Since the arrival of the first 2 packages in April, the spring season has been a mix of sunshine, and A LOT of rain. The grass is loving life, as well as the dandelions… and we’ve gotten to see all the apple trees on the farm bloom (last year most of the early flower buds were killed by a frost). If we don’t get apples this year, it certainly will NOT be because of a lack of pollination!
The queens are laying, and the packages are building up nicely. On the other hand, the nuc that survived the winter has been very weak. Knowing it was definitely not going to be able to move up to a full size hive any time soon, we took another package in May.
In the weak nuc, the queen has not been laying a lot of eggs. The number of bees is so small, and with the chilly streaks and nights we’ve still been having, the queen can only lay as many eggs as the cluster can keep warm. Unfortunately, after a hive check this weekend, I found an no capped brood left, no eggs, and only a handful of larvae – and right in the middle, an emergency queen cell with larvae inside. Looks like the queen is no longer with us, or they decided she isn’t do her job, so they’ve started to make a new one. We’ll have to monitor this hive closely, and hopefully things will turn around.
