Yesterday evening I removed a colony in a gazebo. The wall they were in had quite a slant to it and I could have placed them in the frames horizontally or vertically. This was a first!
They had pretty decent stores. I purposely removed the comb sections from outside in so I was sure to catch the queen somewhere between the center combs but as luck would have it somehow I vacuumed her up or she was on one of the comb sections I transferred.
Either way I saw her today, she is quite huge. This colony is much stronger than I thought. They have already attached each comb section to their perspective frames, over night! They are in a deep and a medium.
I also caught my first swarm of 2010 today! It was a small one, but heh, a swarm's a swarm right?
Got swarm call #2 also this evening but they were airborne just as I was entering the yard.
Spring is definitely here!
Pics: http://picasaweb.google.com/112138792165178452970/March192010# (http://picasaweb.google.com/112138792165178452970/March192010#)
...JP
Big hive there, JP. Looks to have a few years on it. You may want to keep it around awhile and do a few mite counts in the summer. My guess is the counts will be low.
The outside to inside comb removal kept her from running into the next section, and that is it's purpose. Sounds like it did it's job.
Yeah Wally, did you see that black comb? Man it was black!
Oh, saw maybe one or two shbs.
...JP
That's why I said it's been there a few years. You may have some good, resistant genetics there. Most times when a swarm moves into black comb like that, they tend to use new comb and abandon the black stuff, or use it for storage only. They looked to be at home on the black stuff.