A fond farewell

I did not expect much of this inspection, as last time we had left both hives with no queen. But I did have hopes that the Star might have a mated and laying queen. However, (main) purpose of the inspection was to bid a very fond and tearful farewell to Goulwenn, who has helped so much with the bees over the past year and more. Readers of this blog will know how invaluable his help has been. So, what I'd like to do today, after I have reported the little there is to report, is to give the floor to Goulwenn and photos of what was his last (regular) inspection of the school bees.

We started with the Moon and found, as expected, a whole host of queen cells. Some of these were architecturally questionable at best and we removed about six, leaving only one well-formed and well-situated cell.

Discarded queen cells - thus quickly is a palatial room destroyed!

The Star was a bit of a surprise. While we found the empty queen cell and must therefore infer that the queen has hatched, she is not laying yet and we could not find her. However, we did find another sealed queen cell. This should not be if there is a viable queen in the colony. Having had so many difficulties with queens lately, we decided to leave the cell where it was and see what would happen (if we have any possibility of finding that out).

The mystery cell

Hopefully, fingers crossed, next inspection I will see eggs in both hives.

And that's all about the inspection. I now give you Goulwenn, with heartfelt thanks and gratefulness.

Cap for additional head protection

Goulwenn's unique tool hook technique

 

Always careful not to squash any bees

 

Thank you for all your help!

Good bye - and hope to see you soon!

Not the executioner royal

I checked through the hive records last night and it seems the paint - though possibly the culprit in the latest episode of reginicide - is not to blame. Here are the facts:
Moon queen marked on 20th April, still laying on 30th April and probably gone 7th May, definitely gone 15th May.
Star queen marked 27th May, still laying 9th June but gone by 30th June.
2nd Star queen marked 30th June, gone by 9th July.
2nd Moon queen marked 18th July- and we know what happened to her.

What is shocking in this is that the hives have been through four queens already this year, but even more astonishing is that from 7th or 15th May till beginning July the Moon had no laying queen (though never any apparent decrease in numbers of bees in the colony) and - for whatever reasons - failed to raise a queen once. Drift from the Star could have kept bee numbers up, but it is extraordinary for the colony to survive six weeks queenless I would have thought.
Or did they raise a queen in the middle of that time who laid for a few days and then was dispatched unceremoniously?

Back to a very clueless square one...

Marking queens for sacrifice

Today, finally, I think we solved the mystery of the disappearing queens. With Goulwenn as trusty side-kick at my side, we did a double inspection: while he inspected the Moon, I looked into the Star. Because of this double act we have no photos of the inspection (also because I forgot the camera...)

The Star was quickly inspected and checked: the super is almost empty and the brood box not overpopulated. There is definitely no queen there as there was no brood at any stage of development. I set aside an empty brood frame to exchange for one from the Moon with eggs on, so the Star can raise a queen (ever hopeful that the Moon did in fact have a laying queen).

I was not disappointed in this expectation: the Moon in fact has a laying queen, as evidenced by the brood frames. While I am still somewhat concerned that there are four frames not even drawn out in the brood box, the bees are obviously busy collecting as two supers are getting very heavy.
But back to the queen: I was ecstatic that we had a laying one, as this means we could introduce one into the Star and the line of Ronian regents, so seriously tested of late, can continue. We introduced a frame with brood and a sealed queen cell (why is there a sealed queen cell there?) into the Star, so they can go about making their own. And then, Goulwenn with his eagle eyes spotted the queen! She was a darker queen again, sleek and sultry. I caught her and proceeded to mark her. I waited a bit to let the paint dry and then reintroduced her into the hive. Imagine our surprise when she was mobbed and then balled by bees. The bees packed around her so tightly, we were not able to see her again. Although we tried to uncover her, it was in vain. I'm not sure whether the bees stung, suffocated or overheated her, but I am sure the queen, after a few minutes of this handling, was dead.

Why would the bees attack their own queen? Mulling this over, our first tentative theory was that the paint must cover the queen's scent (possibly it hadn't dried sufficiently). Although it's specialist queen marking paint, it obviously somehow masks the queen's scent, so that the workers attack her when she is put in their hive. This would mean that in the past every time I marked a queen, I was actually condemning her to death. So I was the culprit (and Republican) all along! Trust humans to mess things up...

I will now go through the records this year and check whether each incident of marking is followed by the queen disappearing, which would be fairly conclusive proof. One thing I know for sure: if both Moon and Star rear a queen again now, I will NOT mark her!

Loony Queens

I was eagerly awaiting this inspection as I hoped it would finally resolve all queen issues in both Star and Moon. To recap: last inspection there had been no trace of a queen in the Moon, though I had hopes she was in there, but not yet mated. The Star had just requeened and I had been midwife to a new Star queen.
Goulwenn did the inspection, to get him more confident, as I sincerely hope he will continue beekeeping when he moves to his new school.

Opening the Star (note the cap under the suit to protect the head from stings)

We started with the Star. The feeder was empty and we decided to take it off, as the bees were only storing honey-ersatz in the central frames of the brood box rather than drawing out more comb.

Smoking a somewhat destitute Star

Although I had seen the queen hatch last time and marked her, there was no trace of her. And despite a 10-day-old queen and beautiful weather in the interim (giving her enough time to mate) there were no eggs or larvae in the hive. So, once again, we have to assume the queen has gone missing, mysteriously. Those pesky republican bees must be guillotining her or something!

So all our hopes were with the Moon. If they did not have a laying queen, if she was AWOL as well, then that would be the end of the hives and we would have to get new queens in. Not a palatable setback.
With some trepidation (and also because the bees have stuck everything down), Goulwenn carefully opened the Moon.

Ready to go in!

No matter what is going on in the brood chamber, the bees are busy collecting honey and two supers are almost full with honey now. It's strange: although the Moon has not had a laying queen for more than three weeks now if not longer), there are still many bees in there. I can't honestly say I've noticed any signs of depletion.

A frame almost full of honey

In the brood chamber we were relieved and delighted to see signs of a well-laying queen. We spotted eggs and larvae, most of them still in initial stages of development, as well as some capped cells. So the Moon queen has obviously managed to mate and is now laying. Phew! Despite checking all frames carefully, we could not find the queen herself. But she is in there and laying and that is all that matters!

A hive slowly returning to normal

Ecstatic that the future survival of the school bees is secured, we left them to their antics. I wonder what the next inspection will bring...