A swarm in July

"A swarm in July ain't worth a fly"... at least that's what they say.  In the Seattle area I would agree that swarms this time of year or later are basically doomed unless a beekeeper makes an effort AND some investment to save them.  A big swarm could build enough comb but are unlikely to fill it unless they are near huge patches of Knotweed (which doesn't exist in many areas in the city) or maybe you haul them up to the mountains for Fireweed.  You could also steal honey and comb from other hives or get a couple 50lb bags of sugar and feed it as syrup over the next two months and hope they store enough for winter and also raise good winter bees.  However who says hobbies have to make money and if bees need saving then go for it.  If you are wondering where this is headed, read about my recent swarm adventure below in the hive notes.

Echinacea is now in bloom and a good nectar source.

A bumble is resting on this Dahlia flower.  Dahlia varieties with open petals can be good pollen and nectar sources.  Hint - if you can't see the pollen then the bees probably can't get to it or the nectar.

Caryopteris x clandonensis is another summer favorite that is a very popular nectar source.

Asters are in bloom and provide pollen and nectar.  A lot of the bright orange pollen coming is will be from asters.

Silk Tree (Albizia julibrissin)

Many gardeners are surprised when they hear that we don't have many late summer flowers blooming in this area.  Blooming bushes and trees make up a large portion of forage for city hives which many gardeners forget about when they think of flowers.  To counter this I encourage people to plant trees and shrubs with late summer blooms to help provide abundant food sources.  The Silk Tree is a good example of a late summer nectar source and can also be very appealing in the garden.  These trees can range from 15 to 30 feet tall and have wide arching branches with wide flat crowns.  The leaves are fern like that droop downwards at night and the wispy flowers have long silky treads that are white with pink or red colored tips.  Like many good honey bee food sources the trees can be invasive in some areas.  These trees can also be messy in fall and are also susceptible to several disease which can make them short lived, but fortunately they grow quickly.  They prefer full sun and produce nectar in the morning hours which is often why you won't see many pollinators on them in the afternoons.

"Black & Blue" Salvia (Salvia guaranitica) has attractive deep blue flowers and also a good nectar source.

Hive checks (7/20/2014)
Solis
Found the new queen and she is a little smaller but looked like she had mated.  I couldn't find any eggs or brood yet.  Part of that might be due to the fact that the hive is smaller and doesn't have many workers left.

The new queen.

Luna
Similar to the Solis hive the new queen in here looks mated.  The two queens look really similar so I'm going to have a hard time telling them apart in pictures.  I found some larvae laid in drone cells, but only eggs in worker cells so far.  Will have to check back in a week or so to determine how well she mated.

The look-a-like sister.

Hive checks (7/26/2014)
Solis
The queen looked a little bigger and finally has started laying.  There was a small patch of young brood and eggs in worker cells.  The hive is just a few frames of bees so I stole a couple frames of bee bread from the Luna hive to help them along.  Looking at my estimates this marks 22 days since I pulled the queen.  Assuming they made a queen from 1-2 day old larvae a queen would have emerged about 11 days later.  Seeing that I have probably 1-2 day old larvae now she would have started laying 4-5 days ago which means it took her 6-7 days to mate and start laying.  Perhaps I was a bit eager last inspection to hope for eggs/brood.

Looking a little more queen like now.

She is looking for places to lay which is always a good sign.

Luna
This queen also looked a little bigger and is about the same size as her sister and mother.  Overall they are all slightly smaller than what I typically see for queens.  Also because of their striped markings they are much harder to spot and blend in well with the workforce.

There are several newly capped drone cells (laid in drone sized cells) and she has now started laying in worker cells as well.  There were multiple frames with brood in worker sized cells coming and she has the majority of the work force so it doesn't surprise me they are jumping ahead of the Solis hive.  No worker brood capped just yet though which will tell me how well she actually mated.  What I find odd is that she started laying almost a week ahead of the other queen and was laying drone eggs initially.

This queen started laying drone eggs right away that are already capped.

Frame of bee bread that has been fermenting to break down the pollen to release nutrients.

Dyno
They have built up really well and the queen has an excellent brood pattern.  She stubbornly lays out as many cells as the hive can support.  Hopefully they start to bring in stores because they don't have much to speak of at the moment.  They are even starting to raise drone brood.

Nice laying pattern.

The queen is looking good.

Despite the damage the queen is still using this comb.  A stronger hive would have fixed the holes first and it does make me worry that they are still focused on buildup and not winter preparations.

Plum Creek
They have several frames of brood on the way and a good amount of stores for winter.  I'm curious how much they will build up in the next month of it they will try to maintain their size.  As always they are still raising drone brood.

This is the mother queen for Luna and Solis.

Quickdraw
The girls were in my face today telling me to go away, however they were not trying to sting.  As with the other two hives at this location there is a decent amount of brood coming.  They have stores but not enough for winter yet, and are using a good percentage of the hive for brood.  Hopefully they scale back from the buildup cycle and start prepping for winter rather than burning through the little reserve they have saved.  I suspect that this South facing, full sun, location is encouraging them to buildup more than I'm seeing at my other locations.  I curious to see how they winter here and buildup next spring.  I may have to watch for early spring swarming plans.

The queen looks good and has done a great job of building up.

Hive checks (7/27/2014)
Rebel
The hive is full of comb and most of it is either bee bread or nectar/honey.  The nuc I introduced to the back of the hive was still the active broodnest area and the queen didn't have many options for expanding being behind multiple frames of honey.  I resorted the hive combs from the entrance so that there were a few frames of honey, bee bread, broodnest, bee bread and then most of the nectar/honey stores. The laying pattern looked good and they don't seem quite as reactive as the mother hive was. No signs of the DWV that was taking a heavy toll on this hive in the spring.

Nice laying pattern on this new queen.

She looks like her mother, perhaps slightly bigger.

Rosemary Nuc
The queen is aggressively laying brood to rebuild the hive.  The laying pattern looked really good as well and I expect them to buildup well.

She is doing well in the nuc.

Ballard Nuc
Saw signs of DWV on a few bees.  The queen is being conservative as usual in her laying to repopulate the hive.  I'm curious to see how they deal with the DWV now that they are in a nuc.  That seems to be an ongoing issue with this queen.  What I've seen is borderline hives like this don't prep for winter well and die out in November.  Hopefully the new daughter queen will work out better.

She is still going at her usual slow pace which is going to make fall survival risky.

Scriber Creek
The hive is full of comb and for the most part it's all in use.  There seemed to be a good amount of honey stores on each frame, but no full frames of honey stored anywhere yet.  The laying pattern looks good and the new daughters of this queen all look very light colored which seems to support my thoughts that this was a virgin queen.  They were very clam today and I could have easily worked them without any protection.

Nice laying pattern.

A big healthy queen.

Hive checks (7/28/2014)
Rosemary Split and Swarm
I split the Rosemary hive on the 13th and on the 28th rather than having a new queen killing her sisters I had a new queen that decided to be a pacifist and leave the hive in a tiny swarm.  Having already done a split the hive was depopulated and being that the nectar flow is now over I was surprised to discover that they would even try to swarm.

While I call the queen a pacifist for not wanting to kill her sisters the reality is that this wasn't a queen decision but rather the collective workers.  Maybe they aren't localized enough to know that we have a long dearth coming, or perhaps that genetic instinct has been washed out because beekeepers always step in to prop them up with late summer feeding efforts.  Another thought is that the heavy rains in the last week might have created a surge in plant nectar production that is misleading their instinct that a dearth is here.  Who knows, maybe they know something I don't and it's going to be a rainy August and flowers will be plentiful.  Maybe I should buy a lotto ticket.

The small swarm hiding in the branches.

The swarm was about 1.5 pounds and I hived them with some old comb, but have no idea how they would expect to build comb and fill it with stores this time of year.  Not to mention with a virgin queen still has to successfully mate. I will give them a few resources and see how they do in the next few weeks.  I'm curious to see how they fare and if the risk pays off.  I'll give them some honey and syrup to keep them alive to see if they can survive the winter.

After hiving the swarm I looked through the originating hive and found another queen running around killing the others and piping quite authoritatively.  There were a few queens cells in the process of emerging that had not yet been killed and I was able to cage them as a backup.  I had one fly off while I was trying to get her to go in a queen cage and I stood still watching her go up up and away into the air.  She never did come back and I held still waiting so she could orient to me.  Having not come from a hive I have no idea where she will end up but wouldn't be surprised if she tried to enter one of the queen right hives nearby, which would not end well for her.  However being that is was evening I also wouldn't be surprised if a bird found her before morning.

The new queen was running around piping.  She would momentarily stop on the comb and vibrate against it when she made the piping sound.  The rough pattern was about 15-20 seconds running and 1 second stop to pipe.  I did see her cautiously inspecting the outside of a queen cell with stinger ready to make sure no one was home.

Back to the bees,

Jeff

Preparations for Winter

August is already winding down and the bees have been busy preparing for winter.  Yes that's not a typo, the hives are placing stores closer to the brood nest and raising bees that will be prepared for several months of minimal activity during winter.  With 21 days between each brood cycle there isn't a lot of time left for hives to beef up their numbers and make winter bees to replace the summer workforce.  As we nudge into fall and then winter the broodnest will get ever smaller as they back fill with honey and pollen.  Because these winter bees are so important for colony survival I have been hypersensitive about noting signs of disease and/or pests during my hive checks this month.

Collecting nectar from thistle.

Black Eyed Susan is a nectar source.

 Sedum Stonecrop is a good nectar source that is coming into bloom.

Russian Sage is another popular late season nectar source.

Plains Coreopsis also does well late summer. 

Milkweed is a nectar source for bees, and is also the only food source for Monarch caterpillars.  Butterflies drink nectar from many flowers but if you want them to reproduce you need to have a few milkweed plants around.

Goldenrod can be a big nectar source this time of year.  This plant was covered in tiny wasps.

I've noticed several Cherry Laurel (Prunus laurocerasus) plants putting out a second bloom this year.  Usually they only bloom early spring.

A week ago I got a call to look at a beehive in a tree to determine if they could be removed.  When I got there I found a massive 6 foot diameter tree with a hole about 15 feet up.  The activity looked good and they looked as happy as bees could be and the tree was in excellent health as well.  It's hard to say how long the nest had been there but I talked them out of removal and to just let them exist since it's unlikely they would bother anyone with and entrance so high up and any kind of removal would likely kill them this time of year and potentially damage the tree.  I told them if it gets to be a problem we could try a trap out in spring otherwise just call me when they swarm.

The entrance to this bee fortress is at the indent in the upper right trunk.

Echinacea is a type of coneflower native to eastern and central North American forests and grasslands.  It has a distinctive spiked center with drooping petals and gets it's common name from Greek word "ekhinos" for sea urchin.  This perennial doesn't need much water and prefers airy dry soil and can take partial shade making it a good candidate for our northwest gardens.  They are often covered in bees when in bloom and produce ample nectar.  Where Echinacea is grown commercially a flavorful medium colored honey can be produced.

I've had a few people tell me they aren't seeing the bees on their Echinacea this year.  If the plant is too dry it won't produce nectar. 

In top bar hives you can get some honey combs mixed into the brood nest depending on what they were drawing when you added spacer bars.  This is the month I have been moving non-worker bars forward or back so that the broodnest mostly has combs that are worker sized cells.  I like 1-2 frames of storage frames inside the entrance that can be any cell size that they usually use for pollen and honey and then worker frames and then multiple frames of honey in the back.

Ideally I like to leave at least 5-6 frames of solid honey in the back plus whatever is backfilled into the broodnest so they have enough to feed on February through May.  This usually allows me to avoid feeding.  My frames when full are about 6-7 pounds so if I have 8 frames of honey and 8-10 brood frames I'm usually over the 80 pounds you want to have in the city.  I find that since I don't inflate the populations with feeding that usually is far more honey than they actually use in the winter, but it makes the difference in spring when they want to build up.

Hive checks (8/10/2013)

Surf
The population as a whole is down and they have multiple frames of capped brood on the way and good honey stores.  I saw signs of DWV and the larvae didn't look as moist as they should and I'm concerned about their overall health.  Reduced the entrances and condensed the brood nest to only worker frames moving out the drone frames.  I did not see signs of varroa.

Lots of nectar in this hive.

Sand
This hive looked to be in much the same situation as the Surf hive and I performed the same actions to condense the brood nest.   I'm hoping with the large amounts of brood coming that they can outrun the issue they are having, but sadly based on past experiences sick looking hives don't get better this time of year.  I am however more optimistic of this hive because this is a newly mated queen.

Can you see the eggs in the cells?

Hive checks (8/11/2013)

Geek Daughter
They took the syrup I gave them on last inspection and I'm seeing lots of new nectar stored on back frames, just not on the brood frames.  I'm not going to feed them again as the population size looks healthy and am going to wait and see why they don't store much honey at the tops of brood frames.  I did move two drone frames back behind the broodnest so the worker brood frames are all together right inside the entrance and will get the benefit of nectar and pollen coming in from foragers.  I'm not seeing any signs of disease.

This girl is bringing in propolis that is collected from trees.

The queen is off to a good start.

Ballard Swarm
Lots and lots of brood coming.  They are in buildup mode still.  They have 3-4 inch honey arches on every frame and have some pollen reserves as well.  They will be in good shape for winter once they start to backfill.  They are also still drawing comb which is hard to get them to do in August!

Getting attention from the attendants.

Rosemary Swarm
The girls were a little pissy today.  They are still drawing comb (slightly crazy comb) and trying to build up.  I added two spacer bars to see if they can draw them out. Hive looks healthy.

Another busy queen.

Rebels
The girls weren't pissy until I got half way through the broodnest today.  I guess that's a plus.  I didn't see the queen but everything looks good and their population seems to have stabilized now.  Nectar is coming in and getting stored.  Hive looks healthy.

Hive checks (8/13/2013)
Icon Granddaughter
Things have definitely turned around in this hive since the supersedure.  This hive has had signs of DWV all season and I only saw one bee with DWV today which was an improvement.  The brood was looking a lot more solid than it's been the last couple months and the larvae was looking really good as well.

Lots of healthy looking bees in this hive now.

Geeks
They are building up and things look good.  No signs of disease in this hive.  There is a fair amount of honey in this hive but also some partial combs they aren't drawing out anymore so I might have to do some swapping next inspection.

You can't tell she is three years old.

Architects
They had a surplus of pollen on last inspection and have been making good use of it raising a lot of brood.  The hive is bringing in nectar and building up reserves.  The queen is very active and everything looks really good in this hive.

She was running around too much and I couldn't get a good picture with attendants circling her.

Hive checks (8/19/2013)
Checked the hives at the new host site today and finally got around to naming them.  I decided on Luna, Latin for Moon for the West facing hive and Solis, Latin for Sun for the East facing hive.

Luna on the left and Solis on the right.

Luna
This queen is a daughter form the Surf hive that was raised in Plum Creek.  I'm feeding both hives to build them up a bit more so they go into October with better numbers.  Both hives have minimal stores as well.  I saw a few bees with DWV in this hive, which means all three daughters from the Surf hive have some level of DWV.  While this hive is small it did not give me the same sickly impression that her two sister hives did.  Pulled the drone/honey frames out of the brood nest to help them optimize their resources.

Not the greatest pattern, but it'll do.

Nice sized tiger striped queen.  She is well liked.

 Solis
This hive is about on par with the Luna hive.  This is a daughter of the Geeks and they have established a small but stable brood nest.  Her pattern is also a little spotty in places but based on what I've seen before I think it will be better once they build up more.  This hive also coats more heavily with propolis.  They inherited several frames of brood from the original Icon Granddaughter hive that always showed signs of DWV, but the queen and bees introduced came from the "resistant" hive and now I'm not seeing any signs of DWV.  Pulled the drone/honey frames out of the broodnest to help them optimize their resources.

I'm going to have trouble keeping track of the queens in these two hives since the look like twins.  She is also well liked by her daughters.

Good looking frame of brood, but they weren't all like this.

The girls are also eagerly working the mint growing in the garden.

Back to the bees,

- Jeff