Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
• When the examination is complete, carefully and slowly slide the frames back to
their original position. Don't rush, and avoid squishing bees. When a frame's top is
in place, look inside to make sure the bottom is straight down. If it is not, you will
crush bees when the next frame comes over. Use your hive tool to push to straighten
the frame, if necessary.
• When everything's back in place, quickly puff smoke on the edges to remove those
bees.
• Slide, rather than drop, the box back in place, pushing bees out of the way. You will
probably squash a bee or two, but if you're slow and careful, you won't catch many.
• Replace the inner cover, feeder, empty box, and cover, and call it a day.
• As interesting and exciting as it is to watch bees go about their business when you're
examining a colony, keep your visits to ten minutes or fewer depending on the day,
of course. Cool, cloudy days require short work. Warm, sunny days stand a bit more
time. At any rate, after a while, even the most tolerant colony begins to take a dim
view of all this exposure and becomes less easy to work.
When bees begin looking up at you from between frames, gently puff one or two small
puffs of smoke so they go down and leave you to your tasks.
Let the sun shine from behind you, directly over your shoulder, so that it shines down into
the bottom of the cells.
Honeycomb and Brood Combs
The frames you use in your boxes in which the bees have their broodnest are used much
differently than the frames in which they store honey. When a larva is raised in a cell,
the cell is filled with worker jelly for her to eat. Shortly before she pupates and spins her
cocoon, she voids her digestive system into the bottom of the cell. When she emerges,
