Bee surprised

Saturday 28th July 2012

You may have noticed that recently I've taken full advantage of Blogger's ability to pre and post date posts. That's because I've been totally dedicated to getting the polytunnel erected. With fifteen hour days in the baking sun, I'm afraid doing anything when I got inside was out of the question.

Anyway, if you look at the last 6 posts you'll get an account of the saga that was the polytunnel.

So today I took a very well earned rest.

Sunrise has crept past 5 o'clock now. It may sound early, but it's a little luxury to set my alarm a minute later every day! So today, as the sun rose, I captured this striking cloud formation before going straight back to bed till 10. Then I watched the Olympics!

Bee Surprise
Our introduction to bee-keeping has been eventful to say the least. Our bees seem determined to colonise the whole of the fens, beavering away and building queen cells left, right and centre. Despite our best efforts, they have swarmed twice that we know of. Presumably they are not completely happy with the queen.

It's a week now since I briefly spotted a swarm settled in the veg patch. Since then, there's been mixed activity at the entrance of each hive. At least the bees have been able to get out and about at last and the warmth will be very welcome to them.

No pictures today I'm afraid, but Sue came back from her inspection of the hives with some very surprising news.

The hive which I thought had swarmed has young brood and is thriving. If you remember, when we split the hives we found a newly emerged queen to go in this hive. But, after over a month there was no sign of eggs or larvae, so we put in a couple of queen cells from the other hive. Well, obviously something went according to plan, though we're not sure which plan!!

The other, into which we moved the original queen, is faring OK but Sue could not find the queen. She is marked and has always been easy to find in the past. Could it be that the swarm actually came from here? After all, this is where the queen cells were being built. Could it be that both hives have swarmed?

All in all, by hook or by crook, it seems as if we are pretty much back where we started!