November Hill farm journal, 125

 Another busy week on November Hill. I’ve been watching the bee hives closely after our runaway split + putting a frame of eggs/brood/nurse bees into Artemis hive. Every day things look a bit better.

Hegemone 2 (I’ve decided to keep the Hegemone split in the same name family for ease of tracking) never even slowed down. This is the upper deep hive box that we put on its own stand. We don’t know if the queen was in this box or the bottom box but both upper and lower had brood and eggs so... it will remain a mystery since we do not mark our queens. This hive is crazy busy right now - workers coming and going with pollen and nectar, drones flying, and orientation flights happening daily which is one sign of population growth. 

Here’s Hegemone 2:

As you can see, my colors are getting mixed and matched as we move forward in this beekeeping endeavor. The teal bottom is the stand with a screened bottom filled with 5 or so inches of forest floor “compost.” The darker hive box on top of that is the brood box - it was the upper deep on the old/original hive. We added a wooden slat queen excluder - it will discourage the queen from laying in the medium super above it but the slats are far enough apart that the workers don’t have to squeeze through (thus damaging their wings). On top of the medium super is our glass innercover which allows us to take the roof off and check things out without breaking the hive boxes apart and disrupting the propolis seals and the bees. It has screened holes for ventilation and for feeding during times that’s needed.

Hegemone 1 was moved to Echo hive’s old location. Because its activity slowed a bit when we moved it, I watched super closely to make sure I was seeing pollen going in. The first day was quiet, the second day a bit more activity, the third day that doubled, and today it is extremely busy. Nectar and pollen coming in, a few drones flying out, and orientation flights happening as well. I’m so relieved it’s doing well. One of these two hives is either raising a new queen or had one in the works already and in that case she could have gone on a mating flight and be preparing to lay her first eggs. 

Here’s Hegemone 1:

You can see the stand, the deep brood box, the queen excluder, the medium super, and the top. I’ve ordered a glass innerview cover for this hive and we’ll add it when it arrives. We put medium supers on both these hives because of the sheer number of bees the boxes had and because we’re rolling into our main nectar flow season. My only concern at this point is that we’re having three nights in the 40s coming up and I’m a little worried about that. They should be fine. 

We moved the bait hive sitting on the ground to its new location previously not used in our apiary. It’s ready for a swarm to move in, but if that doesn’t happen by April 24th, our new bee nuc will be moved into it. This is a new genetic line for us and is said to be gentle, quick to build up in the spring, and a huge honey producer. Supposedly it will build up so quickly we will need to do a split to get the swarm it would have cast. So we’ll be watching it very closely once it arrives.

I’m naming this hive Echo since it is technically replacing the Echo hive that was robbed and absconded last fall. It looks tiny here but will soon have a medium super, queen excluder, and innerview glass cover of its own. 

Finally, Artemis, our failing and queenless hive got its frame of eggs, brood, and nurse bees. If all went as hoped, the bees selected an egg and are raising a new queen, the brood is hatching out, and the nurse bees are now becoming foragers. Every day since the addition of the frame has been slow until yesterday when I saw a tiny bit of an uptick in activity. Today that has doubled or tripled. There’s still plenty that could go wrong with this rescue effort, but we’re hoping they make it. Some would say add another frame of eggs and brood and nurse bees each week until it’s up and running, and I have considered doing that, but since we split Hegemone, our strongest hive, I don’t want to now weaken those two splits by taking more bees from them. If Artemis is still struggling when it comes time to split the new Echo nuc, I’ll consider 

combining one of the split halves with Artemis. For now we’re watching and waiting. Artemis had two deeps and since the top one was nearly empty, we took it off to reduce the space this very small colony had to guard and protect. Now it’s a single deep with innerview glass cover and its top. Once they build out, if they succeed, we’ll add a medium super so they can work on putting resources up there for the dearth time this summer. This hive came from the same farm as Hegemone but was never as strong and maybe had an old queen from the beginning. We just don’t know. I’m rooting for them. 

The second bait hive in the tree is very busy with scout bees checking it out today. I’m very excited - it would be so cool to catch a swarm this way. We’ll see. Every day I’m walking down with binoculars to sit and watch and see what clues I can get from all the hives. It’s better than TV! 

In other news, with help, we have finished the deck work, got the camper cleaned out for spring, have a few small repairs (thinking of Shawn Colvin’s song here) to make inside, and got the garage swept and dewebbed. We’re about halfway done replacing some back of the farm fencing. 

Still to come this week is a load of mulch, a quote on the attic HVAC, and some work in the garden beds. 

Keil Bay has acupuncture tomorrow and it’s perfect timing, as he has been sticking his hind leg out again. He’s in good spirits, and all are in need of good baths, but we’ll wait for the 40s nights to pass before we have the first bath of the season spa day. 

All the rest of the menagerie are good, the humans are good, and wow - we will be all the way to May before we know it.