Spring in the Bee Yard

Last spring we lost both colonies in the two hives we had started one year previously.  There were lots and lots of dead bees on the bottom board.  The inspector had looked at the empty hive boxes and determined that the colonies had likely starved to death during the winter because they were weak.

We bought two nucs and installed the new colonies in the hives. 

This winter there were so many warm periods and we frequently saw the bees flying.  We fed them in the fall in preparation for the winter.  Recently we noticed all activity had ceased in the yellow hive.  When we looked inside we found it empty.  The frames were empty.

And there were only a few dead bees.

We closed it up to keep out opportunistic insects.  The honey was gone and may have been removed by robber bees.

The green hive has been buzzing with lots of activity.  In the winter we put a reducer on the entrance so mice cannot get inside.  To mice this is heaven, warm, protected from the elements, and plenty of free food.  The reducer means when the bees are flying they have to take turns entering and exiting. 

Today we removed the reducer so they do not have to wait in line (I know how I hate waiting in line). 
Everything is blooming now, trees, shrubs, flowers, everywhere and the bees are coming loaded with pollen.  So with high hopes we added a super to the top.

Keeping with "beach colors" we put on our first super.  We removed the feeder (on the left) installed a queen excluder (this is a mesh screen that the bees can go through but the queen is too large to fit through) and then the super.  We do not want the queen going up into the super and laying eggs.  Hopefully this is where the bees will store their honey and we can steal it.  We only peeked into the hive today.  It was very active.  We will do an inspection in a few days.

Keep your fingers crossed. 

Mason Bees

Since becoming honey bee keepers we have become more aware of the many, many kinds of bees in our garden.  All of them are polinators and are appreciated. 
 Hubby received this Mason Bee hive as a gift.  We hung it on the garage.  If you look closely you will see that several of the pieces of bamboo are blocked.  The bees have laid eggs and sealed up the openings. 

I tried to get pictures of the many different kinds of bees and wasps on the golden rod and butterfly bush, but no matter how many times I said "hold still for the picture" they did not cooperate.  Below is the best I could do today.

Not shown are tiny little bees, we used to call sweat bees, and a black bee about the size of a honey bee, and the ones I could not even look at because they were so fast.

Hot time in the summer

Ever wonder what bees do when it is in the 90s?  Thousands of workers busy building comb, making honey, feeding the babies, feeding the Queen (she never feeds herself).  This plus a hive box in the sun most of the day with very little ventilation must get very very hot.

 They sit on the veranda and fan themselves.  This is called "bearding" in the bee keeper world, for obvious reasons. 
They also send out the foragers to get water for all the workers.

Inspector at Aggie's

Today we met the bee inspector at our friends hive.  We have been helping with her hive and because we are newbees we wanted him to take a look and make sure all was well.  She has had this hive for three years and last year she lost a second hive to wax moths. 
There was plenty of honey but the inspector said there were not enough bees for this time of year.  They may have swarmed earlier.  There is a laying queen and there is plenty of eggs, larvae, and capped brood so they may recover. 

We will inspect the hive again in about two weeks.  We did find hive beetles and they are not usually a problem unless the colony is weak.  

While we were there we peaked at the cardinals in the nest by her front door.

THE BEES ARE HERE

 After the loss of our bees we had attempted to find a source of bees to repopulate our hives.  A local distributor put us on a waiting list. 
Then we received an email sent to the list serve of the Orange County Beekeepers Association (OCBA) that one of the members, a Master Beekeeper, had two nucs available for purchase.  We jumped on the email and were the first to respond.
Today he delivered the two nucs and they were installed in our hives.  A nuc is a short name for nucleus.  It is a young incipient colony that will quickly grow to full size.  You purchase whole combs complete with bees, brood and a queen.  It is a simple process of removing the frames with bees from his hive box and installing them in our hive box. 

Bees are out and about and seem to be quite happy.  Our hive box already has honey and empty brood combs so they can go to work.  It is a great time because many things are blooming, including the tulip popular (of which there are many in our woods.)

Bees and family are happy!

The Bees are coming The Bees are coming

Two nucs to be delivered May 7th!
Yipee!!!

Postmortem

Our bees are obviously gone. 
The two hives have been weak and last week we found there were none left alive.

After checking with our local Beekeepers Association we called out the inspector.  North Carolina State University (NCSU) extension office has inspectors that cover specific areas.  We called the inspector for our county, Don.  Don came to our home to inspect the empty hives.

After looking at the dead bees, head down into cells, he speculated that they had probably starved. 

At the top of this frame the white cells contain honey.  However during the winter (and we had a particularly cold one) if the bees cannot move to where the honey is stored, they will starve.

Don then checked for American Foulbrood (AF).  He inserted a small stick into a cell, looked at what came out and sniffed it.  AF has a foul ordor.  We were relieved to learn we did not have AF.  If we had, the hives, and frames would have to be burned and buried.  This is a very contagious disease and you cannot risk spreading it.

After AF was ruled out Don looked for evidence of varroa mites and found some.  It was not possible to determine the extent of varroa mites now that the bees were gone but virtually every hive has them.  It is possible that the infestation was extensive and the colony was weakened before winter set in.  This contributed to the colony not being able to access the honey and their starvation. 

The queen had either died or was not laying eggs so we did not have new bees to replace those who had died.

We are in the process of trying to locate some nucs and will be on the lookout for swarms to replace our lost bees.