The Queen Pipes

Since splitting Boudicca’s hive a couple of weeks ago, I have been waiting for the queen cells in the original hive to hatch. On Thursday, I inspected the hive. As expected, there are only a few remaining capped worker and drone cells from Boudicca’s egg laying. I saw one drone emerging from his cell, which is a first for me, and so a bit special. Down in one box I heard a queen piping, so I knew that at least one had hatched out. The piping sounds like a tiny kazoo. She does this to locate rival queens and challenge them to a showdown. The rival will respond with a slightly different sound (more like a quack), even from within her cell. Here’s a link to a video with some queen piping, and the response: http://www.zunibee.com/community/viewVideo.php?fileID=49

I should have removed the frame holding the remaining queen cells, and started another hive, but I didn’t think about that until yesterday. That would have helped my chances of getting a mated queen from this batch. Live and learn. It’s probably too late by today, because they all should have hatched out by Friday or Saturday. But who knows? Perhaps I might find two young queens wandering about, and I can separate them. Unfortunately, my queen-spotting skills are poor. Even though I heard the one piping, I couldn’t find her when I inspected the frames. They’re quick little blighters.

As usual, the workers had built a bit of burr comb between frames. Now that the nectar flow is going strong, these bits of errant comb were full of near-honey. What a treat to have a taste of fresh honey still warm from the hive! When I inspected Boudicca’s summer home at Holly & Harvey’s, her hosts got to join me in this treat. Having honey on one’s hands does make it a bit difficult to work, because the bees crowd in to suck it all up. At left: burr comb with a queen cup.

I found that I prefer working in the hive without gloves. The gloves are a bit clumsy, and I can’t feel the bees. With bare hands, I can feel them buzz in mild irritation if I start to squash them, so I can let up. They don’t mind when I nudge them out of the way, and it tickles pleasantly to have them crawl on my hands.

On Saturday morning there was a small informal gathering of beeks who keep bees in the Bayside area. Although I am five or six miles away in Myrtletown, they let me join them. It is so nice to meet more beeks, and to build relationships. After gathering and talking bees for a while at Hank’s wonderful coffee house in Bayside, we wandered over to Garrett’s bee yard to see what was going on with a couple of his hives. Garrett had sold me Ekaterina, my Russian czarina, and is quite knowledgeable about things apian.

Although Garrett was thorough with smoking the bees, some were upset with a jostling, and I got stung on the hand. This joined a sting from Thursday, when a bee crawled under my shorts leg. Having become rather cavalier about the danger from stings, I had not strapped down sleeves or legs. Fortunately I had taken an antihistamine against this swollen & painful Thursday sting, and so far my hand is only a bit sore. Hopefully any future stings will be less severe.

Later…
Well what do you know? There were still sealed queen cells in Boudicca’s old hive. One looked like it had just opened, and there seemed to be someone inside. I took the two frames with queen cells, along with some that had food and workers on it, and put them in a new box. I also added another box nearly full of honey. The first virgin queen (“Elizabeth I” for now, though I hesitate to have the virginal reputation stick) was still piping, though once again I couldn’t find her. But by her piping I could tell she wasn’t on the frames I was transferring. No eggs yet. We’ll see if I can get at least one successfully mated queen out of this.

This time I didn’t move the hive with the queen cells across town, as I did with Boudicca. I’m trying another method, and moved them about 20 feet away. I placed some twigs in front of the entrance, and some potted plants in front of the hive. In theory, these things should cause the bees coming out to pause and reorient to their new home. This way, I hope they won’t return to their old home with Queen Bess.

I learned why one should not place a hive box directly on the lawn rather than on the lid. A number of bees had been clinging to their sisters on the comb and to the grass. As I lifted the box, they got riled, and once again I got stung. This time it was well deserved. Karin’s sister Kate is visiting this weekend, and she was out with me, observing and helping out. Fortunately she avoided injury, and was quite calm through this, while I was cussing a blue streak. I’m sorry there was no honey-laden bit of burr comb for her as a reward. We’ll have to send Kate a jar of honey after the harvest. Even Karin had come out earlier, as we snooped in Bess’ hive. Very brave of her, especially without a veil. She’ll become a Bee Girl yet.