Miscellaneous pictures

Here are some pictures and a video that have not yet been displayed.

 This is looking through the observation window of Olea's hive a couple of weeks ago.  There were already seven combs (two are hidden).  They stick them onto the glass; that is what I cut with the steak knife three days ago in order to inspect the hive.

 After the extraction process two weeks ago, there was honey everywhere.  Here are some bees and their shadows attracted to the sweet stuff spilt onto a tray.


A close-up of one girl licking honey off the table top.

A couple of days ago, I saw a lot of dead bees in front of the old hive.  At first I thought it might be a massive die-off, but I was sure the hive was healthy since I had just inspected it a couple of days before and seen the queen and lots of brood, and there was still a lot of activity at the entrance.  On closer examination, I could see that these were dead drone pupae.  The bees were cleaning out the old drone frame and dumping the carcasses.  I expect birds and ants will have a picnic.

I noticed a scuffle going on at the old hive entrance.  I tried to capture it on video, but it was too blurry to keep.  While trying to figure out how to focus a video with my new camera, I took this photo and then this video.  No guard bee activity that I can see.  I will try to capture it on video in the future.




The other day was hot.  I was out in the yard that night and saw this.  This is bearding, something bees do when it is hot in the hive.  Sort of like us sticking our foot out from under the covers when it is hot in the bed.  This is actually a pretty small beard; they can be much larger.  The hive does get warm; I can feel the heat through the glass observation window.



To keep ants out of the hive, I set the legs of the hive stand in cans.  When I saw all the dead bees in front of the hive, I figured a lot of ants would be coming around.  So I put some water into the cans.  The next day there were a couple of drowned bees.  Today I made some screen guards to keep bees from falling into the water.