It started with a whole lot of activity around the hive this morning. If there is high activity of the buzzing kind in front of the hive, it can be what is known as Orientation Flight. The new bees need to know where they are and how to get back to their hive after a foraging trip.
This was not Orientation Flights. This was buzzing all around the front and sides and back of the hive with bees milling about on the "flight deck" of the hive.
Time to break out my gear.
I lifted this super off once I'd loosened the corners, and gasped when I found queen cells (yay) with exposed and immature Queens (oh damn).
photo courtesy of Wikipedia
My greatest fear is squishing a Queen. Followed closely by taking off a super and tearing apart their wax cells, exposing them and more than likely ending their quest for Queendom. I just put the hive in grave danger. My hope is that my little Princesses are rearing more Queens, more than the 5 or so white larvae I saw.. As it stands, there is no mobile Queen in my hive, she's still incubating. The hive creates several Queen Cups before the current Queen and up to 60% of the population of my hive goes off to find other accomodations. Once the swarm leaves, the hive is Queenless until the virgin Queen is born and mated.
While inside my hive, I put on a super with mostly drawn out comb so that I can try to harvest something for myself this year. My hope is that the bees continue to draw out this comb and use it for additional honey storage!
