He showed up, inspected the weak hive, and agreed that a lot of the carnage was heat related. Nothing wrong with my setup. We did find an emgency queen cell. He gave me a new nuc and, since original colony was so weak, we combined them at no cost to me. Only recommendation was going from an entrance feeder to a top feeder. I have two that came with the hives so they're going in today.
I take my last post back then.
And yes, the top feeder is safer. But sometimes an entrance feeder makes sense..
Geno! One thing I have learned is that it's best to have more than one hive. That gives you a resource for rescuing a troubled hive.
Well, my buddy I'm starting up with got a package just like mine. His wife ordered them together for us. He kept 11 hives or so when they lived over in the bee area. Retired up here a year or two back and is just getting started again.
He got lucky, somewhat. His neighbor lent him a frame of brood to try to help his get fired up. Not sure, but he doesn't think it's going to help much.
We have an ad in the local paper for folks to call us if they want a swarm removed. Figured why not, as we have boxes and the clothes and smarts to do that. Maybe we get lucky yet and have a colony or two to overwinter for next spring's flow?
As I think I mentioned, neither of us has ever tried bees in this climate. But, we're both retired and can always use another project, eh?
We plan to help each other out with bees, queens, etc if needed in the future.
