First Week Checkup

It is Saturday April 23rd and a beautiful day with the temperature at 56 F.  It looks like it will be a beautiful Easter weekend but the the forecast is for more rain and cold next week so we did not want to miss this opportunity to finally take a close look at how the bees were doing.  It has been a full week since we installed the packages. There  were lots of bees flying so we put on veils and gloves since we were going to pull frames and look for eggs. We did not smoke the hives.

Ellen and I  started with T1.  We checked the syrup and about half of the original gallon was used. We pulled the queen cage and noted that the queen had been released. There was some comb being drawn but we did not want to shake the bees off a top bar to take a closer look. Overall, the hive seemed to be doing well, the bees were finally flying, they were taking the 1:1 syrup, the queen had been released and comb was being drawn.  We did notice that when we put the top bars back in it is a more difficult operation than a Langstroth hive because the bar abuts the neighboring bar along its full length with no bee space so that the bees must be brushed off the full length of the bar to keep from crushing bees when the bar is replaced.  With a lot of active bees hanging from a bar, by the time the bees are cleared from one end they are back on the other end and they must be cleared of both bars as the bars are slid together.  I need to get faster and smoother in the future.

Next we took a look at T2 with the same result except that less comb was being drawn.  L2 was next and was the hive with the ant problem which we seem to have solved for now by removing an ant nest near the hive.  The Lanstroth hive is clearly ahead of the Top Bar Hives because comb was being drawn and eggs were being laid and some syrup and pollen was being stored.

When we took a look at T3 and L3 the results were nearly identical to the previous hives. So far so good, now we just need warmer weather.

Jack