Drstratton - My Backyard Journey Journal

[fuzzi]

Good morning all and happy Wednesday!

Waxing foundations for a new honey super. I don't expect this to be drawn and filled. But, we are hoping for more drawn comb for next season.

I've probably said this before, but I've learned that it's best to wax the foundations before popping them into the frames. If you wax after it's in the frame it can warp. It also allows me to get wax all of the way to the edge. I warm a block of wax and use it like a crayon.

View attachment 120638

Crayons are made of wax.

 

[Baymule]

Yes, they were hatched on April 30th. I'm calculating she was actually a couple of days over 14 weeks.

Definitely sooner than I was thinking. But, I knew she was close.

This is Astrid! She's an Aquila. Which is a cross of a Black Australorp and Rhode Island Red, with a little White Plymouth Rock mixed in. She matured very quickly. I have a Barred Plymouth Rock, that looks just as close to laying.

This was taken on August 13th.
View attachment 120620

A cross of Australorp and Rhode Island Red is a sex link. They lay like crazy the first 2 years then slack off after that. Astrid even has a little White Plymouth Rock mixed in, great barnyard mix!

 

[drstratton]

A cross of Australorp and Rhode Island Red is a sex link. They lay like crazy the first 2 years then slack off after that. Astrid even has a little White Plymouth Rock mixed in, great barnyard mix!

Thank you for that information. I'm hoping the different genetics will mean they will be healthy for a long time.

 

[drstratton]

Visiting the bees this morning, took a couple of videos. They are busy, bringing in pollen and nectar from the buckwheat. Then I sat down to look at the videos and one of the bees decided I needed to move along. She bumped my head a couple of times and chased me off... It's that time of year!

They are so loud.

 

[drstratton]

Pulled a drone frame from the freezer today. It was from hive #1 on July 22nd. We removed it from the hive as soon as they were capped, so the mites did not have much chance to do anything in the cells. This frame was not intended for drones. It's the frame we were hoping to get honeycomb from. I cut the comb off and froze it. We then placed the empty frame back in. Upon last inspection, they had rebuilt the comb and were finally filling it with nectar. I will share a picture when we pull it.

I found over 20 mites, looked like only one per cell. If allowed to hatch out there is the potential of around 80 or more mites exploding into the hive. just from the ones I found.

Mites crawl into the cells just before they are capped. They first lay a male egg and then several female eggs. The eggs hatch, feed off of the larva, mature and the females mate with the male. When the Drones emerge the mites also emerge and attach to other bees. Their process then continues to repeat. A hive can be quickly overwhelmed, weakened and then die off from disease if not managed. Some bees are very hygienic, meaning they will pull bees out of cells if they sense something is wrong with them.

We also pulled a drone frame from hive #2 today. We placed it in the freezer. In 3 or more days we will pull it and place it back into hive. The workers will clean out the cells and prepare it for more eggs.

A healthy protein treat for the chickens!

They devoured it.

 

[drstratton]

We had intended to only place a super today, then I remembered we had a drone frame that needed to be pulled as shown above.

Inspection went well, the bees were mostly calm. I was a little concerned after getting buzzed off earlier...lol

We saw lots of bees, eggs, larvae, capped brood, nectar, bee bread and capped honey in the deep boxes. We are very pleased with the amount of honey in the deep boxes as the double deeps are what we will leave them with over winter. Supplemented with candy boards.

We have also decided to add another super to the package and swarm hives. Just need to put some frames together and add wax. I think I will also expand my experiment. Maybe splitting 4 & 4 in one and checkerboarding in the other.

 

[Baymule]

So the drone frames are bait for the mites? Pretty smart, getting rid of the mites like that.

 

[drstratton]

So the drone frames are bait for the mites? Pretty smart, getting rid of the mites like that.

Yes, it's kind of a raw deal for the drones, but it saves a lot of bees. We're trying to do this as naturally as we can. Hoping to use just this and Oxalic Acid.

We have pads with with Oxalic acid in the hives right now, they last for 3 months. We're starting a regimen of Oxalic acid vapor tonight. We will apply it every 3 days for 28 days. That allows for catching mites before they go into the cells and catching them as the bees emerge plus a buffer window on the end. Workers in 21 days, drones in 24.

 

[drstratton]

Just finished our first treatment. We waited until after dark. The bees were not very happy, but hopefully this regimen will help to mostly eradicate the mites.

 

[drstratton]

Happy Friday! Well, I'm trying to be happy. It looks like I now have 4 cats and none of them were ever mine.
This girl showed up while we were gone. She let's my grandchildren pet her and pick her up. She jumps up in your lap, she tries to run in the house and I think she is pregnant... Pretty sure someone dumped her. People are so irresponsible.

What am I supposed to do, she's so sweet.