Dr. Spivak and Mr. Reuter

We also did a "partial reversal", where we take the first box and switch it with the one below. It is suppose to help in preventing swarming, giving the queen more room to lay eggs. It has to be done at the same time every year, no matter what...just like "Tax Day" is unavoidable! It has to be done.

The honeybees are so cute and golden fuzzy; it makes me smile :) They were busy, coming and going.

I saw few ants around and on the hive, so I sprinkled some powder cinnamon on the ground. It is effective to repulse ants.

Shakopee #2 Waiting for honeybees.

This is Shakopee #2, this hive had the Carniolan bees and we lost them to starvation. It has been clean and now waits for honeybees that will come from Shakopee #1 when we do a division or split later this spring. 

Chanhassen

We stopped in Chanhassen, the sun was still shining but a little bit of wind developed. We felt colder. We were greeted by our friends Liz, Gayle, Dick and 2 puppies coming out from their house to hear some fresh news about the honeybee buzzing in their yard.

Chanhassen #1

We inspected the first colony, Chan.#1. Made also a partial reversal,  removed all corks covering entrances, and had a large entrance opened. It was a busy place. The honeybees were flying in and out, and all around us. It seems that they were happy to get some fresh air. We looked at frames and everything looked perfect, eggs, brood, nectar and discovered a "new" queen; she was unpainted! Ours had been painted blue in July 2010, indicating the year "2010". No wonder this colony is looking great.

Chanhassen  #1, beautiful!

Chanhassen #2

Chanhassen #2,  is only 2 deep (2 boxes) because it was a swarm that Ben caught from Chan #1. However, even though it is small hive. It was also doing great, full of honey and bees. Even with only 2 boxes, a partial reversal was done, cork removed, and larger entrance was in place. 

Chanhassen #3

                      Chanhassen #3 is ready to welcome the new package of  honeybees, and a queen. We transferred the frames of honey from Shakopee #2. This will give the new honeybees a wonderful head start. The "bee pickup" is still schedule for April 23 in Stillwater, MN. 

Busy Bees

The little empty colony in Shakopee, awaiting new bees from California.

April 1st. 2011:  We visited our honeybees. To our astonishment they did not touch the pollen patties that Ben and Sophie had placed 10 days or so ago. This can only  mean that our bees have enough food (honey and stored pollen) and that most importantly they can reach their bounty.

Pollen patties left untouched by the bees.

Since temperatures are increasing slowly, the honeybees can move around better, and investigate other part of their hive where they had deposited their summer and fall harvest.

It was very comforting to see them buzzing around us, they did not feel frightened...maybe they remembered us. Ben had the smoker ready and we used it to remind them that we were going to look into their hive.

Ben is removing the protective cardboard.

Now that we believe Spring is here to stay, we removed the black cardboard from each hive. This protection is now unnecessary as the temperatures oscillate between 25F to 50F (-3C & 10C). The honeybees can regulate the warmth of  their colony better.

We also cleaned up the dead bees, those are the one that expired because of old  age. Since most entrances are closed (except the top one) for the winter and bees have to stay in a cluster during the harsh months to stay alive and protect the queen, no cleaning from them is done. In doing so ourselves, we are helping them. Otherwise the honeybees would have to carry each body away from their colony, a long and strenuous job. They can enjoy Spring too!

Dead honeybees at the bottom of a colony.

Scraping unwanted combs.

Many buds on trees are ready to explode and the honeybees are ready to visit them and collect the nectar, pollen and propolis. It won't be long before you see the little one buzzing around in your garden and saying hello. Like us they are happy to be out, and like us they are waiting for nature to show itself.