Stedic
House Bee
Inspected my hives today. Two are doing very little but are fine. The bigger of my three are going great guns and are capping the first super. I gave them a second last week but it's undrawn and being ignored so far.
Anyway, today, as I half expected, I found Queen Cells. All varying ages, saw a few empty cups, some with an egg, and then 3 or 4 drawn queen cells with jelly. One was quite long, I don't think it'd be far off being capped.
First observation: The terror! It's funny how my mind went blank!
So I was planning to use a Snel board and had it with me. I think I did mostly the right thing. I put the queen and flying bees in the bottom brood box, then QX, then supers, then Snel board, then second box with brood, some stores and lots of (almost all the) nurse bees.
What I couldn't remember was what to do with the cells. Some say leave one cell, some say remove all and let them start new ones. I left one (unsealed) as I figure I can remove tomorrow if I have to! What should I have done? They're nice bees so an increase from them is desirable.
Are either of the boxes likely to make more cells this week? Should I open them up and check?
I'll probably flip the Snel boards in a couple of days to bleed some more bees into the bottom box.
Anyway, today, as I half expected, I found Queen Cells. All varying ages, saw a few empty cups, some with an egg, and then 3 or 4 drawn queen cells with jelly. One was quite long, I don't think it'd be far off being capped.
First observation: The terror! It's funny how my mind went blank!
So I was planning to use a Snel board and had it with me. I think I did mostly the right thing. I put the queen and flying bees in the bottom brood box, then QX, then supers, then Snel board, then second box with brood, some stores and lots of (almost all the) nurse bees.
What I couldn't remember was what to do with the cells. Some say leave one cell, some say remove all and let them start new ones. I left one (unsealed) as I figure I can remove tomorrow if I have to! What should I have done? They're nice bees so an increase from them is desirable.
Are either of the boxes likely to make more cells this week? Should I open them up and check?
I'll probably flip the Snel boards in a couple of days to bleed some more bees into the bottom box.
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