Second Inspection

Another warm day, and some more good news... My white queen has been busy and she's now "with brood" like my blue queen.

I estimate that the blue queen, from the "weak" hive (which now feels a bit of a misnomer) has brood on 3 frames.  A nice oval about 6 inches by 4 inches. The white queen (from the "strong" hive) has brood on 2 frames, about the same size.  Given that I missed seeing eggs and larvae last weekend, this is probably a bit of an underestimate of the amount of brood that is actually there! I reckon in a little over a week both queens could be on 5 to 6 frames of brood.  Probably not this weekend, but the one after that.

The pollen patties I put on last week (as well as the ones from 2 weeks ago) are still there, so there must be enough natural pollen in the area to satisfy the bees demands.  I think this is evidenced by the fact there was plenty of new pollen stored in the frames near the brood. So, all in all, I fell pretty confident about my hives at the moment. Maybe my re-configuration last weekend was worth while and it stimulated the queens into laying.

Anyway, if the brood rearing goes as I hope then I'll be looking to add a second hive body to the hives in a couple of weeks. So I think I'll leave the hives alone until then, but once the second body is on I'll feed, feed, feed and hopefully get drawn comb and supers on in double quick time!

This weekend I was lucky enough to get hold of some additional hive equipment.  A complete hive; baseboards, top and inner covers, 2 hive bodies and a super, but no frames. All from my friend Brian, who is interested in keeping bees, but has not been able to commit to it yet. This equipment will buy me some time should I have to divide the hives. But where will I put the hive?  Well, Jurgen (the husband of one of the local school teachers) may have it, but I am exploring other avenues...