June Frame

June Frame

Friday, June 28, 2013

Success..

Yea!!!

Success, or at least partially.  As I previously posted I was going to try and create a couple of splits from my hives.  I created 2 splits with both from several hive combinations, with one of  them being a split into 1 4-frame and the other going into a 10-frame box.  The 10-frame worked and the 4 frame didn't.  I think that even though I  believe I had enough resources in both the 4-frame didnt because if the robbing that started and even though I tried to stop it- I wasn't successful and eventually had to shake the remaining bees back into their respective hives.

I checked the 10-frame yesterday for queen activity (already given ip on the 4-frame a few days ago) and not only found her, but am glad to say she looks very fat and happy.  I've been feeding them on and off every several days and noticed/decided that even though their "supplies" seem to be ok - I think I'll feed them for a few weeks so they can draw out some more comb and give her plenty to lay in.

I'm saddened that the 4-frame didnt work, but decided to try again yesterday, specifically with the hive that I refer to as the "Nuc bomb".  This time u took a (almost full) frame if capped/in-capped honey and put into the 4-frame Nuc box.  I also added a few frames of brood and pollen along with their respective nurse bees, and 3 other full frame shakes.  I decided to also use a top entrance this time to see how they will react to it.  It only has about an inch opening, and with no external feed source they should be able to protect it w/o any issues.  I have the option to top feed with a quart jar, but will see how they do for a few days on their own.  I might have made a mistake by adding the honey-b-healthy to the sugar mix last time, so this time as I feed - it will be sugar water only.

I also toasted to my local bee buddy, "S" and he still wants to try some grafting off of my Nuc bomb. I bought the grafting cups and tool myself, but haven't had a chance to experiment yet.  Hopefully we'll be able to get the "cloak" board on their next week and get some good eggs for grafting.

I checked all the other hives while I was back there yesterday, and they seem to all be doing well.  I've started to see some more hive beetles, so ill have to make some changes this weekend to try and get bak on top of them.  The bees are handling them at the moment, but they can quickly get out of control so better to start now.

More later...

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