Rare sight today as a new queen returns back to the hive after mating! For most colonies, honey bees will only replace their queen once every three to four years. When the colony deems it necessary to raise a new queen, larva is carefully selected, fed “royal jelly” and is encapsulated with a beeswax queen Read more about Rare Sight – Mated Queen Returns To Hive[…]
Have you ever been curious about where bees go in the winter? Why do we never see bees flying during the winter season? All insects have different ways of handling the cold of winter. Some hibernate, some die, and some stay right where they are. On January 10, 2016 we went to the hives with Read more about Winterization Of Honey Bees[…]
The hives are growing! On Sunday, April 26, 2015 we observed the miraculous birth of a new bee being born into the hive. This was our fourth hive check and we noticed there were empty brood cells in the middle of the frames. Inside some of these cells we saw a tiny rice sized shape. Read more about Birth Of A Bee[…]
Today was an exciting experience. Alex and I visited all three hives to check for the release of the queens. We are happy to report that all three queens were successfully released from their cages and happily making their way around the hive. We also saw signs of drawn honeycomb in each hive with nectar Read more about Hunt for the Queen![…]
Today, we returned to each hive to remove the wooden packages and replace the 5 frames we removed during the hiving yesterday. It was incredible to see the bees active and moving around the hive for the first time! Today was sunny and good temperatures (about 60F) so there were many bees out and about.
On March 31, 2015 we released our Italian bees into our Langstroth hives (on the Southwest Conservation Club’s property). Since the weather was under an average of 40F, our installation procedure was a bit different the usual process (we did not “shake” the bees into the hive). We began by removing 5 brood (deep) frames Read more about Hiving the Bees![…]