Is Anybody Out There?

I apologize for the time warp, but there's so much more time to post during the winter, when I'm not actually handling the bees.  

Aug 2013:

I thought all of our bees would be dead by now.  What with no viable queen laying since May, they should be.  Granted, we picked up some homeless bees during the Black Forest fire, but that was in June.  It's been at least two months, during which there has been no worker brood.  What the hell is going on?  I'll tell you one thing, being a beekeeper isn't boring.  I'm sure it will be keeping me on my toes 40 years from now.

After the last hive check, where we removed the second deep box due to the drop in population, we assumed it would only be a matter of weeks before it was completely empty.  There was no sign of Queen Catherine, the Carniolan queen I tried to introduce in July.  Then I get a message from Dick saying that there were still bees flying into the hive.

Sarah, Jason and I drove out and suited up to check for ourselves.  This is what we discovered:

Pile of earth beneath where the hive used to be.

A gopher (or something, not ants) had built a little hill of earth beneath the hive.  And there were still bees left!  We knew it wasn't viable, so we made the decision to walk about 100 ft away from the hive, shake off the bees, and load the bee-free equipment in my car.  We packed it all up and left nothing but a pile of dirt with lonely bees flying around it.  

I had a few stowaways in my car, but none of them bothered me on the drive home.  I unloaded the equipment and stored it away for the winter, with plans to start again next spring.

I love bees.

Quest for the Queen

We have not had good luck with our hive this summer.  Is there a queen, is there not a queen, is Beatrice dead, do we have a laying worker . . . are they all going to die?
Then, a surprise.  We did a hive check on July 3rd, and low and behold, we had bees!  Yes, there were quite a few fuzzy drones (left behind by the laying worker, no doubt), but where we'd thought to find an almost zero population, we had bees working both boxes!  Our best guess is that our laying worker died, along with some of the original bees, and we collected some foragers from hives that were burned out in the Black Forest fire.  Without a laying worker and a decent population, we could try introducing a new queen.  We added some sugar syrup to them, and I went in on an order for a new queen from Z's Bees.  

This time I got a Carniolan queen, instead of an Italian.  While not being as big honey producers, they're even less aggressive than Italians and suited to cold climates and high elevations.  They're smaller, darker, and just as lovely.  The new queen (Queen Catherine?) arrived last Tuesday.  I picked her up, carried her around in my pocket until I could make it out to the bee yard and install her.  

Keeping Queen Catherine nice and warm

I left the cork in the cage, and placed her crossways between two frames on the bottom box.  I wanted as much access to her as possible for the worker bees.  Then I closed it all up and left them to do their thing.  I'm slightly concerned because her abdomen isn't as large or fat as most of the queens I've seen.  I'm not sure if this is because she's a Carniolan, or if she was poorly mated.  I guess we'll find out in a few weeks.

Queen Catherine and her attendants

I returned on Friday and removed the cork.  I poked a hole in the fondant, so the bees could work on releasing the queen from both sides.  There were a lot fewer bees, but hopefully enough will survive until the queen can produce a new bunch of brood.  Keep your fingers crossed!

Hardly any bees left

The World Is On Fire

For anyone in the Colorado Springs area, you already know our world is on fire.  We have fires burning to the south of us at the Royal Gorge, and the Black Forest fire to the immediate north.  The evacuation area is about 4 miles to the north of me.  It smells like a camp fire, but of course it's the pine forest and homes that are burning.

I don't know why this fire is hitting me so hard.  The Waldo Canyon fire one year ago didn't stress me out this way.  I'm having trouble knitting.  Maybe it's because I know more people who are affected by this fire.  Maybe it's because my bee yard is in a mandatory evacuation zone (and I'm still waiting for Dick to email or call me letting me know he got out OK.  Dick, you out there?).  Maybe it's because I'm paying more attention to the outside world this year.  Who knows.

I'm watching a friend's dog for a few days.  They're in a mandatory evacuation zone.  I feel slightly helpless, and being able to do something is making me feel a little better.  Several of my knit group ladies are evacuated, and they're planning a special knit group session this weekend, which unfortunately I am unable to attend.  I would love to be able to hug each of them in person, just to make sure they're good.

Beginning of the Black Forest Fire, taken Tuesday from the edge of my neighborhood.

UPDATE 6/17/13: 75% containment, 511 homes completely destroyed, 2 deaths, and thousands still in the evacuation area.  Dick's place and the hive boxes are OK.