Hive Update
Since the field day I have been over to check on what I am referring to as the "double hive", or the one we combined. I am calling it the double hive because in two weeks' time the bees have not chewed through the newspaper, so the two hives are operating separately, but one on top of the other. Since the top hive was the weak one, I tried to put sugar water on it. I did successfully put a bucket of sugar water on the hive, but I was not satisfied that they had enough empt
September Field Day
Here is a nice picture of the queen in the vertical hive we combined with the horizontal hive. Thanks to Kelly Bolthouse for taking the picture! This queen was actually in the top box, in the first frame we pulled out. Another lesson in "the bees don't read the books" and the queen can be absolutely ANYWHERE in the hive. This hive really didn't have any honey stores to speak of. Neither did the horizontal hive. Both had queens and as you see in the picture, brood, in al
What to do in September
Today I checked the hives. It has been about three weeks since the last field day and the goldenrod flow is in full swing. The two hives shown above are what I will call hive #1 and hive #2, the first being the horizontal hive and the second being the vertical hive. Hive #1 literally looked the same as it did three weeks ago. No growth, no capped honey, only small amounts of wet nectar. Some brood, both capped and open, but not a lot, and only covering around six or seve
