In the middle of a meeting at work, I got a call from Bill letting me know that there was a very large swarm in the top of our Manitoba maple...very high up. I suggested he set up a bait hive on top of a ladder to see if we could entice them into it.
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| Bait hive on top of ladder |
All day Thursday, she stayed up in the tree. It was rainy all day Friday. I wrote John the beekeeper to see if he could tell me how long the bees could survive in a rainstorm out in the open. He wrote me back to let me know that a swarm outside could last 4-5 days. In fact, it is sometimes easier to entice the swarm into a box in inclement weather. I rubbed lemon grass on the box and left some in the opening hoping that she could not resist it. At this point I had no idea where this swarm was from though logic would say that it must be one of my hives...likely Queen Mab. My sister was convinced that the swarm was Queen Maggie coming back! We crossed our fingers.
Saturday was still grey but starting to clear and she was still up in the tree. Bill and I were very busy that day since we were part of a local garden crawl (much like a pub crawl including lovely drinks at each garden) and were hosting the bbq later that day. I had my camera with me all morning in case something happened with the swarm. Nothing. Nothing that is until Bill and I were completely immersed in setting up tables and chairs. During that extremely short period of time, the swarm decided to take off. What an anti-climax!
We shrugged, took down the bait hive and had a lovely garden party.
PS: We did catch a cat though! :)
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| Smokey climbed the ladder to entertain us |
Monday July 1, 2013
Happy Canada Day!
I went into Queen Mab to see what had happened and if that swarm on the weekend was her. What I found was a so-so strong hive with at least 8 capped queen cells. No Queen Mab to be found. I really should have gotten a puppy! Sigh.
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| Capped queen cells |
Queen Mab laid the eggs in the queen cups so that the hive would still have a queen after she left with half of the hive. The workers fed the larvae with royal jelly for the entire time until they capped the cell.
This swarm was so unexpected since the hive was young but they were extremely healthy and built comb super fast on the open frames.
I wrote Dave and John for advice and to see if they had any mated queens for sale. Neither of them had any queens and they both said to just let the hive alone to hatch its own queen naturally.
Tuesday July 2, 2013
I got scared by the Queen Mab story so I thought I'd better go into Queen Olivia this morning. She is very, very strong. She has lots of honey stored in the top box. I found her majesty very easily and I didn't find any sign of queen cells or queen cups on any of the frames. Yippee!
I have decided to do an experiment and have started a third small hive with a couple of frames of honey and brood from Queen Olivia and a frame of brood with 3 queen cells from Queen Mab. It will be very interesting to see how this plays out. I closed up Olivia and added another box on top for honey storage.
In case you are wondering what the timetable for these queen cells to move on to being queens in their own right, here you are:
In 7 days from today the queens should emerge. The queen will strengthen, put her make up on and then head out to be fertilized by 10-20 drones. She will then come back to the hive and start laying eggs. That is all she will do for the rest of her life ( 3-5 years) unless she gets sick or accidentally dies...or she swarms due to a unaware beekeeper taking care of her.
In 21-28 days from today I should be seeing eggs in the comb. I am going to go into both hives with queen cells next Tuesday to see if they have hatched and to see which one got the crown. The first queen to hatch will go to all the other cells and kill the occupants. If they hatch at the same time, they will have a duel to the death. The queen uses her stinger in this duel and she is capable of stinging multiple times. I am told that she will only use her stinger in this fight and not for stinging humans. I haven't tested that theory...don't plan on it actually...she is much bigger than a worker!
It seems that beekeeping this season is very dramatic. Makes for a more interesting blog.
I am on holidays now so gardening and beekeeping are my focus these days...and sleeping in.
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| Campanula with yellow lilies |
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| Honey bee at sage blossoms |
Happy summer!
So nice to finally be ble to sit down and catch up on my reading!
ReplyDeleteMelodie