Saturday, June 16, 2012

My New York City Bee Adventure .. Day 42 & 43

Day 42
June 14th, 2012


Ok so officially my first nuc is dead.  Maybe 200-300 bees left in there, at least 255 drones.  Out of the 10 frames 4 frames had a handful each on them.  
The Good news is I picked up the new Nuc from Eddy Honey today. Great to meet someone from the group just wish he was a little closer. I did not take any pics of the nuc but it looked great. Nice fat queen Great laying pattern good stores great temper. It was a full five frames and now knowing a little more about bees then I did when I started the 2 nucs I have gotten this year are as different as night and day.
So I finally got home about 8pm and did as Iddee suggested. I put the new hive in the old hives place took the frames from the old hive and knocked the bees off in front of the new hive.                 Maybe about 200-300 bees.




  They started going in the hive and clustering on the front of the hive. It was getting dark by this time so I put the frames in a bag and put them in the freezer.
 


Day 43
June 15th, 2012

On Friday I went outside to put the hive top feeder on and the hive was buzzing with a lot of orientation flights. I am going to Las Vegas Monday morning for business till next Saturday. So the girls will have a good week to get settled before I jump in for an inspection.


Sunday, June 10, 2012

My New York City Bee Adventure .. Day 37 Nature Fest 2012

Day 37
June 9th 2012

I was supposed to go in the hive a few days ago..
But I am on crutches...
I stepped in a nail and it has become infected....

To make things worse the Wife was in a car accident yesterday....
She is OK. She was stoped at a light and a Dodge Ram 2500 Pickup blasted her in the back
Throwing her into the car in front of her.



Important thing is that she is OK!!!!

Well Went in the hive yesterday and still looks bad..

Still Frames 1 ,2 ,outside 3, Outside 8, 9,10 not drawn out at all.
Very little on Inside frame 8 and 3/4 of inside frame 3.
Frames , 4 ,5,6,7 original nuc frames.
No Queen cells anywhere
no capped or uncapped broods
some pollen stores
Some nectar no capped honey
SHB >5 found and Killed. SHB Trap Still had about 6 dead inside .
Found more then 20 bees with Deformed wings.
No Mites seen on bees
Bees carrying several dead bees
No Queen or signs of queen seen.
I pulled out a frame to put in the observation hive.





 A lot of Dead bees being carried all over the frame




So off to Nature Fest 2012 in Willowbrook Park 



So this is how I set everything up...










I Think it went great. about 300 people during the day.
I had the smoker going.
A lot of people had question and now know the difference
from honey bees and other stinging insects.

I also want to thank Pete from the Staten Island Meetup.com group for coming by
and helping out.

Saturday, June 2, 2012

My New York City Bee Adventure .. Day 28

Day 28
May 31st ,2012

Still Frames 1 ,2 ,outside 3, Outside 8, 9,10 not drawn out at all. Very little on Inside frame 8 and 3/4 of inside frame 3.


Frames , 4 ,5,6,7 orginal nuc frames.



No Queen cells on frame 3 ,



SHB x 3 found and Killed. SHB Trap had about 6 dead inside .





No Mites seen. Did pull some larve a no mites but some were just mush not like a formed larve.





Found more then 15 bees with Deformed wings.






Hive top feeder removed as from advice as that if there is a new queen she will have no place to lay.
No Queen or signs of queen seen. On the advice of the NJS inspector I should not check hive for a week.

My New York City Bee Adventure .. Day 24

Day 24
May 27th ,2012

OK I don’t think this is good. I just did Hive inspection and this is what I Found..
SHB total saw was 3 (Yes I killed them) 1 in the hive top feeder, and 1 each on frame 9 & 10.


Frames 1, 2, outside 3, outside 8 ,9 & 10 still empty nothing at all on the frames (except SHB).
Frame 4 ,5,6,&7 orginal nuc 3/4 covered with bees
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Inside frame 3 75% drawn out, nectar, pollen, capped, uncapped drone/worker and queen cups /queen cells.

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Inside frame 8 25% drawn with just nectar
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Still no queen did see queen cups , closed queen cells and where there were queen cups last were and now taken down.

And Now things are worse look at this...
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And Now things are worse look at this...

What could that be?

I did find some Capped honey too .. About 20 Whole cells in a 10 frame deep
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My New York City Bee Adventure .. Day 14 and 15

Well its been 2 weeks since I updated this post. So I will fill everyone in on what has been happening .
First some hive inspections and photos:


Day 14
May 17th , 2012


Well Its been a crazy few days.. an I think I just made it worse... So  before work I go to check the Hive and report back what I find..

Found the orginal marked queen and open and close queen cells. I was going to kill her but then I remembered Iddee saying to post what I find and go from there... so I close up and go to work.


So today I figure everyone is telling me to kill the queen I am just going to do it. Go in the hive find her finish looking for queen cells and another queen .. I did not see another queen but found my first SHB. I did kill it.



So Im about to pinch the queen when I get my first sting on my wrist. My very first bee sting ever.. Took the stinger out and watched it swell up.





Then as I try to get the queen again.. she takes off and I loose her. I dont know if she flew back to the hive or to the grass... I wait a few min and still cant find her. Its getting time for me to get ready for work. I close up the hive and figure what more could I do wrong... (my luck I am allergic to bee stings).. I come in the house and take 50mg of benardryl and I am getting ready for work...

Some good things...
Got my first sting out of the way with no issues
Got the smoker to stay smoking for 45 min..
Found SMB (know what to look for)
May have got rid of the queen...

Some Bad things
Stings suck....
Found SHB.. GREAT!!!! ..

Day 15
May 18th ,2012

I went in to check to see how bad I messed up the hive... Ok so they were a little moody but not too bad.. Searched the whole deep and no marker queen and no other queen that I could see.

Still Frames 1 ,2 ,outside 3, Outside 8, 9,10 not drawn out at all. Very little on Inside frame 8 and 3/4 of inside frame 3.
Frames , 4 ,5,6,7 orginal nuc frames.

Pic of frame 3




I also found eggs
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And Queen cells

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Looks like 3...total


On another note am I wrong for not being too happy with the Seller of the Nuc for I finally got another responce from her after I asked several times what the NJ state inspector says.. Here is her answer:

"I did talk to the NJ inspector and he said let them be. The new queen will come out and take care of the old one. Leave them alone.. In those words. There are many times when you start a nuc the bees don't like the queen they let her lay eggs and then they raise a new one. I trust what my inspector says. Chat soon Sallie"

Also made an Observation Hive today for the Nature Fest 2012 ..

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And when I say made I mean BOUGHT ... But I did have to install the Glass , mount the feet and stain the Hive...