Wild Comb and Hatching Bees

Booo! I got stung on Tuesday trying to help Matt adjust his hive. It was my fault because I didn't put my bee costume on and I had a navy blue shirt on. They don't like dark colors. It wasn't too bad not much swelling at all, but I wanted to have a sting free record for as long as possible. I guess I've been inducted into the official beekeepers club now.

Yesterday we checked our hives.  We both had burr comb between the feeder and the top of the frames. Whenever there is too much space, the bees will fill it with comb. It's not bad for the bees to build this extra comb, but it makes it difficult for us to work with them when things are all stuck together so we have to scrape it off. 

Matt's Hive

Kate's Hive

We also spotted Matt's queen which was good: 

We knew there would be a bunch of bees hatching soon, but when we pulled Matt's frames we saw that a lot had hatched! See all those empty cells that are dark? Most of those are empty from bees hatching out of them. Their first job after hatching is to clean out the little space they just climbed out of. Clean your room little bee! If you look closely at the very bottom left of the picture, there is a bee hatching with it's head showing. It is hard to see in this picture, but see the video for a better look. 

It was hard to keep holding the frame up while the bees hatched, and the bees were starting to get annoyed so we had to put them back in. One of these days we will actually see one climbing out.