All settled in.

I did my first proper inspection for over a month today!  Holidays, harvests and bee moves just seemed to get in the way!

Anyway, all seems to be really, really well.  The queenless Parent hive that we put the frame of brood into on 4 June now has eggs and larvae and brood in it.  So clearly the queen we reared managed to get mated and also return to the hive!  There is a very strong brood pattern, so that hive looks strong, although I didn't see my new lady!  The lower hive body looks a bit empty of brood, but there is honey and pollen, so i think the queen will find her way there if she wants to.

The Daughter hive (the one we re-queened from first Iris, and then Bob) also looks to be doing well.  Strong brood pattern, but still not all deep frames have been built out. So I gave them some 1:1 syrup to help encourage them, and I shuffled some empty and drawn comb about.  They look pretty good.

Perhaps going into winter with two strong queens from this year is a good idea, and de-populating one is not such a good plan.  What purpose would killing a hive off do? Both queens are healthy and laying. Maybe I'll start a new colony, or two, next year!  I will have to find another location and think about this a bit.