...making honey

 

Well, the bees are finally capable of living off their own honey supplies. We removed the feeder containing sugar water and replaced the 3rd super with frames. Rachel and I have both decided to purchase 2 more supers in the hopes that we will have excess honey to take off the hive in August.

 

We took a close look at what the bees had been doing.  The frames below show the bee's progress.  Bees usually structure their hives by placing eggs in the center of the hive, pollen storage around that, and honey stores on the outside edge.   You can see this in the pictures below.  The capped eggs are a pale yellow color.  The pollen is dark yellow/brown.  The sugar water/honey supply is white.

 

Below are a few pictures of drone cells that were ripped apart when we separated the hive boxes.  Bees will build what is called burr comb in spaces that are abnormal such as frames being placed too far apart or in between hive boxes.  Bees prefer to lay drone cells in the burr comb.  Below you can see the drone larvae.  Some of the larva have developed eyes and legs. 

 

Drones and worker cells are very different in appearance.  Below is a good example.  When the bees cap their eggs, the drone cells appear raised as you can see on the right side of the photo.  The remaining cells are worker cells.  Worker cells are in the middle of the picture, and they appear flat.