Inspected and rearranged my "Bunker Hive" long hive.

[hobbitlady]

Finally our weather was right with sun and with the fruit trees ready to bloom (a few hail beaten blooms out on the earliest plums right now) I got into my long hive to do some work. All the workers were out gathering pollen and they were sure happy when I gave them a bigger entrance. All of them were full of pollen and it was so nice to see. The frame propolis "glue" was not as hard and stuck as the last time I tested it so there was no jarring to anger the bees that were home and only one guard even checked me out. I was so relieved and happy. The small prior nuc colony's queen had two full frames of babies (yeah I know I should say brood...guess I feel sentimental or something-ha) on both sides and some more partials waiting to hatch and they saved all the food I gave them into comb.plenty of winter sugar and new syrup food in there.Even though they started on top bars they knew how to fill frames just right too. Good bees;hahaha. I only accidentally broke off one partial comb;where the one next to it was too fat and ripped it loose when I was slicing them apart.It's from their sugar or the syrup I gave them with HoneyBHealthy in it this week,so I get to feed that back to them.

A long hive works like a top bar. Even though it has frames instead of bars I needed to get around the brood nest  adding frames and give the queen room to lay more eggs.With no upper box like a Lang the queen can get "honey bound" with no room left for brood and queens almost never go past the honey frames to start brood in empty frames in the back. It looked like she was ready too. She would have swarmed in a few weeks for sure if I hadn't done what I did today. I'm confident now she'll give a split or maybe two for my empty hives. Busy queen! yay.   I feel right on time making space for her. It's all going into my bee journal for future reference.

After losing both my top bars to moisture I can hardly contain how happy I am that my double walled "bunker" long hive is doing so well. No mold anywhere except the tops of the inner frame covers. The only mistake I made on all the construction I logged here was that the inner covers should be solid pine,no matter how heavy they are. Those plywood frame covers warped so a few bees got above and died. Not a lot did that but I didn't like seeing Any up above(under the lid) in the space I left for tools.  I do think I'll want another long hive or reinforce the empty top bar I've improved so it has double thick walls. Insulation is quite a pain here with all the rain and plastic covered insulation is OK but holds too much moisture in too so bees need a lot of Spring mold clean up even when the colony lives and is fine with it.

Well, today was a happy day and I wanted to share!  Happy beekeeping friends! Spring is upon us!!!

[manygoatsnmore]

hobbitlady, I love reading your updates. Someday, I hope to get into beekeeping, but until then, reading what you and others are doing helps me learn and lets me live vicariously!

[hobbitlady]

Another good report Day! Walking by Bunker I saw a lot more bees coming in (I first thought) so I stopped and took a longer look. Turned out it was New bees Orienting! Yay,they are building up for sure now. When they really get going it'll be the biggest colony I've ever had. I still love top bar hives but they just don't support a big colony to produce an excess of honey beyond my needs. They've filled my needs wonderfully the last 3 years but I want to make some Mead some day!

[hobbitlady]

Today was sunny and not too much wind and the Bunker ladies were Really filling the entrance coming and going. I only saw about a dozen new "orienters" but seeing Any makes me happy...ya never now how many will mature at a time. The dead top bar hives were all out in the sun and breeze and dried out well. I'd done some scraping on them too to clean them out and broke off moldy and honey comb.. I had all the leftover top-combs-on-bars face up on the hives spaced out with big gaps,(discarded or melted the parts I broke off), and on cinder blocks beside the hives so foragers could clean out the honey left. I broke off the darkest comb but left some on all the bars...and I scraped the honey-caps left on the tops too, so other bees would get attracted. Well,that worked.ha.Today I went out and re-figured the top bars and spacers for new hive set-ups. None of the hundreds of foragers out there cared what I was doing at all. All they cared about was the easy food to take back to Their hives. Well, it's early but Just in case some of those bees were Not from Bunker I added lemongrass oil to the insides before I closed the top bars back up again. Left the entrances Fully opened too.If any of those bees are from a colony that's going to swarm in a month or two I want them to remember to scout back to my top bars! I know I'll be able to do a split and fill one of them this year (maybe more) but any escaped or wild swarm moving in from somewhere else would overjoy me Too! So I'm gonna keep food and good scents over there at the empties for the next few months. Doesn't hurt to Try to get new bees for free! giggle.

March 31 edit:  Nice to see all the foragers entering the closed top bar hives through the entrances now. I'd put some lemongrass in them and there was still some honey for them to rob,so I'm glad they all Know about those great potential homes....