I did an inspection this weekend and I found only a small amount of eggs and brood. I know things have been a little bit cool in this area. But when does the queen usually get going pretty good?
In your Area? This Week. Check them again this weekend.
I have one hive that is totally full of brood, but 2 hives are full of honey and no brood at all. I found eggs in these 2 hives. So I was amazed at how little they have built up. We had very cold, wet weather for many months.
I guess it is the cold weather that kept them from building up sooner.
Any other suggestions out there???
I had five hives with brood last week and a Russian hive that didn't have anything brood wise till late this week.
Checked my lone hive on Saturday and it looks to me like the queen has been laying for 3 days...4 days tops.
Russians wait till they start collecting pollen before laying. My hives all have some sealed broad. inside of two frames. One hive has no honey at all and has filled the frames with eggs. they must be expecting perfect weather this spring. Hope their right
With all of these responses from others here in PA, considering our weather, when would be a good time to consider splitting my one remaining hive? (I opened the top about two weeks ago and put in three full frames of honey, but they EXPLODED with anger, so I quickly closed them back up and left them alone.)
I'm on almost the same parallel as Trinity NC and this weekend my two hives had some capped and some open brood each - about 1 frame total (each) as far as I can tell spread between 3-4 frames. A few (very few) capped drone cells. The bigger hive had a spot of honey going in over the pollen - lots of pollen - that they are collecting. A surprising amount of stores left in both hives.
I'd sure like to see some of that "explosive build up" that I keep hearing about. Of course it spit snow today.
QuoteWith all of these responses from others here in PA, considering our weather, when would be a good time to consider splitting my one remaining hive? (I opened the top about two weeks ago and put in three full frames of honey, but they EXPLODED with anger, so I quickly closed them back up and left them alone.)
End of April or beginning of May depending on how big your colony is. I'm going to start raising in that time frame and hopefully have some queens near the end of May or beginning of June. Not really the size of the colony that concerns me...it's the abundance of drones. I didn't see much for drones when I did my last inspection.
Quote from: bassman1977 on March 22, 2010, 11:12:45 PM
QuoteWith all of these responses from others here in PA, considering our weather, when would be a good time to consider splitting my one remaining hive? (I opened the top about two weeks ago and put in three full frames of honey, but they EXPLODED with anger, so I quickly closed them back up and left them alone.)
End of April or beginning of May depending on how big your colony is. I'm going to start raising in that time frame and hopefully have some queens near the end of May or beginning of June. Not really the size of the colony that concerns me...it's the abundance of drones. I didn't see much for drones when I did my last inspection.
I have not seen one drone yet Bassman.
Sorry about getting OT
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I have feeded 20 years pollen patty to hive before willow blooming.
First the hive eate really much pollen even if it has no brood. It tells that
it has been generated the lack of protein during winter.
Second phase is that the hive makes 3-4 frames of brood. Not more.
It tells that hives have a limited grup of feeder bees because they all are old.
When 4 weeks have gone from start of patty feeding, quite much new feeders are ready to take care of brood. Then the limiting factor is the temp of the hive. The brood area enlarge 8 to 12 frames.
If it is a cool or rainy week, bees drop down brooding about 50%. When they get pollen outside it doe not last many days when brooding is again maximum size.
When new bees emerge from the first brood generation, old wintered bees die very soon. It takes about 2 weeks and winterd bees have died. So the hive is not able to enlarge during that time but 2 weeks later it is hurry to put new boxes to hives.
It takes almost 8 weeks from brooding start that the colony is able to expand.
Since I started to use terrarium heaters in spring I found how important is the heat to the expanding colony.
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As Iddee said, they should be building up now.
I checked my hives this past weekend and the queens are busy and numbers are building up. Quite a few drone cells as well.
Put syrup on the hives just in case they need it but I only have one hive that's taking a little syrup.
Quote from: Two Bees on March 23, 2010, 08:50:11 AM
Put syrup on the hives just in case they need it
YOu should learn to look how much they have stores. To put syrup just in case is not a good habit.
It stucks limited room of brood. I try to get rid of winter food during spring that when nectar flow starts, there is not much winter sugar in hives.
Quote from: Finski on March 24, 2010, 02:15:09 AM
YOu should learn to look how much they have stores. To put syrup just in case is not a good habit.
It stucks limited room of brood. I try to get rid of winter food during spring that when nectar flow starts, there is not much winter sugar in hives.
If they are building comb, that means they have access to nectar, correct?
Quote from: luvin honey on March 24, 2010, 12:07:05 PM
If they are building comb, that means they have access to nectar, correct?
Yes, bees need more room for stores. In certain time bees are eager to build combs for drones.
What do you have in bloom there: apple, cherries, berries, willows, mapple or are they gone?
Wethers seems to tell that they are not http://www.wunderground.com/forecasts/CWA.html (http://www.wunderground.com/forecasts/CWA.html)
It is frost at night -9C is bad.
Things are just getting going here. With maple and dandelion.
Quote from: Finski on March 24, 2010, 03:08:58 PM
What do you have in bloom there: apple, cherries, berries, willows, mapple or are they gone?
As best as I can tell, only willows, chickweed and maybe maples. How about in Finland?
Quote from: luvin honey on March 24, 2010, 03:55:00 PM
As best as I can tell, only willows, chickweed and maybe maples. How about in Finland?
I have 70 cm snow. Willows start to bloom at the beginning of May. Dandelion and apple are at the beginning of June.
Hives have allready some brood. Perhaps 2 palm size areas.
When the snow is partly melted and bees get water from soil, I put pollen patty to hives every week.
It is something 10. April when I can start.
It has been cold and damp this winter in the southeast. They are about 3 weeks behind depending on the race of bees. Last year I had 3 to 4 frames of capped brood by 10 March this year about 1-2 frames last week. I had 15 day periods that the highs were in the low forties and it rained every other day and the humidity did not drop below 75 percent in Jan and Feb. That is not good bee weather. Remember that a bee becomes a forager 40 days after the egg is laid. My main flow starts around the last of April, so a egg laid today will not make the first few days of the flow. Let's hope the flow is three weeks late too. This is farming one year, it is dry, and the next wet and cold. I have a friend that runs about 200 brood cows, and he says that a person has to be in the business 10 years to make a profit, with the wet years and the dry years and other weather problems. He doesn't have to worry about mites, SHB and CCD.