Third Hive Body

Hello everyone! Today was the first time in a LONG time that I had opened my hive, and it was also the time that I put on the third and final hive body. The inspection was very short, most of my time spent in the less bee infested second body then in the lower brood box. I found that I may have waited just a tad too long to put on the next box, as there was only the outer edges of the outer frames that were free of wax.

That aside, I feel that my lack of inspections during this time was a wise call. The bees seem happy and healthy as a whole, and they seem productive in their efforts to fill up the second box. One thing that I may regret is that I had failed to look at the brood that lay in the inner frames of the lower body. I had checked an outer frame, bet it seemed much the same as the top ones (which it should, as it is a honey frame.) and that was enough for me as the bees were starting to become a tad restless and the buzzing was increasing. The only issue that I may see is that the wax on some of the frames was a dark golden color, but I brushed it aside as the aging of the wax.

I will be sending an email to a associate of mine with some descriptions and questions regarding my colony, and will most likely open the hive again after I receive some advice on where to go from here. What I have done is just about the final step to beekeeping in the first year besides reversing top and bottom boxes, and I would prefer to advance from this point with more direction.

Tip Time:

Instead of purchasing individual snack bags and the like, buy in bulk. It reduces the amount of plastic used, and you can put just as much as you'd like in lunches in reusable containers.

Thank you to everyone who reads my blog! The next post is another Bee Bio 101 on queens!