Trouble in the Hive...

It's been quite a while since I've posted about my beehive... since we've had a lot of action happening in there of late, it seems a good time for an update!

The beehive was strong and healthy and growing at a very rapid pace for the first several months. We added as second brood box, and the bees were quickly filling it up with eggs, brood, pollen, and a pretty good amount of capped honey! Then one day in the beginning of August, as I inspected my hive, I noticed there was some capped brood, but no new eggs or larvae.This is a very bad sign... it means that the queen bee is dead, or otherwise no longer viable. Oddly, the bees had been quite agitated the previous week when I had inspected... so agitated, that one of my normally docile bees stung me. My guess is that our queen (whom we had called "Alice") was in trouble then, hence their unrest.

Once I determined that Alice was definitely gone and our hive was definitely queenless, we needed to go about trying to requeen the hive. This is sometimes tricky business, as the hive sometimes rejects a new queen. So, we ordered a new queen from an apiary in Georgia, and upon her arrival, we placed her in the hive, and waited patiently to see if she'd be accepted. After a week, I inspected the hive again. I inspected all ten frames in the top brood box, but found nothing... no queen, no eggs, no larvae. Onto the bottom box... one frame after another... same story: no queen, no eggs, no larvae. About seven frames in, the bees started getting angry. They were buzzing quite loudly, and giving me plenty of warning bumps. One stung me on the wrist. I hoped this meant I was near the queen, and sure enough... on the 19th of 20 frames, I found my new queen (dubbed "Elizabeth" by my cousin, in hopes that she would have a longer reign than Alice!) Along with the queen I found some eggs and brood... hooray! The 20th frame was also full of eggs and brood, so it appears that our hive may be back on track.

In other news... oh my gosh, you guys... it's almost time for the homeschool year to start! We have SO much happening this coming school year. I've been very busy getting our supplies ordered, cleaning out the homeschool cabinet, and getting everything ready! Next post, I'll be sharing some of our preparations, and give you a little peak at our homeschool space.