I am new to beekeeping and installed my first three packages two days ago. I was hoping that someone would be able to summarize what to expect on a day by day basis after installation for the first week to 10 days. Example of what am I supposed to observe outside the hive. All I am seeing right now in front of my hives are bees removing bees that are dead and some are actually still alive and was wondering if that is something normal ( or could it be robbing? ). Also, I used a frame feeder stuffed with straw to prevent drowning and I see bees carrying out the straw. My feeder accommodates only one liter of syrup, should I open hives to refill syrup or should I wait until it's time to remove the queen cage. I don't know if this is of importance but I am using 8 frame medium boxes (hence only one liter syrup in the frame feeder). would one liter of syrup be enough for the bees for 4-5 days until it's time to remove the cage? Thank you in advance for taking the time to read my post and hopefully answer some of my questions.
All the dead that were in the bottom of the box will have to be removed. Then, of course, they are dying off at a rate where they will all be dead in six weeks... If there is a nectar flow they don't need to be fed at all, so of course it would be enough for 4-5 days, or 4-5 months... I would have released the queen when I installed the package...
That sounds pretty normal for when I install packages. They like to clean house. I have a couple of colonies that will not tolerate rubber bands and will have them pulled out in a couple of days when we repair comb. [so we started using long zip ties to repair comb.] I have seen colonies remove extra sugar crystals if a winter sugar brick is too crumbly.
You should see coming and going. They should be bringing pollen in. Are you in a flow? [What's blooming in your area?]
Thank you all for the replies. I opened today my hives and none of the queens where released, almost but not quite. I wish I would have read Mrs.'s Bushes reply before I went into the hives, because I would have released the queens today and retrieved the queen cages. The feeders where absolutely dry, even the straw I placed to prevent drowning was not even sticky anymore. There are a lot of trees and flowers in bloom and I do see some of the bees carrying pollen back to the hive even though it has been drizzling or raining almost constantly since I installed the packages three days ago. My concern is the bees dragging out of the hive other bees there are still alive. I don't think there is robbing, I have robbing screens on and there is no fighting that I can see.
With Top Feeders, not sure why you added straw.
I know you added straw to help prevent drowning and not sure if you have plastic or wooden top feeder, but the plastic ones I am using now have ribs on the interior walls of the feeder, they act like a ladder and I see many in there climbing up and down and no one is floating in there.........yet, I just started using them.
It is amazing (to me) how much syrup they will drink in a day.
I have the same type of plastic feeder but i was afraid they might still drown. I did not find even one drowned bee and I think the straw helped too
I have ordered bees, should be here in 2 - 3 weeks. I did not feed last year (my 1st hive). There is a lot in bloom here. Do I need to feed?