Hive inspection and box reversal

[misfitmorgan]

lol i didnt mean sepcifically him...there are a lot. i like Wallsbeeman durham too.....he only has like 15 hives or so. There is a few other people with lesser numbers of hives like 5-10 and they do foundationless for cut comb...the one guy just puts a paint stick in the groove at the bottom and it seems to keep the bees building straight. What keeps them building straight in a top bar? the only thing i have seem is empty bars or a tiny peice of foundation stuck in the bar.

 

[Latestarter]

@Maggiesdad can go in depth and detail about the top bars... I know little to nothing about them.

 

[Happy Chooks]

@Maggiesdad can go in depth and detail about the top bars... I know little to nothing about them.

Ditto that!

 

[Happy Chooks]

First major inspection today, as the temps were in the low 70's. After 10 days of solid rain, the front of my hives were covered in bee poop. They were happy to be out and about again.

Hive #2 (the small hive) got inspected first. I saw a small clump of wax moth larvae under the pollen left from last year. Scraped out the comb and squished the larvae. It looks like the bees were trying to take care of them, several were around the area where they were. No brood was in that frame, so it didn't take much, and I moved on. I saw my queen, and the brood pattern is looking great. LOTS of fuzzy, pale colored brand new bees. They haven't started expanding into the nearby frames or drawing comb yet, but they have good pollen and nectar stores for the brood they are raising. Put a fresh feeder on them, and closed them back up.

Then for the main hive, I figured I had better light my smoker first. Got it done and smoked the hive before getting into it. The top box had nice brood patterns, eggs and good honey storage. The bees were not back up to using the entire box yet, but had 3/4 of it occupied. I didn't see the queen, but I usually don't when I use smoke. I figure with the great weather and blooms, they are going to expand fast, so I decided to look in the bottom box. As I suspected, it was empty, just comb. So I reversed the boxes and closed up the hive. I came down to make more syrup for them, and I'll take it up in just a bit.

So, spring is off to a good start. Hopefully I'll get a good honey crop this year.

 

[Maggiesdad]

...the one guy just puts a paint stick in the groove at the bottom and it seems to keep the bees building straight. What keeps them building straight in a top bar? the only thing i have seem is empty bars or a tiny peice of foundation stuck in the bar.

You can do a paint stick and groove on a topbar, too. Some folks cut fancy wedge bars, some wax in strips of foundation to get them going. They'll all work if you keep an eye on them. The main thing that keeps them building straight is you, because once they get done building their brood combs they want to get fat and sloppy! By last summer I was just dropping in bars with a saw groove, but no strip, foundation or wax. If you put them in between straight combs, they have to build the new one straight, and their attachment to bare wood is the strongest.

 

[Latestarter]

That's fantastic news Chooks! So happy for you! Hope you have the best year yet!

 

[Happy Chooks]

Thanks! I'm pretty excited that I didn't screw it up!

Here are my hives covered in bee poop. Who knew such little insects could poop so much! We had a heck of a rain storm, over 9 inches of rain and a lot of snow in the mountains. But I felt badly for the bees being confined to the hive for so long!

 

[Happy Chooks]

I doubt I'll get any honey off of the small hive this year, but we'll see.

 

[Maggiesdad]

If they've got drawn comb they'll do just fine.

I found that my colonies that were actively working the pollen patties had poos like that, too.

 

[Latestarter]

You'd be pressure pooping large quantities too if you had to hold it for 4-5 days lol... It's a wonder they didn't explode!