Sunday, July 14, 2013

Bee Vlog - July 13, 2013

I'm bringing back the hive scale for some baseline measurements. I hear that the main nectar flow is over for my area so I'm taking weights to see how well all the hives did this year. This will also help me to track if another nectar flow starts up or if everything is done for the year. The weights and a chart are available at my apiary page.

It's also been 2 weeks since installing the quilt boxes on 2 of the hives and I wanted to see if they've started chewing through the canvas bottom. I'd like to put quilt boxes on all the hives this winter, but need to first test things out with this design.

All the hives but one seem to be doing just fine. The one hive, Queen Isabella (a cutout from June 1, rescued from a townhouse attic), just isn't growing as I would expect. The population seems to be dwindling. There's good looking brood, plenty of pollen, but very little honey. I'll check on them again in 2-3 weeks and see if things have improved. If they still look weak then I'll give them a boost from a frame of brood and a frame of honey from a strong hive and reduce their space to one box.


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