Early to bed?

[treebee]

I went by my new hive yesterday at about 6:30 and they were all inside. There was still plenty of daylight left it was a little cloudy but warm out.My question would be, do I have them in to much evening shade? I placed them so they would get morning sun and evening shade thinking it would be better this summer in the heat, but I want get them all the forage time they will need..Or are bees early to bed naturaly? thanks John H. :?

[charles]

A healthy hive will forage right up to sunset if the weather is good. There might be something going on inside.

[JP]

How long have you had these hives?


...JP

[treebee]

Ive only had the hive since sunday ,4 days.I was tring not to disturb them but i think I,ll go Open and look today.John

[JP]

My guess is your queens may not have been released if they were package installs. Open them up and release the queens, they should get busy soon after that.


...JP

[treebee]

I went to check on the new hive, puled it all the way down and wow what a thrill they where really going to town in 4 days they have filled 1/2 the box with comb and I had bees coming and going at a pretty good pace, bright orange pollen stuck to most the incoming bees and some yellow. It was great to see them just working away... I think I jump the gun when I did not see a whirlwind of activity the other night. I installed this swarm on sunday with half plastic cell and half top bar with ridges and they filled every thing that wasn't plastic so now I am changing them to all wax coated or top bar style. For now they look happy.. I did put a gallon of 1 to1 on them sunday when I got them home ,It was almost gone friday morning,should I feed again or just let them forage? JOHN H Thanks for listening :)

[JP]

If you offer them feed, be ready to offer them space as well. Bees being fed will build quickly. When they've drawn out about seven of those frames add another box. If the amount of bees in the box seems obsessive, add another box.

You could alternate the feed some as well to guage the flow or lack of in your area.

Ideally you want them to build from resources in your area, but if there isn't a whole lot of nectar being produced in your area, you'll need to feed them.


...JP