irishguy
Field Bee
- Joined
- Dec 26, 2012
- Messages
- 865
- Reaction score
- 0
- Location
- ireland
- Hive Type
- National
- Number of Hives
- 2 over wintered nucs
Seeing today was first decent bit of weather we've had in 2 weeks, I popped the hoods open in my hives to get my inspection done. First hive with super I opened, the bees where bouncing off me so naturally I knew something was up, noticed no eggs or larvae and not much capped stores in first few feames then low and behold, a lovely big QC staring me right in the face. Went through the hive and noticed another 6! Closed hive up and moved onto the other.
Next hive I opened, plenty of stores, eggs, larvae and capped brood thou more eggs than capped brood. Bees were very good natured. Put dummy board in and removed last frame of stores to put in the overwintered nuc.
Checked the overwintered nuc next, not much stores but plenty of eggs,larvae, brood so added another few half drawn frames. Spotted the Queen and bees were also good natured.
Ended up going to work u till half 6, opened -Q hive @ 7ish, went through all frames again and found 11 QCs, removed 10 and kept the best looking one. Put all QCs in an egg container filled with cotton wool and gave to another beek to put in incubator. One thing I noticed thou, this hive was teaming with bees, in fact its the most bees I've ever seen yet so I'm thinking that queen hasn't swarmed, would I be right. Queen wasn't clipped or marked.
Going to check in 7 days to see if hatched OK then leave another 7 days to see if it mated and laying. If any problems will be getting a new Q from the guy who's looking after the QCs. If virign Q is laying OK, still thinking of getting a q from the other QCs and making a nuc from.hive.
Was this the right approach.
Next hive I opened, plenty of stores, eggs, larvae and capped brood thou more eggs than capped brood. Bees were very good natured. Put dummy board in and removed last frame of stores to put in the overwintered nuc.
Checked the overwintered nuc next, not much stores but plenty of eggs,larvae, brood so added another few half drawn frames. Spotted the Queen and bees were also good natured.
Ended up going to work u till half 6, opened -Q hive @ 7ish, went through all frames again and found 11 QCs, removed 10 and kept the best looking one. Put all QCs in an egg container filled with cotton wool and gave to another beek to put in incubator. One thing I noticed thou, this hive was teaming with bees, in fact its the most bees I've ever seen yet so I'm thinking that queen hasn't swarmed, would I be right. Queen wasn't clipped or marked.
Going to check in 7 days to see if hatched OK then leave another 7 days to see if it mated and laying. If any problems will be getting a new Q from the guy who's looking after the QCs. If virign Q is laying OK, still thinking of getting a q from the other QCs and making a nuc from.hive.
Was this the right approach.
