First fall check--ready for winter?

We've been pretty busy, plus the weather has been now rainy, now windy, and so on, so I've put off an inspection for awhile.  We needed to remove the box of frames we had extracted from hive #2, where I had put to have the bees clean them off.  I debated putting them there, but thought the hive was strong enough to fend off any robbing.  I didn't see any fighting, so I hope the decision was a good one. Also, we wanted to determine how well they are prepared with food for the winter.
Hive #2, the newer hive, did nothing with the super we put on, so we pulled that off.  They only have honey in about two other frames.  The older hive has a very heavy, full 3rd box so it should be in great shape.  We did take two frames partially filled out with honey from the super on that hive and put them in the newer hive.  I'll start feeding in a week or so, only the new hive. I meant to put the frames they had cleaned out in the top super to replace frames that were not drawn out and I didn't do that, so may do that tomorrow or the next day.
As far as brood, it looked kind of spotty at first but then we found several frames really full of capped brood, so she has been busy and doing well.  I have noticed more bees doing orientation flights near the hive lately, so I felt things were looking good in that regard.
And that's about it for now.  Bees were good, and very busy flying to and from the hive.  They like a warm, dry day like this.

Comments

Popular Posts