The swarm had settled under the hive before I left Sunday but I was the fried chicken cooker so had to get to my Mom's and get to cooking (she has this old electric fry pan that cooks the best crispy chicken).
Well, we all know or can guess what happened - yep, they were long gone by the time I got back.
Hopefully some lucky person got a nice swarm of bees Sunday.
Mr. Ellis came today and we opened all the hives. This is Nuc #3 - if I had not seen the swarm, I would have never known they swarmed on Sunday. Lots and lots of bees so a brood box (deep) was added.
New Hive - reversed the boxes - put the deep on the bottom and super on top.
Hive #4 - saw the queen - still room in hive so no changes. This is the least active hive even though there are plenty of bees in the hive.
Hive #6 - the busiest hive. Added a super. The super that was added on 4/27 was full.
The weather has been cool and windy - so different from last year. I'm already thinking I won't get much honey this year. I always try to leave two brood boxes and and a super on each hive for the fall and winter. Right now I would only have two supers of honey. Only saw 1 hive beetle and the little devil flew out before I could mash him! All the hives looked good and thank goodness Mr. Ellis came. It took both of us to take the brood box off Nuc #3 - it is full and heavy!
