July 12, 2015 · Not sure how I overlooked sharing it, but we met with the Queen, yesterday! It was such a surprise, and my camera phone was still missing, so either way, I didn't get a picture. It's the first time that we've found any of our queens and she was a busy girl, doing her job, seemingly oblivious to us! She was on the first frame that Joe pulled out of the one hive! We moved her to a lower hive box and then put a queen excluder to keep her in the lower boxes. This is how beekeepers keep eggs and baby bees out of your yummy, edible honey. It was a big day for us, for sure!!!
DR: this sounds so cool we will have to come up for a tour this would be interesting Me: the best time is very early afternoon on any sunny day. If it's the weekend, then Joe can be here, and he's far more expert than I am! He is off work for two weeks, starting July 20th, too! Shoot me a text first, to make sure we're available, 226-231-0914 :)
LT: hahaha, cute!
KH: So, is her name Elizzzzabeth?
ML: Sounds as the bees aren't the only ones who are busy.
Pictured above is purchased queens. I took this picture April 29, 2016. The most visible queen is on the very left hand side, the biggest bee in the picture.
LT: What is happening in this picture? Me:what you're seeing is a queen in each little box with a few workers. the white things at the top are little pieces of paper towel that we keep dabbing in water for them and at the bottom is a little block of sugar candy that they chomp their way way through to get out. the bees in the hive need time to get used to the smell of the new queen, so she needs to be let out, gradually. otherwise, she's a stranger in the hive and they'd kill her. LT: What is the purpose of the wet paper towel? Me:we can't give them too much water or they'll drown. they basically lick the water off of the paper towels
