We waited until early evening so most of the bees were home and less active. There wasn't much activity around the crown board.
There were plenty of bees on top of the bottom brood box.
It seemed a good idea to give one or two puffs of smoke so we didn't squash any bees or get stung if one got in our way.
The smoke soon did the trick.
The bees seems to have a fair amount of stores (nectar/honey and pollen)
We think they also had a fair amount of capped brood. This is the area where the queen was last week. However, the sun was in my eyes and we were neither of us entirely sure what we were looking at.
The queen has now moved into the upper brood box, which was only added last week. Unfortunately she is very shy and was scurrying down, so we didn't want to keep the frame she was on out longer than necessary. Maybe next week I'll be quicker at taking her photo, but I hadn't really expected her to be in that box and assumed we'd missed her in the lower one.
These bees are quieter than the ones we work with on the course, so I felt happier about taking photos so close up.
Such an interesting 'hobby', I'll admit, you're braver than I would be in those photos! When can you expect to harvest honey?
ReplyDeleteIf we're lucky there might be some honey to harvest next Summer. It is interesting, but we will need to inspect them every week and then we should really show up at the local bee-keepers association at least one or two weekends a month, so it takes up a bit of time.
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