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We're in the thick of it now so it's time for an update. If I have time, I'll put together some clips from my queen installs that some might find interesting.
So far this season I have:
1. made some walk away-splits.
2. Made some splits from my hives with queen cells and frames from my strong hives.
3. Made splits with queen cells I purchased from another producer
4. Made 4 splits with Cordovan Italian queens I purchased this week.
5. Captured 1 swarm.
6. Failed to capture 1 swarm because it was already "moving inside" an upper story soffit before I got there.
8. I have swarms caught in 2 of 5 traps that I have out at this time and need non-rainy day to get those home.
7....I did a removal of bees the owner said were mean. They had old bee equipment underneath a deck next to a walk-out basement door. Apparently, bees had moved into the stack of boxes 3-4 years ago, but recently turned very aggressive.
When I arrived there were indeed bees everywhere. They had 4 stacked deep boxes that were bursting at the seems with bees. I was short on daylight, and cracked them apart to find that some boxes had no frames and were full of wild comb, some had 2-3 frames turned the wrong way and were a mess and 1 box with 7 frames. I mean they were FULL. They were heavy and angry bees exploded from rotted spots and gaps when I pulled the boxes apart.
I ended up making 2 stacks of 2, putting them on bottom boards and strapping lids on. These boxes had to weigh 250lbs per set. I struggled to get them into the back of my truck but did get them relocated.
For those of you watching the show for the crashes, this was your lucky day. It Turns out the elastic is bad on the bottom of my bee jacket. I don't know how many got under it when I was in the middle of that, but several. I assume I had 15-20 stingers to remove from my forearms and love handles area and no idea how many "half stings" through my gloves and pants but it was a lot. These bitches were angry.
In their new location, one of the boxes appears to be calm and likely has the queen. The other stack is pretty damn grumpy still and need a queen. I'm deciding if I'm going to get 4 queens, make each of those boxes their own hive with a new queen or just try to make 2.
I'm also picking some nucs up from 3 producers in the next week, so I'll have a big variety of new bee, different types of queens and will have a lot of things to compare and try to figure out what the best plan will be moving forward.
I just wish I had time to do all of the things I need to do.
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