Hello everyone,
It's so awesome to see an entire forum dedicated to beekeeping, and overflowing with wise beekeepers willing to help those new beekeepers just starting on their venture into such a wonderful world. So thank you all ahead of time for all your help!
Now I must say that I am in quite the bit of a pickle. I'm a new beekeeper who is located in Virginia. I had my package of bees arrive on May 12th(They didn't arrive earlier because all other package ship dates were gone) and I immediately put them into the hive that evening. The hive that they are in right now is on a 2 foot pedestal and consists of two deep hive bodies with ten frames in each. On top of that is the hive top feeder with about 2 gallons of invert sugar syrup. I just check the feeder this evening; there were absolutely no bees in the feeder. The level of the syrup has not changed at all either!
I have been making quite a few observations regarding the weather and hive activity. The weather lately has been dreary, with clouds and rain at some point every day (as opposed to clear blue skies when I put the bees in). Whenever its not raining during the day ,however, there is an absolute flurry of bees outside the hive. I have seen some bees foraging, and the water I set out hasn't been touched. There have been 10 or 15 bees crawling on the outside of the hive.
To sum it up, I have a newly hived package of bees in a hive made of two deep hive bodies and a hive top feeder, and the bees haven't touched the feed at all. What am I doing wrong and what should I do to fix it? Sorry if I seem all over the place right now, it's been a rather stressful week.inch:
It's so awesome to see an entire forum dedicated to beekeeping, and overflowing with wise beekeepers willing to help those new beekeepers just starting on their venture into such a wonderful world. So thank you all ahead of time for all your help!
Now I must say that I am in quite the bit of a pickle. I'm a new beekeeper who is located in Virginia. I had my package of bees arrive on May 12th(They didn't arrive earlier because all other package ship dates were gone) and I immediately put them into the hive that evening. The hive that they are in right now is on a 2 foot pedestal and consists of two deep hive bodies with ten frames in each. On top of that is the hive top feeder with about 2 gallons of invert sugar syrup. I just check the feeder this evening; there were absolutely no bees in the feeder. The level of the syrup has not changed at all either!
I have been making quite a few observations regarding the weather and hive activity. The weather lately has been dreary, with clouds and rain at some point every day (as opposed to clear blue skies when I put the bees in). Whenever its not raining during the day ,however, there is an absolute flurry of bees outside the hive. I have seen some bees foraging, and the water I set out hasn't been touched. There have been 10 or 15 bees crawling on the outside of the hive.
To sum it up, I have a newly hived package of bees in a hive made of two deep hive bodies and a hive top feeder, and the bees haven't touched the feed at all. What am I doing wrong and what should I do to fix it? Sorry if I seem all over the place right now, it's been a rather stressful week.
inch:
