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doodlemaierI hived my bees on the 5th of May, and today was my very first inspection. Everything went well, I didn't find the queen but there was brood and eggs, plenty of pollen and un-capped honey. I'm not sure if anytime sooner than later is a good time to super an extra deep of brood frame but I think I can wait a couple of weeks for that, at least as only about 5 frames contained brood and those weren't yet full. Everything was textbook except bur comb. They'd gotten an early start making bur comb; a week after hiving them I went back in to removed the queen cage, etc. and they'd managed to create bur comb between the frames around the empty queen cage after releasing her that I, in turn, had managed to drop down inside the hive while attempting to remove it. Rather than go into the empty space left by the "absent" frame and try to pull it out then, I left it. It has been a point of concern for me after the fact that in doing so I took the chance of having possibly crushed my queen had she been on that bur comb when I situated the full compliment of brood frames.
Today I discovered that they'd managed to make bur comb in between two adjacent frames despite that they were squeezed tightly together. It looked as though rather than drawing comb based the foundation they formed a little bridge attached at the top bar that was connected only marginally to either of the flanking foundations. They managed to make similar bur comb with what I'd left on the bottom board two weeks prior. While separating the two nesting frames I managed to damage both caps or base. This time I was diligent to remove this "extra" comb although it contained brood, eggs, pollen, and un-capped honey. I weighed my options quickly but carefully as to whether I should take this stuff out now or leave it. Just in removing the frame I had already done significant damage to many of the cells within the questionable comb, and would probably compound the damage with each successive inspection, so I took the chance and removed it. Had I discovered this later in the season I wouldn't have attempted it but in doing so now I'm hoping it's still early enough to encourage the girls to draw out the foundation without significantly setting back their progress.
Chunks of comb removed from a single deep brood box, the largest two are each the size of my hand (and, therefore, probably the size of yours). The middle piece at the top was what I had managed to drop to the bottom board when removing the the empty queen cage two weeks ago.
Detail of the piece of bur on the right of the previous photo. The dark cells along the top and right-hand edges contain pollen. The maggoty-looking things from the center down to the bottom corners are larval bees. From the center left, if you look carefully (click for larger image), you can make out a single egg in many of the cells (looking like a tiny grain of rice) - good signs that my hive has a healthy laying queen present, as late as two days ago.
Detail of the chunk from the right (opposite side pictured in 1st photo) showing pollen and capped brood. Except for having to remove this stuff everything looks good!
Today I discovered that they'd managed to make bur comb in between two adjacent frames despite that they were squeezed tightly together. It looked as though rather than drawing comb based the foundation they formed a little bridge attached at the top bar that was connected only marginally to either of the flanking foundations. They managed to make similar bur comb with what I'd left on the bottom board two weeks prior. While separating the two nesting frames I managed to damage both caps or base. This time I was diligent to remove this "extra" comb although it contained brood, eggs, pollen, and un-capped honey. I weighed my options quickly but carefully as to whether I should take this stuff out now or leave it. Just in removing the frame I had already done significant damage to many of the cells within the questionable comb, and would probably compound the damage with each successive inspection, so I took the chance and removed it. Had I discovered this later in the season I wouldn't have attempted it but in doing so now I'm hoping it's still early enough to encourage the girls to draw out the foundation without significantly setting back their progress.
Chunks of comb removed from a single deep brood box, the largest two are each the size of my hand (and, therefore, probably the size of yours). The middle piece at the top was what I had managed to drop to the bottom board when removing the the empty queen cage two weeks ago.
Detail of the piece of bur on the right of the previous photo. The dark cells along the top and right-hand edges contain pollen. The maggoty-looking things from the center down to the bottom corners are larval bees. From the center left, if you look carefully (click for larger image), you can make out a single egg in many of the cells (looking like a tiny grain of rice) - good signs that my hive has a healthy laying queen present, as late as two days ago.
Detail of the chunk from the right (opposite side pictured in 1st photo) showing pollen and capped brood. Except for having to remove this stuff everything looks good!
