hi all,
caught two wild swarms last summer and now have two pretty good looking hives. I just checked the hives the other day, It's been in the high 60's all week here in boulder, they looked pretty good i left all the honey stores they built up last summer to be sure they made it through the winter. they have been out gathering pollen during the day. I have a couple ? for the the spring
Should i think about feeding?
should i do any
Also when i first caught the swarms i put them in home made hives that i built. I built the frames myself as well and didn't realize how much the bees glued down the frames, so now they are all falling apart in the bottom hive body, the cluster in one hive is in the 2nd body and the other is in the bottom body. i purchased the upper bodies on both hives, so the only problem i have are that the top of the frames in the home made body are very wide and restrict movement and ventilation, my thought was to go in there and pull out all the comb which is sort off a mess and wire it into the new frames i got, and let the bees patch it up. any thoughts on this. the other reason i want to get rid of the home made body is because i have the bottom board nailed on, never saw a hive before and couldn't find a local bee store and had a swarm ready to start building so i did my best only to find out it was all wrong, Thanks in advance for the advice, i am very excited about this upcoming summer with my bees.
Chris
caught two wild swarms last summer and now have two pretty good looking hives. I just checked the hives the other day, It's been in the high 60's all week here in boulder, they looked pretty good i left all the honey stores they built up last summer to be sure they made it through the winter. they have been out gathering pollen during the day. I have a couple ? for the the spring
Should i think about feeding?
should i do any
Also when i first caught the swarms i put them in home made hives that i built. I built the frames myself as well and didn't realize how much the bees glued down the frames, so now they are all falling apart in the bottom hive body, the cluster in one hive is in the 2nd body and the other is in the bottom body. i purchased the upper bodies on both hives, so the only problem i have are that the top of the frames in the home made body are very wide and restrict movement and ventilation, my thought was to go in there and pull out all the comb which is sort off a mess and wire it into the new frames i got, and let the bees patch it up. any thoughts on this. the other reason i want to get rid of the home made body is because i have the bottom board nailed on, never saw a hive before and couldn't find a local bee store and had a swarm ready to start building so i did my best only to find out it was all wrong, Thanks in advance for the advice, i am very excited about this upcoming summer with my bees.
Chris