No news is good news

My apologies for not blogging in a month, but as the saying goes, no news is good news. Aside from being distracted by the new chicken coop, it has either been rainy or hot as a mofo on the weekends, so inspecting the hives has been on the back burner. I do keep a regular eye on them and watch the entrances for good or bad signs. All has looked good from the outside, so I wasn’t terribly worried and feeling like I need to inspect. Besides, leaving a newly installed hive alone for a few weeks is good for them.

But despite the 90-something degree weather today, I did a full inspection today. Slightly overcast is my friend, but it was still super hot. I’m currently drenched in sweat, rehydrating and cooling off. I wore a full suit today because I knew I’d have to do a thorough inspection, which means moving boxes and frames around and pissing off a lot of bees. About 30 minutes out there in a full bee suit and I am absolutely drenched. I mean, I sweated through my leather bee gloves, and my leather shoes. It’s HOT out there. Yuck for me, the bugs love it though. Warm bees are happy bees!

Both hives look great. All good signs, lots of brood, workers, foragers, etc. Honey, pollen in abundance. I couldn’t find either queen, but I found day old eggs in both hives, so no worries there. I see nothing to worry about and that’s about all the news.

The only thing that bothers me is that the hive with the honey super still has not built any comb on the honey frames. None. Zilch. Nada. They are not eager at all to give me that sweet liquid gold and I am not anywhere closer to harvesting honey. I need to do some reading to see what I need to do to encourage them to start building that honeycomb.

But I have two healthy hives and I am happy enough with that for now. Now for a shower! 🐝