Summer is on it's way to Texas. Mark and I worked in the bee yard on Mother's Day, May 14 while it was a sunny day and 90 degrees. We come across these little scorpions around our hive boxes on occasion. They're pretty fascinating to watch!
(Click on photos to enlarge).
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| Striped Bark Scorpion on our hive foundation. |
We bought three new queens from BeeWeaver Apiary in Navasota, Texas with plans to install them into our hives 01, 02, and 07 which have been empty since last summer's varroa mite problem. We now know to stay ahead of the mites and treat for them twice a year.
To bring these three colonies back to life, we had to move frames from our other healthy hives. We moved three frames from hive 03 to create a new colony in hive 01, three frames from hive 04 to create a new colony in hive 02, and three frames from hive 05 to create a new colony in hive 07.
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Our new colony in hive 01. Three frames were brought over from hive 03.
Worker bees, brood, pollen and honey are in place for the new colony to grow.
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Hive 01 bees are meeting their new queen. The queen is trapped in a queen
cage with a few attendant bees. It will take a few days for them to escape and this
time will allow for the worker bees to grow accustom to her and forget about
their loyalty to the queen in their old hive, 03.
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Our new colony in hive 02. Three frames were brought over from hive 04.
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The new queen in hive 04 meeting her new worker bees.
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Our new colony in hive 07. Three frames were brought over from hive 05.
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The new queen in hive 07 meeting her new worker bees.
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All of our hives seem very healthy, however, they are slow producing a lot of honey. Removing frames from these hives will slow the honey production down even more. But, it is more important for us that we have healthy hives than it is for us to extract honey in the fall.
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Hive 08 larvae.
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| Hive 08 pollen will be used to feed the larvae. |
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Hive 05 queen.
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Hive 06 bees with a lot of brood ready to hatch.
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Each of our foundations now have a colony of bees.
We will work hard to keep it that way! |
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