Had a few fun hours (4) today helping out some other Darwin rural beekeepers inspect 8 old hives today
Some we thought were weak but had plenty of brood, larva and bees, once the hives were open – awesome!
Most hives were very gentle - despite a full inspection of nearly every frame. All required lots of scrapping of burr comb between, on top and bottom of each frame that needed to be removed to make future inspections easier.
We didn't spot the queens but so much evidence of their good work and effort to expand their hives
Many had plenty of drone brood clearly see as the raised cells - so looking to swarm maybe? Lots of those lazy males and their big eyes.
Most had no more space left to them (so maybe the drones did indicate swarm prep)
Due to time between inspections (unavoidable for many reasons), every hive had heaps of burr comb with a couple of buckets for wax processing and another full 20 litre bucket for honey extraction via the pressing method of the burr comb
We double brood boxed the hives taking away the queen excluders as the goal with this apiary overall is expansion – taking some honey good but hive numbers the goal
We managed 10 full depth frames of capped honey (the rest we left with the hives as uncapped or only portion of the frame drawn out with comb and 3 “ideal” sized boxes of capped honey as well – for extraction with a 3 frame hand spinner I have lent them.
Two hives needed major action given the wooden boxes were totally succumbed to wood rot. The frames broken, soooo much burr comb. We placed a new box on bottom, shook bees off each frame into new box, added a queen excluder and placed the old broken frames as best we could in a full sized super box – so nursery bees will come through excluder and help the remaining brood hatch before we remove the broken frames. Best we could do with what we had – hope it works! We shall see in a few weeks.
Darwin weather is so very hard on painted wooden boxes – the heat the extreme sun, the wet season – certainly don’t get the 20 years out of wooden box like some say. – still constant maintenance does extend the life of such
The three of us: learned lots, shared some wild stories, ate some very fresh and sweet watermelon.
Hives are now tidied up and ready for expansion in 4-6 weeks. Then we will find the queen, place her in bottom box, give a lid and base to top box and turn the other way. The queen in bottom box will keep doing her thing. As well, hopeful the bees in the top box will make a new queen from a fresh egg or larva – but 2-3 weeks later we will inspect to see if successful – if not order some mated queens for postal delivery that now that our “turned” box is hopelessly queenless.
Well, that’s the theory!
With the current flow indicated by the melaleucas covered in flowers, the lemon trees and the rockmelon/watermelon on the property – all enjoying the warm days – perfect timing for the small apiary’s expansion plans.
One of the hives that needed its hive boxes replaced - the last few bees still clinging tohte old rotten box - get rid of it later.
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