#yard notes

Friday Mar 6, about 11am. Hot and humid, in the mid to high 80sF. We had been predicted stormy, rainy weather all week, but it didn't show. Just windy and humid.

I'm still not feeling well so I came with the intention to take my time and check the growth status of the bees and see if they're showing signs of nectar flow/swarm season. THEY ARE!!

When I first arrived I chatted with my friend by the yard for a bit, when we both noticed a little black mark on one of the back row hives. He noted that it wasn't there earlier that morning when he filled the water dishes, and we assumed it was garbage or leaves stuck to the box somehow.

IT WAS A TINY SWARM!

My instinct was that something was wrong with the abandoned cafe removal colony and this was them, and my instinct was dead on.

Because I was so sick last week, I asked my friends to feed the bees for me. They did, but they're still new beekeepers with a lot to learn, so they don't look into the colonies when they feed them for me, they try to keep exposure minimal. Which I do appreciate.

However, something was already wrong with the removal colony, and I think they just didn't notice. My theory is their feeder was compromised, probably by hive beetles from the old comb I added from the removal to make the new hive body feel more like home. Then they just added more feed to it.

With the warm humid weather we've had all week, their feeder fermented and clearly bubbles over, soaking everything around it in nasty moisture, exacerbating the problem of decaying comb and hive beetles. Quite a bit of the bees died and were on the bottom board, which was now covered in a layer of rotten syrup and muck. The walls of the hive body were damp and mucky. Thankfully, the small amount of brood on the frames in the center were dry, and bees were on them, but very few.

It seemed only about half of the remaining bees and the queen attempted to abscond, but since she was likely not prepared for emergency flight and the winds were high, they thankfully didn't make it out of the Apiary, and my timing happened to be perfect.

I scooped up the little swarm in my hand and immediately saw the queen. I quickly stored her in an empty Nuc box with clean frames, and put the Nuc on top of the colony they were taking refuge on, to help the stragglers find their queen, and I went to work cleaning out their hive body. It was horrific honestly.

I hung the nasty frames and feeder from a stand to rid it of the hive beetle larvae infestation and muck.

I scraped and wiped the bottom board then flipped it, since it was completely dry underneath, and scraped and wiped the hive body. I removed any wet or damaged frames, managing to spare the dry ones with brood, then put the clean new feeder and frames with the queen on it from the Nuc back into the box, and gave them an entrance reducer. Later I also added a frame of capped honey for them to use as feed, donated from a much stronger, overstocked hive.

I'm stressed and appalled at their situation, and I feel so bad that it got so bad they had to abscond, but I'm grateful I was there in the nick of time, and I hope my efforts are worth it and keep the colony anchored.

I then started my hive checks on that row, with colony India right next to it.

Thankfully they were going strong, and may even make good use of a super this spring. This is their first year in the Apiary, and they were another removal colony, so I'm not expecting a lot of growth from them this year, but I won't ignore it if they're able.

Do you see their big beautiful blonde queen?

They had some wack burr comb on their feeder that was starting to cause problems with the neighboring frame, so I removed it. They're doing so well though.

I found these cloths at the dollar store that look exactly like the pricier beetle sheets I buy from the farm, so I cut them up and used them in the colonies. I hope they work as well too, it's be a great money saving hack.

In early March I hit the ground sick and was set back a week in my hive check schedule. I'm more hands on with my bees than the average sideline beekeeper, but I'm okay with that; I feel like that's part of what kept my apiary at 0% loss this winter, while my peers experienced on average 60% or more.

I was seeing signs of early/false spring, which meant brood growth and swarming, so I stacked my colonies with new deeps and supers in February. I felt crazy for doing so, but we only had one last random freeze, that lasted about twelve hours, and I was able to insulate my hives regardless, so they were fine.

When I finally felt well enough to leave the house, I dragged myself from yard to yard, trying to catch up with where the bees were at. My Apiary had already gone through their swarms 💀 I missed them entirely somehow. Thankfully, my colonies were so large and strong, the remains from the swarms were still well populated, fed, and with plenty of brood. Each swarmed colony was way too successful at raising queen cells, too, lol, they all had multiple frames with multiple cells per frame. They were ready!!

Seriously, multiple frames like this per colony:

Since the queen cells were capped, I knew they had already swarmed and were queenless, which messed with my plans. But as they say, bees don't read the beekeeping books, so I had to get flexible fast. Thankfully, because they were so determined to raise armies of queens lol, I was still able to use some of the cells in splits and Nucs, without ruining their chances of requeening.

Some of them were already fully emerged, too, so I tried not to mess with those colonies too much, so as not to accidentally kill or injure the virgin queen. They're much smaller before mating, and harder to spot. They move faster and are more nervous. I wanted to give these colonies their best opportunities to restart, so I fed them and let them be.

I started building my Nuc yard and split colony S1 into S1 and S3. They were extremely aggressive, but now after the split, they're calm again. Sometimes the bees need to be humbled lol.

I've just been maintaining my yard, watching the queen cells and counting days. It'll be a couple weeks from cell formation to mating flights, so I'm expecting to see eggs laid again next week or so. 🤞

They only just began their nectar flow this week, which is a huge relief for my wallet.

My other yards were pretty stable. MF yard had no loss, was growing, and wasn't swarmy until this past week (03/25/26). I was there early enough to pull the queen cells and add supers.

R Yard actually got two Nucs installed. One was a cobbled Nuc from frames with queens cells plus bees and brood up the wazoo from other colonies. I expect that one will be able to mate out there, but I'll need to keep an eye on it. The other had a verified mated and laying queen already (!!), so I am not worried about them. They'll be needing honey supers soon, they're a very productive yard. I also got the third hive stand out there to give them more room and less competition, which is a relief. I feel like they were bullying each other.

M yard was looking small but still chugging along. Their third colony, technically a winter loss that I've been trying to rekindle, freaking refuses to raise a queen, which makes me think the original handful of leftover bees were all completely robbers or drone layers. It's been long enough that those bees should have died, so I essentially built them a Nuc, too. The two strong colonies are doing well, and ants are taking over the empty hive body of the other loss, so I am constantly treating for ants and trying to keep it clean.

B yards are always a struggle. My friend and mentor, who gave me this client, told me in the beginning it was a difficult yard, naturally swarmy and unstable. It's proven her right tenfold. They had the most winter loss, thankfully mostly absconds and not dead outs, and their colonies struggle to produce bees and honey comparatively. I think it's their environment. But I'm working on their Nucs and keeping their current colonies stable. Some of them in the large side of the yard are actually doing so well they got supers. And one in the small yard swarmed, but the swarm just crossed the yard and landed in one of the dead outs in the large yard! Lol. So that was easy. Had to give the original colony some egg frames though, looked like they didn't raise a queen in time before they decided to swarm.

Here's a shitty photo of their queen hiding on the hive body wall. I was inspecting the empty box and cleaning it, when I noticed a small group of brand new eggs in a frame, and started searching frantically lol.

She's definitely older, and quite healthy, so I'm glad she stayed in the yard!!

My opps client lol, WA yard, had contacted me again after at least half a year. I never know who's hands they invite into their Apiary anymore, but I went out to see how they were fairing for her. Thankfully they were thriving for the most part. The split I initiated last year survived, but they had outgrown their single deep, of course, and swarmed before I got there. Their new queen had emerged, too, but I felt certain by the state of the colony she was lost in high winds on a mating flight and they were about to die out. Because the other colonies were so strong, I was able to give them frames of bees, brood, and eggs, to try again. They're doing well so far.

She wants more splits this year, which will make workdowns and honey harvesting easier for me, as her colonies are already pretty stacked, so I'm ready for it.

MF Yard: Arrived much earlier than anticipated, which meant the owner couldn't join me, as he often likes to, but he said he was pretty busy today anyway so it was probably for the best. He doesn't live on this property, it's like a vacation spot for him. I noticed he set up a hunters blind recently, I'm sure there's plenty of deer around.

Arrived around 10:30am. Weather was in the high 50sF, misty and wet.

Not a lot of action around the entrances, which was expected, but no signs of dead bees piled up under the colonies, which is good.

ALL the colonies in fantastic shape. Densely populated, healthily defensive, plenty of food still on frames. No signs of loss or ill health whatsoever, a very encouraging experience. Relieves me of some of my concerns about bad Beekeeping practices due to the losses in the other yards; now thinking it's more regional, as this yard is in the same county as my personal yard.

Fed them all with the Mountain Camp Method, and exchanged the broken entrance reducers with whole ones for better insulation. I feel confident that they do not need a mid-freeze check, and made plans with the owner to come back as soon as the frost threat is over.

Owner finally applied for Ag Valuation, so expecting to meet county rep for verification soon.

If this apiary comes out of winter as strong as they are now, they'll be my production core yard for Nucs and splits. I've already arranged this with the owner in exchange for free honey processing.

FB Apiary/S Yard: Started with my personal Apiary today. Arrived around 11am, much later than usual, but waiting for warmer weather. It was 58F but felt cooler, very damp but not raining, no noticeable wind. My friends have helped tremendously by creating our little insulation system. We've started a plan for them to make permanent versions with buckles for ease of use. We're considering double layering them with wool or something in the center? Not sure yet. The weather down here is mostly hot and humid, so insulation isn't often needed, but we're expecting a week or more of nights below freezing, and they aren't acclimated to even flying around in the 50sF. Very little to no activity at entrances today.

Finally moved colonies Delta and Echo from the more centered hive stand to the new, more leftish hive stand. They have been weaker and more problematic than the other colonies, and my theory was flight paths and competition. I assume most of the Apiary flies back across the other colonies to forage mostly in the woods, and I wonder if the cross traffic with the center colonies was encouraging regular robbing events. We won't know until the weather stabilizes, but hopefully this helps.

Delta is the spiciest of my personal colonies, with my friends' colony S1 being the consistent rough and rowdy hive. I prefer tough, defensive bees over delicate, calm bees, so I don't mind putting up with the behavior. My friends are still able to walk around the apiary without equipment to fill water bowls and observe, so they don't feel out of control or dangerous.

Today was just dry feeding Mountain Camp Method, so beyond checking entrances for activity, below the hives for signs of dying en masse, and quick scans on top of the frames to see what the clusters look like, very little hive checking was performed. I felt bad breaking seals to feed, but they have time to reseal again before the freeze hits on Saturday. My biggest concern is extra moisture in the hive causing problems. We'll see.

Colonies S1 and S2 look strong and well populated, with S1 being it's usual reactive self.

Colonies Alpha Bravo Charlie look well, no concerns. I desperately need to buy more beetle sheets though, I keep forgetting, and the dampness seems to have dialed up the beetle issues.

Colony India looks small but healthy and clustered. The Nuc was clustered and surprisingly populated! I'm shocked, the last time I looked at the frames, there was no sign of brood or queen, so I assumed It was the neighborhood bar and the bees were just robbing. Thankfully my friend even insulated the Nuc for me. Godspeed little hive, I'm very interested to see how hardy you are.

Colonies Foxtrot Golf Hotel look strong as ever and usual. Didn't bring enough newspapers and had to use copy paper from my friends for the sugar layer.

Colonies Delta Echo looking smaller but healthy. Colony Delta was surprisingly feisty, with more active and defensive bees than usual. Gives me hope they're strengthening and have something to protect. Hope the move helps them both. Some stragglers returned to the old hive stand, surely smelling their colony but confused where it went. The move was probably just over the recommended 3 foot threshold, but I don't think they will suffer significant loss.

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R Yard: Delays from traffic got me to R Yard later than expected, but it was a mid afternoon planned visit regardless. Arrived around 4pm. Around 64F, light wind, no rain but very damp. Had to use paper towels for the sugar layer in the colonies.

Facing the apiary, working from left to right, the first two colonies seemed well. They were clustered in their deeps but some were wandering along the supers. Supers are running low. I intend to return sometime next week, when we're expecting a midweek high in the 50sF midday Wednesday, and I want to see if the bees could use a refill or have had significant loss.

Third, center colony was a dead-out. Signs of absconding and robbing, no dead cluster or pile of bees on the ground below the hive. I removed the super but left the deep and entrance reducer.

Fourth colony from the left is single deep, cluster easily visible. High strong population.

Fifth and last colony on the right was another dead-out, seemingly an abscond. Some mild wax moth presence but minimal damage, signs of robbing. Shocking considering this was at one point last year the largest and strongest colony.

Very upsetting, 40% loss, and the worst has yet to come weather-wise. And the customer was very concerned, didn't want to experience any loss this year. No one ever wants loss, but some form of loss is generally expected, especially as the weather gets more and more unpredictable. And losses this year and last have been at all time highs for various reasons. We're lucky to have bees left at all. Still incredibly heartbreaking and disappointing. R Yard has been added to the spring priority list.

Their neighbors livestock stopped by to watch.

I had a pinched nerve in my neck so I was very slow to get moving. I arrived around 11am, and it was already 80°F and extremely humid. It was threatening to rain all day, but thankfully didn't. Some wind was moving, but nothing extreme.

All of the colonies were relatively calm, despite the threat of rain and the naturally spicy colonies just being themselves, like S1, Foxtrot, and Delta.

I was hoping to add second deeps to all the remaining colonies today, and that's exactly what I was able to do!

Before:

After shot is above and at the end.

Colonies S1 & S2 we're doing fine. There were plenty of bees working in their additional boxes, as well as in the brood box below. I am slightly concerned about the queen excluder hindering their growth in S2; some people call them 'queen killers' or 'honey excluders', they're somewhat controversial. But it's what my friends wanted for their colony. Hoping for the best.

S1:

S2:

Colonies Alpha, Bravo, and Charlie were all right on track. Every colony had a minimum of 3 full frames (both sides) of eggs, larvae and brood, plus food frames, and therefore ready for their expansion. I want to get ahead of our early swarm season, and actually grow these colonies out to have double deeps going strong into next winter, and use this yard for bee and queen production. So I did whatever rearranging of feeders and empty frames I felt necessary, and added their second deeps.

The removal colonies, colony India and unnamed recent removal, are still growing out and getting established, so they were just fed and checked for status. Thankfully the abandoned cafe removal is staying on and going strong! It's so hard to get a removal to stay and establish themselves in a hive body, as the removal process is inherently so destructive and traumatic, but I feel I'm getting better odds at it.

Colony Hotel got their expansion finally, and colonies Foxtrot and Golf already had theirs, and are already filling their second deeps with resources. I'm not expecting them to start laying up there until it's drone time, possibly the first week of March at earliest.

Loving the bull's-eye pattern here though. All the queens have healthy laying patterns, very little unused or missed cells. If you look closely you can see that the uncapped cells have larvae and eggs already. A good sign!

Colonies Delta and Echo are still the smallest, but technically met my minimum of three brood frames, and got their expansions. I hope I'm not overwhelming them with space too soon; it won't be an issue unless we get an unplanned cold snap before the first nectar flow hits. Fingers crossed 🤞

I am in DESPERATE need of beetle sheets, I just keep fucking forgetting to order them! Lol. But I also need to order more deeps and deep frames with foundations ASAP, I used all my available frames and deeps just on this yard, and I have dead-outs and second deeps to replace in other yards soon...

The potential split colony was S1. It was pretty much ready, but I didn't have the equipment on hand, so I knew I'd have to come back soon more prepared. They were crazy spicy, seemingly only getting spicier. I don't mind but I know my friends do, and it's their colony, so I am hoping the split will be enough to humble them lol.

S2 is looking full in the deep, but the first nectar flow has barely started around my Apiary, so I am not surprised they're not pushing through the queen excluder really loading up on honey in the super yet. I'm just keeping an eye to make sure they have enough room for spring growth still.

The front row of my bees, Alpha Bravo and Charlie, are slower and smaller than expected. Their growth is happening, just far slower than their peers. I'm not super surprised, just because the back row of colonies by the woods, Foxtrot Golf and Hotel, have always been bigger and more active. I think it's location/orientation in the apiary.

They're looking good, just not truly filling out their second deeps yet.

Colonies India and unnamed recent removal were next. India is doing fantastic, and since they were a more recent removal, they're smaller, but they're excelling for what they have. Unnamed removal pretty much swarmed off again after the random dirty colony swarm that happened on my last visit, despite me catching them and cleaning/replacing their equipment. I used the frames from the prior client's apiary to bolster the remaining bees and give them a chance at raising a new queen.

India is doing so well they finally got their second deep! And the last deep I had available at the moment until I finish the rest in my garage.

The big back row, colonies Foxtrot Golf and Hotel, will be the end of me lol. They're somewhat spicy and building swarm cells like crazy. They have plenty of brood, bees, and room to grow in their second deeps, so I need to use their queen cells for splits or Nucs asap, and I need Nucs for replacements in my large client yard, so they need to be built now.

I used some of the frames with cells towards starting Nucs. I only had three jester Nucs on hand, so that's all I could do for the moment. I need to get more and dig my wooden Nucs out of storage and fix them up.

Colonies Delta and Echo are stable and predictable, thankfully.

I need to come back SOON with Nucs and splits equipment!!

My friends are building the second yard for me this week, as this one is already oversaturated. I don't want to create unnecessary competition or scarcity with resources.

Thankfully colony Bravo was not in danger, they just apparently made room for more brood and haven't cleaned up their mess yet lol. I scraped some of the cappings out of the entrance to help them clean up.

Here's their queen!

Colony Alpha was doing well also, the dead bees must have been the final wave of winter bees ❤️‍🩹

Here's their queen, still rocking her blue dot 🔵

This year's queens will have white dots!

Colonies S1 and S2 are doing very well. S2, the designated honey production hive, has a queen excluder under the super. I am hesitant to use a queen excluder, some beekeepers call them 'queen killers', and I'm apt to agree more often than not, but I'm trying to get a real good honey harvest for my friends, and they wanted to go with the excluder.

They haven't begun building into their super yet, which is not surprising, as the nectar flow has just barely begun. But they're growing like mad in their deep box, with plenty of room for the queen to continue working. Depending on how prolific they are with brood growth, they may get a second deep regardless, with the queen excluder and super on top, but for now they can keep trucking. They are building wax on their queen excluder lol so they are trying to expand.

S1 is SPICY. Very defensive bees lol. I like defensive bees, they are in my opinion the hardiest and most productive, but I understand why people don't want them. That makes S1 the perfect colony for my friends' split though; they're actually pretty much ready for their walk away split when I go back tomorrow. I'll need to purchase a new bottom board, inner cover, and lid to prepare though! Splitting a spicy colony is a good way to 'humble' them, and calm their behavior without requeening. I don't want to destroy a successful queen just for behavioral issues.

I was rearranging their frames to encourage more laying and storage in the top deep, and decided they also had more than enough food stored, so I brought a frame of honey up to my friends' porch for them to enjoy. I could tell by the light color honey and wax cappings that it was fresh new honey, and not left over from last season. One of my friends tried to come over and say hi while I was working S1, and they're so defensive that she didn't even get past my truck before they started stinging her! She had to run away. I was hoping the honey would be a fair apology lol. She's okay btw, not even upset about it. They thankfully understand the nature of the bees.

You can see them all flying up at my phone lol.

All in all it was a wild but extremely successful apiary visit, and I'm planning to do at least one split and give them all a light, 1:1 ratio feed on Monday (tomorrow as of this post).

I may steal some bees and brood from one of the back row colonies and start my queen rearing hive, we'll see how terrible I feel after working a client yard and doing a large removal in the morning lol.

I moved through the apiary in reverse after colony India, with colonies Hotel, Golf, and Foxtrot next.

Hotel was absolutely popping off, already laying brood and capping nectar in their second deep. I am so relieved that my instinct to start spring prep a bit early, despite warnings for late freezes and stormy weather, was correct. I have a lot of Nuc building and queen rearing to do this season, and I need production to start immediately. My back row has always been my strongest colonies, so they will likely be the workhorses this year.

Hotel also has a big beautiful blonde queen! She's easier to see here.

Colony Golf blew my fucking mind!!! They are blasting off, I may even need to add a super to them sometime soon! They have a TON of drone comb and hatched drones already! I'm so impressed and grateful! We need a done mother at the apiary, and I think I've found her. 🙏

Can you see all the eggs in the empty cells?! So many frames of brand new eggs, I wish I was feeling better and prepared for grafting that day!! I need to set up my temporary queen rearing colony still though. So much work to do.

You can see a bunch of big boys on the frame as well! And one big cutie let me carry him over to my husband and our friends so they could meet him lol.

Colony Foxtrot was also going strong, already building into their second deep, though not as insanely prolific as Hotel and Golf yet. Soon though, I'm sure.

I did take a frame of honey from them, as they had more stored honey than brood in their first deep, and donated it to the absconded removal hive, in hopes of helping them out. There aren't many bees left with them, and I didn't have food prepped that day, plus now I'm gun shy to give them syrup lol.

Colonies Delta and Echo were doing so much better than they were before we rearranged the apiary and moved them more to the side instead of essentially in the center. They struggled all of last year to get fully established, I had to prop them up with new queens, donated brood, and feed all year. My theory was that the apiary is officially fully populated and I can't add anymore colonies to the area, as it was already generating competitive behavior, and these two colonies dead center of the apiary were getting bullied on all sides. It feels my theory was correct, as they're finally thriving now. They're working on their second deeps, and have great brood nests in their first deeps, but of course aren't as prolific as that back row.

I really spoiled myself starting with the back row lol. All the colonies are right on schedule and growing healthily, but goddamn, that back row is CRAZY strong.

When I worked my way up to the first row, with colonies Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, and S1 + S2, I noticed a lot of comb debris at the entrance of colony Bravo and on the ground in front of it. There were very few bees at the entrance, so I feared the worst, but started with colony Charlie as I was going in reverse order. I noticed colony Alpha had a lot of dead bees on the ground under it, too, and was getting nervous for this row.

Thankfully it wasn't needed and they're all doing well, in stages somewhere between the smaller colonies Delta and Echo, and the larger colonies on the back row. Great brood nests, healthy active queens, plenty of food storage, starting to build out on their second deeps. Had to clear some burr comb in between boxes, some of which was unfortunately drone comb; drone cells have to be larger than standard worker and honey cells, so bees tend to build their own comb in empty spaces to make room for drones.

That frame isn't empty, can you see all the eggs?! And look at the different sizes of cells, you can see the drone cells are much larger.