Quelle mess! Or, I still don't know what I'm doing

Blackberries are on their way

Two days ago I looked into all three hives, only the top box to check for honey.  #1 has not drawn any new comb that I could see in the top super.  I added a second super to #2, checkerboarding four frames of unripe honey from the first super.
When I looked into #3, for a moment I was pleased to see comb and nectar in the foundationless frames, but quickly realized that they had built from the bottom and the comb was every which way, mostly crossing the frames.  I pondered what to do and then did nothing and closed up the hive.
I put sticky boards into all three hives finding and squishing a fat was moth worm in #3.  Then I went inside to research what to do about the crosscombing in foundationless frames.
It is not uncommon for the bees to start building from the bottom if they do not have a "ladder" to get to the top.  The beekeeper should intersperse frame with either drawn comb or foundation.  Live and learn.
Yesterday I went out to try to correct the crosscombing.  First I had to remove the frames attempting to do little damage.  Dream on!  I took out two frames from the edge and gazed with dismay at what the girls had wrought.

The first part of the mess

A closer view

Another angle

To remove a frame, I first had to separate it from its neighbor.  I used a knife and the hive tool to slice through the comb, much of which had ripening honey in the cells.  It quickly became messy with sticky gloves and tools as well as bees coated with honey or squished.  I tried to leave as much comb on the frames as I could, but large hunks fell off.

Pieces of comb from first frame with the girls lapping up the honey

It still looks neat in the above picture.  Later there was honey, pieces of was and gooped up bees all over the tops of the frames.
I worked away, freeing frames, trimming the comb so it was not sticking out and putting them back, alternating foundation and foundationless.  Most of the comb that was left was not oriented properly but I decided to leave it anyway hoping the bees would straighten things out.  More likely, they will just continue the comb at the same angle and cross comb to the foundation.  (Live and learn.)
Then I came to one set of three frames that I could not see how to break apart.  (I was looking between the frames and there were bees all over.)  These frames came out as one unit.

Block of three frames

I stuck wads of wax at the junction of the ridge and the top of the frame to encourage the bees to start building there.  Of course, there is still a lot of wax on the bottoms of the frames.
I also got a bunch of wax and some unripe honey to process.  In a week I'll take a look a look- keep your fingers crossed!

Underneath #1

Before inspecting the hives today, I pulled out the trays below the screened bottom of Nos. 1&2.  I was surprised to see a lot of bees on the #1 tray as well as some comb. 

I crouched down, with some difficulty, and looked underneath, worried that there may be a hole in the screen.  There was no hole, but there were a lot of bees on the screen.
The poor quality picture on the left was taken blindly, pointing the camera under the hive.
Inspection report:  #3-There is some come being drawn in the top brood box, no other significant change from last week
#1- I only checked the top super for new honey production or comb.  There was a fair number of bees on the frames but nothing else.
#2- Lots of brood, at least eight frames!  Two of these were in the top brood box.  I saw the queen in the bottom box and then saw her again on the next frame I removed; an active monarch.  There was some honey production in the top brood box.
Overall, the apiary appears healthy.
After inspecting the hives, I cleaned out the trays, brushed the bees off the screen and replaced the trays.  There was a large amount of debris in the #1 tray.  The black tab in the center is about 3/4 of an inch high.

Inspection update and #1 is queenright

The apiary this afternoon

There are two inspections to report, one two weeks ago (May 3) and one done yesterday and today.
Hive #3- The split is developing into a good colony.  On the 3rd, two of the foundationless frames had been completely drawn.  The queen was on one of them with capped brood.  A couple of other frames also had capped brood.  The brood ball was off center so I shifted everything over one frame.  Eight frames were drawn, so I added a second deep box. 

Yesterday, Sophie inspected #3 with me.  There was still a fair amount of larvae and capped brood, but nothing was happening in the top brood box.  Sophie did get to see brood, larvae, hatching worker, the queen, drones, workers doing the waggle dance, stored pollen and honey.

Hive #2- Two weeks ago, there was no activity in top brood box but five frames filled with capped brood.  The queen was not spotted.  Today I saw capped brood, larvae and eggs in the lower part of a couple of frames in the upper brood box.  I did not inspect any further.  Full of optimism, I added a honey super.
Hive #1- Two weeks ago, I saw lots of drones, honey being made and empty cells where there had once been brood.  I looked through the entire hive and saw no queen nor sign of a laying queen; no larvae, brood or eggs.  I did see one empty queen cell.  I worried that #1 was queenless and wondered what to do- transplant a frame with eggs from #2 so they could make a queen?  Combine #3 with #1 with the newspaper technique?  I emailed Kathy who pointed out that it had been only a bit over two weeks since it had swarmed and it takes at least that long for the new queen to hatch, mate and start laying.  So I waited until today.

 

 

There she is, on the frame in the center

Before I spotted her, I had seen capped brood, both worker and drone.

Capped worker brood

Capped brood, mostly drone cells, on foundationless comb

There was lots of honey in the supers, so I added a third box, checkerboarding three frames full of honey from one of the other supers.  We should get a good honey harvest.

The three dark frames are full of capped honey

Did I goof the top bar hive?

The bees stopped buzzing around the top bar comb, so today I went to clean up and store the comb.  In the no longer sticky comb was bee bread and some dark spots.

 Curious, I took a close up look:

Dead larvae!
I can come up with three ways the larva got there.
1.  They were there all along from a year ago.  I think this is quite unlikely as the comb appears new and I believe I would have seen them before when I cleaned up.
2.  There was a queen in the hive and things were going just as they should.  This is possible, but before I dismantled the top bar hive I inspected carefully and did not see a queen, although I did not see the larvae, either.  And don't forget the behavior of the clustered bees I failed to collect.  Tom Seeley says it is unlikely a swarm would stick around and then leave for new quarters without a queen.
3.  Most likely, these are drone larvae from a laying worker.  At least I hope that's the explanation.
In any case, a learning experience and another reminder of my ignorance.
I will post again soon concerning the inspection of all three hives done five days ago.

Everyone helps clean up

I left the sticky comb in the top bar hive and moved it to the bench in the lower garden.  It's being cleaned by my girls as well as ants and bumble bees.

The ants are visible on top of the bars.  There is one bumble bee

The combining did not go as well as expected

The ground in front of hive #2

Close-up of the carnage

A swarm for Olea's hive, not

A small brown trout on the Beaverhead River in Montana

There have been changes in the apiary since the last post
The day after capturing the swarm, Karly and I went into #1.  Karly is positive she saw the queen run quickly from one frame into the box below.  We did not see her again.  Most of the queen cells I had seen on the earlier inspection were gone; we did see two empty queen cells with the tops chewed off.  I am certain there is a queen in #1.  I will take a look this week to check for larvae.  I also exchanged the drone frame.   The frame only had some pupae, so I tediously picked them out.  There were 349 total pupae, 14 of them had mites- 5%, an ok number for now.
Back to the swarm.  I had noticed that there was a casaba melon sized clump of bees left on the Hebe bush.  The day before we left for Dillon, Montana, I noted bees still flying around the clump.  I could see many of them flying to Olea's hive and some returning from that general direction.  I looked closely at the clump and saw bees doing the waggle dance and could tell the direction was toward the apiary.  I realized that the bees were scouting for a hive meaning that the queen was still probably in the bush.  I hoped that they would decide on Olea's hive; after all, it was a nice place to live and already had comb, as well as a few thousand bees.  I decided that when evening came, I would cut the bush and move the remaining workers, and queen of there, to the top-bar hive.
Then, the bees took off from the bush and flew slowly in the general direction of the apiary, then over the fence and out of sight towards Viewpoint.  I went over there, but the swarm was nowhere to be seen.  I figured that I had not moved the queen into Olea's and that the bees there would eventually die.  I emailed Tom Seeley describing the situation and he said "I'm sorry to report that your hive is probably queenless, but of course, time will tell.   Give them a week and take a look inside for eggs and larvae."
We returned from a terrific fishing trip yesterday.  There I fished the Beaverhead, Big Hole and Ruby rivers.  These three rivers flow together to form the Jefferson, a tributary of the Missouri.  We floated in drift boats with guides on the Big Hole where Karly caught the most fish!
I took a look into Olea's- new comb with nectar and pollen but no larvae or eggs and no queen seen.  A doomed colony.  Then, today, I took the bees from the TBH and after spraying them with Honey-B-Healthy, I shook them into hive #2, giving it a big boost in population.  I moved the TBH away and left the comb with nectar near the hive for the bees to clean up.