Queen Knives has settled in nicely and is an egg laying machine. She had great capped brood patterns and several nice frames of cells with eggs.
The second super had 6 frames completely drawn out with the 7th one almost done. I decided to add the third super to give them the space to build out as Knives definitely seems up to the task.
Filed under beekeeping
With Queen Knives recent ascension to power, our whole evil-ex super concept got thrown off. We will still add the evil-ex supers as needed, but decided to pay respects to Ramona by creating a super that depicts the epic battle between Ramona and Knives from the comic. We like to think this is what went down in the hive as well.
Thanks to the camera team for their drawing, inking, and lettering skills.
Filed under beekeeping, equipment, Fun
The one good thing about the hot and dry weather here in Austin is the ease of melting wax in my homemade solar wax melter. It doesn’t hold a lot of wax, but with every day being hot and sunny, I can process a lot of small batches. Here is the before shot.
If you want to review how I made this contraption, check out this previous post.
Filed under beekeeping, equipment
It has been a few weeks since I checked Marge’s hive. The top most super is still pretty much empty from the honey harvest a few weeks back. Without some rain and a good nectar flow, they won’t make much progress drawing out wax, but I’m leaving it on to prevent overcrowding.
All eight frames on the 5th super are completely drawn out and filled with honey.
The 4th super is filled with queen cells.
I’m pretty sure this hive may have swarmed once already, so I’m surprised to see more queen cells in the making. With the drought and heat right now, I can’t imagine any swarm would have good luck starting out and surviving. I also don’t get the sense that this hive is overflowing with bees either.
Here is another frame with the start of a queen cell plus some really nice pollen.
Our resident Texas Spiny Lizard also took advantage of the hive inspection to run in and eat some bees. Here he is scampering away after chowing down.
Filed under beekeeping, queens
Most beekeepers (especially urban beekeepers) usually worry about the pests that live inside the hive like small hive beetles and varroa mites. We now have documented evidence that a skunk has taken up residence in the beeyard.
Skunks can be a major problem for beekeepers as they like to eat bees and their thick fur protects them from stings. A single skunk can really damage a colony in just a single evening. So far I haven’t seen any signs that this particular skunk has been bothering the hives, but I am going to take some precautionary measures.
Elevated hive stands help as it forces the skunk to expose its underbelly to reach the hive entrance. My hives are on stands, but they are not that far off the ground so I’m not sure how much good it will do. I think I’m going to try a product they sell to deter cats from areas in your yard. Hopefully these spiky mats will prevent the skunk from investigating the hives and deciding they are a great all you can eat buffet.
Filed under beekeeping, pests
About a month ago, I found a very obvious supersedure cell in Ramona’s hive, but the next week’s inspection found the cell gone and Ramona still in the hive. However, I never saw Ramona after that week, but always just figured she was in there somewhere. Looks like I was wrong:
You can see the new queen right in the middle of the photo. Unless Ramona was able to remove her white mark, you are now looking at the new queen named Knives Chau. Happy Independence Day Knives!
Edit: It just occurred to me that the package from Bee Weaver came with a marked and clipped queen. As this queen has full length wings, it is most definitely a new queen.
Filed under beekeeping, queens
I was a little nervous after last week’s inspection of Ramona’s hive, but I now think she is starting to recover from the pesticide incident of a few weeks ago. All the capped brood have now emerged and her numbers are a lot stronger by evidence of the quantity of bees in the hive. The only cause of concern was the wax moth I think I found hiding in the outer cover which promptly got squished.
I also put the feeder back on the hive to encourage the girls to draw out more frames in the 2nd super which in turn should allow the population to expand. Right now I’ll be happy if I can get all 8 frames in each of the two supers fully drawn out. The inch of rain we got earlier in the week should also help matters in the flower department. This drought is just miserable, but it has been a great learning experience on how to handle hives in these conditions.
Filed under beekeeping
So I finally got my labels printed for my honey jars. I ordered 1000 of these suckers mainly because the difference between 250 and 1000 is like 20 bucks.
Thanks again to Essi Zimm for the awesome label and t-shirt design.
Filed under beekeeping, honey
Even with this drought, Marge’s hive has still been managing to pack on the honey. One of the advantages of having a hive in an urban setting is that people have a variety of flowers in their gardens and often have watering systems to keep them blooming. Still, with no rain in the forecast for the foreseeable future, this will be the last time I take any honey off until at least the late fall, and only if we see a considerable nectar flow sometime between now and then.
This being my fourth harvest, I think I’m finally getting it down to a science. The bee escape is the best invention ever and even with this hot weather, it is still very effective with only a few bees left in the honey super. Here are some shots of the frames of honey.
I’m still using the crush and strain method for extraction. One of these days I’ll get an extractor, but for now this works well and I do get a lot of beeswax for other projects.
While we were waiting for the honey to settle through all the filters, we had a wonderful dinner and scotch tasting at Brenna’s house where we keep the hives.
We pulled right around 25 pounds off this 8 frame super, and it is the same color and consistency of our previous honey harvest.
Filed under beekeeping, honey
For the past year, we have been trying to get a picture of this super fast lizard who hangs out around the bee yard. I can only assume he takes advantage of dead bees that are thrown out of the hive for an easy meal.
With yesterday’s carnage at Ramona’s hive, this guy was having a field day. Of course, I don’t know how he will react to eating tons of pesticide ridden bees, but hopefully he will be ok.
Filed under beekeeping
Urban Beekeeping in Austin, Texas 