Thursday, August 4, 2011

A Late Summer Split?!

Last week when we went in to check the hive was overflowing with bees! The weather has finally really warmed up and the blackberry flowers have been going full tilt for weeks, and now almost all turned to little green berries. Only one super has been on (for about 3 or 4 weeks now) and it is filling up, but not full by any means. It was a late spring, and all the berries were a few weeks later than last year, but still not nearly as much honey as last year. Could have been because of the preponderance of drones we noted last month. That situation seems to have stabilized, and the drone population, tho still high, seems to again be (happily) far outnumbered by the workin' girls.

Now, it might prove to be too late in the season to attempt a split but we are concerned about a swarm from an egg-bound queen, so we are going to attempt a "takeaway split" tomorrow, and hopefully we will find a nice queen cell already begun being drawn out for the new hive.

More notes (and pictures) to follow after the move!

-=pj=-

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