One down, one to go

I began checking both hives today after a vacation and bad weather hiatus. I haven't really ripped them open to the bottom chamber in, oh, QUITE a while. Plus, I've heard several reports of swarming (heck, with all this weather, I'm ready to go to), so I figured I'd check on the status of things.

Unfortunately, I was only able to get to one this afternoon, my own. My dad is visiting later this afternoon, maybe I can rope him into doing the second one with me. Joel's hive tends to be a bit more aggressive (I swear, I'm not saying that because I'm convinced one of his girls stung me), they rush towards anything that moves in their hive, it's hot, I'm dehydrated, and man, those full frames are HEAVY. Oh, and I'm working on a big project at work. That was pretty much my lunch break.

So, the deal is that I put on a super before I left on vacation. They haven't done much with it, but I think maybe they're poised to, if we can manage a sunny rest of the summer. The bottom chamber still had empty frames on either end, so I switched them out a little, giving the girls something to do. The upper deep had, just as my friend Sandy was telling me yesterday hers had done, two full frames of honey on either end (as opposed to the textbook pattern of each frame containing "stripes" of honey on top, a thin band of pollen, and brood on the bottom). Full brood and/or honey frames are VERY heavy, and now with three on, it's hard to navigate them gently, so there was more squishing than in the past. Feel bad about that. Plus there are just SOOOOO many bees and SOOO much propolis (bee glue)!! It took a lot longer than normal to even chisel the frames out of the chambers. I didn't spot the queen...actually come to think of it I didn't spot eggs either. I wasn't really looking for either though as of about halfway through, although I should have been. I'm still a little gunshy on sticking my head too close to the frames. Ah, drat. I just realized I didn't sugar them either; we're supposed to sift powdered sugar on them every three weeks or so to treat for varroa mite prevention. Sigh. I guess I didn't do a great job. I have to get back in the saddle. I guess my next bee inspection of my own hive won't be too long in the future, and I will know better what to look for and perform with Joel's later today or this weekend.

First Sting 7/2/09

I'm a marked woman. Or at least my head is. I went into both hives between the raindrops on 7/2/09 because I needed to replace the syrup since we were leaving on vacation for a week and a half. We'd taken it off the weekend before, but were advised to put it back on due to the weather and the fact that they still had comb to build (we put on a super each, knowing we wouldn't be back in for a week). Because I was just doing the syrup, I went with my usual "eh, veil, schmeil" attitude. This was probably my first mistake, since I had grumpy, hungry bees, most of whom were cooped up in the hive due to the weather. But still, I got my sugar topped off just fine, half the job done. I went the long way around our yew tree so as not to get in the middle of the bee highway as they madly dashed to the flowers between raindrops, and stood on the "lawn side" (or between the hives) of Joel's hive. Oh, bother. His sugar can was on the OPPOSITE side of his hive. This time, I got lazy, and crossed the beeline. I think this was my fatal mistake. What I think happened was that one of his mad dashers ran PLUNK! into my unveiled head, got stuck in my hair, panicked and stung me right on top of my head, about 5 inches above my right brow. YOWZA. And off went the pheromones of the stinging bee, which may have accounted for the several more that landed on me. I could hear at least one still in my hair, and I stumbled into the front yard where my husband was performing some last minute repairs on the RV. I think I yelled every four letter word, and then some, so that the folks in Mansfield must have heard me. That finally got his attention, and he came to my rescue, brushing off the rest of the bees and disentangling the one from my head.

So, well, I guess the upside is that I know I'm not allergic now. And my kids appreciated that I couldn't raise my eyebrow at their antics for 24 hours. BOY did it hurt, though, and I think my veil will see a lot more use from now on!!