Sunday May 10, 2015 Day 29 of new hives

It was glorious out yesterday when we returned from our trip to the Czech Republic - side note: we went with 6 of our family members, which included my parents: my dad ended the campaign in WWII under Patton's 3rd Army in Pilsen, Czechoslovakia and there are AMAZING celebrations of their liberators/our veterans annually but particularly on the "five" anniversaries. Of course, these veterans were all over 90, one will turn 100 in one month, so the chance of them returning across the ocean in 5 years, seems difficult to imagine.

We celebrated VE Day and the Liberation Festival in Pilsen from 1-6 May then we were in Prague for the last two days, including 8 May (official VE Day).

Anyway, there was too much laundry, mail, jet lag to check my hives other than I filled one of my syrup jars.

Today, it is cool, windy but I needed to check the pollen patties and replenish the remaining 3 (quart) jars of 1:1 sugar syrup. Of course, my iPhone battery died after my first video and photo, so that will be all you see today! Then it started to rain when I opened the second hive.

So the first hive, both pollen patties were mere remnants, so put more on the bars of the second box (not top box because it pulls the cloth too much and then they will get into my feeder box). The second hive, there was still almost a whole pollen patty left, but I replenished with two more anyway - it's supposed to be cool and rainy the next few days. Jim Kloek (Stillwater, MN) keeps pollen patties on until the first week of June. Marla Spivak's notes (from the U of MN beekeeping course) just show pollen patties for two weeks when one first hives the packages. Well, hopefully, it can't hurt. Too late anyway, they're on.

I was considering looking at a comb but due to the weather, decided against it - I gently pulled back an edge of the top box's cloth and it's so intriguing to feel the heat emanate out of the hive. Thus I sealed it up quickly and let them be.

This is the "first" hive with the two new patties on (see the old ones?):

We hired someone to do a "prescribed burn" of our land ~12 acres before we left for the Czech, so this photo was 10 days ago:

This is the brief video as I opened hive one

Thursday April 29, 2015

today it is glorious outside and the bees are laden with pollen.
nevertheless, it can still freeze in Minnesota until June 1, so I put pollen patties on and filled the feeders.
the queen is laying in each hive and all is well.

Sunday April 26, 2015

I decided to take photos through the windows of the hives, so I would remember how far along they were at this point

The bees are very active today and LOADED with bright yellow, pale yellow and some almost white pollen.

The first one is the top box of the SE hive the last two are the top and bottom boxes, respectively, of the NW hive

I started the top boxes with comb from last year, that's why they are so far along in 2 wks!!

Saturday April 25, 2015

After some very cool rainy days, it is sunny and 60 degrees today so the bees were loaded with pollen moving in and out of the hives.

Here they are:

Friday April 17 (day 6) and Tuesday April 21 (day 10)

It was really warm during the first week of the hives - up to 70 degrees. I filled the feeders on day 6 (they were pretty low - but I had only filled them 1/3 full initially). I left for Boston and on day 8, it got cold, in fact, yesterday, April 21, it was SNOWING when I went to the hive. The wind was blowing hard and my hands were SO cold.

I filled the feeders but they were only down ~1/4 so not sure why they weren't taking down more syrup. I put some pollen patties on top of the top bars, under the cloth - and placed them above the clusters on each hive. I smoked the hives when I did it but honestly, it was so chilly, I probably didn't have to.

Closed up the hives and will wait for warm weather to check on them.

Day 3

The feeders (though only filled 1/4 when I put them in) were nearly empty so I filled all 4 quart jars completely.
I smoked the hives and opened them to remove the queen cages - it was sunny and 70 degrees out.
Put it all back together and will leave them "bee."
They were looking good, and all over the combs which were from last year.
Lots of activity!

One final video of April 11, 2015 hiving the bees