A Buzzword Post
There are moments in beekeeping where the bees do exactly what you hoped they would do, exactly when you needed them to do it, and you have to resist the urge to ring someone about it at an inappropriate hour.
This was one of those weeks.
But we’ll get to that.
The setup
Saturday. Proper sunshine. Hawthorn in full bloom in the field behind the apiary, apple blossom still going strong on the old tree. The bees had been flying all week on days like this and you could see it in the activity at the entrance. Purposeful. Busy. Coming back heavy.
New smoker. Full suit. Orange gloves that Bee Girl thinks are embarrassing but I think are practical. Dad somewhere in the background with coffee.
We had a list.
The top box
Three frames pulled. The bees are drawing wax on all of them now, fresh white comb being built out properly. Honey going in. Pollen stored. Heavy frames.
And then.
Day old eggs. Right there in the top box. The queen has crossed up.
If you are not a beekeeper this might sound underwhelming. If you are a beekeeper, or you have been following along with our six stage split plan, you will understand why this felt like a significant moment. We have been watching and waiting for the queen to move up into the second brood box for weeks. She has been taking her time about it, which is her right, she is the queen. But this week she went. Day old eggs confirmed. She is laying up there now.
We may have done a small undignified celebration. In full beekeeping suits. In a field. Nobody saw except Dad and he said nothing which is his way.
The bottom box
Five frames of brood. Two and three day old larvae. Solid, even pattern. Bees on every frame. The colony is in excellent health and has been building steadily all spring.
We also found play cups.
A play cup is exactly what it sounds like. A small waxy cup built by the bees, shaped like the beginning of a queen cell, facing downward from the comb. Finding them sounds alarming if you don’t know what they are. We didn’t, the first time. We do now.
Play cups on their own mean very little. A healthy colony builds and tears them down throughout the season as a matter of course. They are the bees keeping their options open. Preparing for eventualities. Having a plan B ready just in case. Our cups were dry, no eggs, no royal jelly, no sign of anything being raised in them. We noted them, we photographed them, and we will check them every inspection from here.
If the queen lays in one that is a different conversation. Until then they are just the bees being sensibly prepared, which honestly is more than can be said for me most of the time.
What we left alone
The drone frame. The wild comb the bees built under it is spectacular and completely impractical and if we had pulled that frame today we would have lost drone brood we specifically asked the bees to raise. So we left it. There will be a better moment to assess it properly and today was not that day.
The front two frames. The bees got a little buzzy as we worked toward them. We had seen what we needed to see. Eggs confirmed, brood healthy, play cups noted, stores heavy. The bees were telling us they had had enough and we listened. Closed up. Moved on.
Reading the bees means knowing when to stop as much as knowing when to look.
What the hive looks like right now
The bees have been busy between inspections in the way that bees always are, which is to say completely and without any input from us whatsoever. They have sealed every gap between the two boxes with propolis. They have built wild comb bridging the boxes together. They have drawn wax on the new top frames, filled some with honey, moved the queen up, and generally got on with the business of being a thriving colony.
We opened it, looked, confirmed what we needed to confirm, and closed it back up again.
That is the whole inspection. Twenty minutes. Full suit. New smoker performing beautifully.
Where we are in the plan
Stage two is complete. Drone comb drawn and filling. Queen crossing up confirmed. Stage three, putting the queen excluder on to locate her by egg position, is now a real conversation for next week depending on what we find.
The split plan is alive and moving forward. One hive. One queen who has finally decided the upstairs is worth investigating. Fifty thousand bees who did not ask for any of this but continue to tolerate us.
We will take it.
The Good, The Bad, and The Sticky
The Good: The queen crossed up. Day old eggs in the top box. Bottom box brood solid and healthy. Heavy stores. Drone comb progressing. Hawthorn and apple blossom both out. The bees are in exactly the right place for this point in the season.
The Bad: We didn’t get to the front two frames. The bees made it clear they had had enough and we respected that. It goes on next week’s list as the first thing to check.
The Sticky: The propolis. The wild comb. The bees connecting their two boxes together with all the architectural enthusiasm of a colony that has absolutely no interest in making future inspections straightforward. We are going to need a very good hive tool and a great deal of patience next week.
Worth it though. Completely worth it.
Related: meet Clover, our marked queen and what a hive inspection actually looks like.
Mum and Bee Girl x