The new queen arrived today, in a cage with seven attendants. The queen is marked with a blue tag, indicating that she was born in 2005. Vinfille took a picture of the cage, sitting on her desk. You can see the blue tag on the queen's thorax:
So we placed the cage in the hive, wedged between two frames of foundation. Immediately, bees began mobbing the cage, biting the wire and trying to get to the queen. We wished her luck and put the cover back on the hive. In four days, I will visit the hive to see if they have accepted her yet, and release her if they have.
Of course, I could not resist peeking into the other hive to see how they are doing. Almost all the frames in the top hive body have been drawn out, and the hive is crowded with bees. Very happy-making for the new beekeeper! This weekend, I will perform a full reversal and add an empty honey super on top. Soon I will have yummy, yummy comb honey.
This morning I went in to prepare the queenless hive for queen introduction. I performed a more detailed and thorough examination, and I suspect that the old queen failed due to old age or sickness. There was brood, some capped pupae and larvae, but the pattern was spotty, and there were zero eggs. So she must have become sick and started laying poorly before she either died or was killed by the bees. There were a few queen cells, which I removed. I put a sugar syrup feeder on top, and they should readily accept the new queen when I introduce her.
After putting the new queen in the hive for 2-3 days, I will manually introduce her into the hive. This will allow me to watch the reaction of the bees as she is released onto the comb. If they attack her, I can take remedial action to correct the situation. If not, at least I will be assured that she is alive and ready to start laying eggs.
The queen is coming via UPS, and is being sent to vinfille at work, since she will be there to receive the new queen. I do not want the UPS person to drop off the new queen at our house, where she will be sitting outside for who knows how long before we get home. I figure the caged queen should be a good conversation piece sitting on her desk.
Yesterday afternoon I conducted a hive inspection. One hive is still doing very well, but I suspect that one of the hives is not queenright. That is, the hive is either missing a queen entirely, or the queen is sick or injured, and unable to lay eggs. Clearly, this is very frustrating.
So today I ordered a new queen from Glenn Apiaries. They are shipping me a Minnesota Hygienic/SMR queen cross. She should be here on Wednesday, and I will introduce her as soon as I am able. She needs to start laying eggs as quickly as possible, since the loss of the old queen means that there will be no new bees emerging until at least 21 days after the new queen is accepted by the hive. Thus, the hive population will be dwindling from at least now until the time that new bees begin emerging from their cells. This can be a problem.
Insha Allah, introducing the new queen will go well, and the bees will be back on track to get through the winter.
Today was the sort of day for which I spend over half the year longing. It was hot, about 95 degrees, humid, and there was nary a cloud to be seen. Finally, I feel like my blood has thawed from the cold, savage winter past.
I spent all day in the yard puttering with the garden. All the flowers I plant are mid- to late-summer blooming, so things are finally starting to open up. The Bee Balm is finally starting to flower, something which brings great joy to my heart. Here is a picture of one of the flowers:
Here is a picture of a Hairy Woodpecker relaxing on the Finch feeder in the back yard:
Finally, while I was taking some pictures my dog felt like playing, so I chased her around, camera in hand. I snapped some pictures while I was chasing her, and I like how this one turned out. The picture is fuzzy, crooked, and not at all well taken, but I love it, anyway. And yes, she is going around a Mulberry bush:
I visited my honeybee hives today. The roses are now blooming, and I managed to get a couple of pictures of honeybees working the roses. Enjoy:
