Only one hive overwintered at Chastain. My nuc and my unmated queen hive from the Fatbeeman (I will never recommend him to anyone again) both died/absconded before winter began and Noah's hive there died as well.
The first official hive inspection for Metro Atlanta Beekeepers was held on Saturday, March 1. Julia was in charge of it and we had nine people coming to learn. Some had attended the short course and others were members of MABA.
We found the hive alive and doing medium well. It wasn't busting out of the seams as some others are right now, but there was evidence of a laying queen (we saw eggs and small larvae). We also saw some drone brood as well as worker brood. It was a coldish day, just barely over 50, so we worried a little about the passing around of frames, but this is a teaching hive and supposed to be a learning experience. In other words, we probably sacrificed some brood for the experience of the participants.
One beekeeper borrowed a veil of mine and I'm embarrassed to say that there were THREE holes that I was unaware of in the veil material. So she got a bee or two inside her veil. It was an opportunity to show the participants how to move slowly and we were able to encourage the bees to leave with no harm to her!
If you can't see the slideshow below, here is a link to it. Here is a slideshow of our inspection:
Hi, the slideshow doesn't seem to work :-(
ReplyDeleteThe slideshow works for me on every computer I open it up in, but I can't get the slideshow on my iPad. Don't think I ever have seen one of my slideshows on the iPad - maybe because it's through Google??? Picasa web albums is what I used for this. I've tried Flickr also but it often is offline.
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