And so it has started..

[LazyBkpr]

I went through hives today for the first time..  Meaning I actually inspected rather than peeking...
   WOW lot of drones...  Lot of Drone brood, and a LOT of incoming nectar and pollen... so the trigger was pulled...

   My FAV queen was pulled from her hive and installed in a nuc with three frames of brood in different stages. A frame of brood, nectar and pollen, and a nearly capped frame of nectar/honey..  Another 5 frame box was installed above her with drawn comb...

   FRIDAY morning, I will go into the old hive, and tear it apart, frame by frame.. and remove any started queen cells. I will remove the top box, and shake all the bees down into the bottom two boxes. I will give the brood in the top box to hives that need it..
   Friday afternoon.. I will go into the Nuc, and pull one of the frames of drawn comb.. one of those frames "should" have some 4 day old larvae in it...  I will cell punch 20 to 30 cells, put them in the bar, and settle them into the mother hive...   I'll check on them a week later and let you all know how its going!


   I did not expect to see the amount of drones I did today, nor the amount of brood and incoming nectar and pollen.. I have some top boxes already over half full with capped honey..   I really.. REALLY hope we dont get a week of freezing cold now....
   How many drones do you see?

   

[mowarren]

 
   Friday afternoon.. I will go into the Nuc, and pull one of the frames of drawn comb.. one of those frames "should" have some 4 day old larvae in it...  I will cell punch 20 to 30 cells, put them in the bar, and settle them into the mother hive...
   

ok  can you explain the cell punching?

[Yankee11]

So Lazy, you pulled them through the winter?

[LazyBkpr]

Yeah Yankee....  Sort of...    I lost 12 of 43.   They more or less all survived on granulated sugar on the top bars from start to finish.

   mowarren;
   you can see a bit about it here;
http://www.outyard.net/queens.html
   not quite 1/4 of the way down the page..    Basically you use a tool to slice out a cell with a new larvae in it, slide it into a JZBZ cup with a bit of warm wax.  When you have the number you want, put the bar into your frame and slip the whole thing into your cell starter.

[Perry]

I'm jealous, I can still only peek into mine, probably another few weeks before I can safely pull frames. Still a couple feet of snow on the ground, but lots of bare spots.

[kebee]

 I hope the weather holds out for you also, this has been a bad winter for you guys above the mason dixie line.

Ken

[mowarren]

Thanks that's a great page , I'll save that and read again tonight

[LazyBkpr]

Five boxes became two this morning.  THere were SO MANY bees that I ended up making a nuc with the queen cells that had been started. 8 of them, well drawn out and filled with jelly..  so we will see if the bees in the nuc finish them.
   Ted and I punched 22 cells and put them on the cell bar and dropped it into the center of the now 2 box packed with bees hive.. they have syrup on top and lots of pollen inside...     I'll check in a few days and see if they accepted any of them..