Gordo's Brain

Hey, isn’t this weather amazing? Springtime is about six weeks ahead of last year in this area. Heck, it was 22C here today! That’s insane!

But, the bees are loving it. I’m not sure if I mentioned it, but the ladies were decimated over the winter: we lost 12 of 15 hives. No mysteries, though: most of them starved. Last year was pretty rotten for storing honey and most of them went into winter low on stores. The warm winter kept them active and they burned through those stores more quickly than they would have in a typical winter. Several had moisture issues, mice wreaked havoc in a few more and a weasel set up camp in one hive, urinating and defecating on top the honey storage part of the hive. The bees stayed away from the honey there.

Now, the good news: the three hives that did survive are going gangbusters with this early spring weather.

Two of them are the temperament that we like, too: calm. Very calm. First season, we coined the term Rasta Bees® to describe them: they were so laid back that they simply didn’t care that we were poking about in their home.

While losing 12/15 of the hives sounds catastrophic, it’s not an insurmountable situation. New hives can be started from exiting ones simply by moving some combs of eggs and larvae and their attendant workers into a new hive. The ladies very quickly realize that they don’t have a queen and will move a few of those eggs into special queen cells and raise a new queen. We started that process today.

Donor hives can be split every 2-3 weeks and new splits can enter that stream after 5-6. Greg’s calculated that with some judicious splitting, we will be at the 30-40 hive level around mid-July. For now, we have three hives and new split. And hopes.

I posted some more info over at SFA if you’re interested.

One Response to “Busy as a bee!”