2nd Ispection Questions

[KONASDAD]

Did 2nd inspection. No disasters this time.
First, I found three tiny black beetles. One on the inside edge of cover, and two on comb. About the size of a BB. Could these be SHB? If so, what to do?
Second, as a newbie I have no real idea what new comb being drawn should look like as compared to burr comb on the frames themselves.
Third, Do I leave the bees on the frames as I inspect, or shake them off?
Four, Just how much burr and propolis should be removed? Everything not w/in confines of frames?
Five. Had two queen cells, on seperate boards, both in the middle. Remove them or not? My boards had lots of capped brood, w/ drones on tops and perimiter? Didn't see any larvae, as wind was kick'n up and I basically was cleaning and seperating and bees appeared to be getting annoyed so I moved on quickly.


Pictures of the way things should be are very educational and thanx in advance for any help.

[Michael Bush]

>First, I found three tiny black beetles. One on the inside edge of cover, and two on comb. About the size of a BB. Could these be SHB?

Could be.  There are also some sap beetles that resemble them.  The sap beetles I've seen are a little more reddish in color and slightly longer and skinner than the hive beetles I saw in North Carolina.

> If so, what to do?

Keep an eye on them.  If you want to send samples in for identification, here's the beltsville lab:

http://www.ba.ars.usda.gov/psi/brl/directs.htm

But the give awy is the spikey larvae.  If you see those they are small hive beetles.

>Second, as a newbie I have no real idea what new comb being drawn should look like as compared to burr comb on the frames themselves.

Don't know what to tell you exactly. Normal comb has the foundation as the mid rib.  In my terminology burr comb is really just bits of comb here and there.  But sometimes they draw paralell combs either down from the edges of the top bars or out from the face of the comb.  This I would call a paralell comb I guess.  Then there are "fins" out from the face of the comb.  I don't cosider either of these burr.  Burr is just stuff that isn't messed up it's just in places where you'd rather not have comb.  Any comb that has a space between it and the foundation is messed up and need to be removed.  Burr you can remove if you like, but it really doesn't matter.

>Third, Do I leave the bees on the frames as I inspect, or shake them off?

Leave them on the frames. Never shake the bees unless you have a specific purpose that requires it, like harvesting or boosting a split or breaking up a laying worker hive.

>Four, Just how much burr and propolis should be removed?

I only remove it if it's in my way.

> Everything not w/in confines of frames?

If you have lots of time.  I never do unless it's in my way.

>Five. Had two queen cells, on seperate boards, both in the middle. Remove them or not?

Never.  I never remove queen cells. Why would you?  Either the bees are goign to swarm and you will leave them queenless, or they are superceding and you will leave them with a failing queen.  It is almost always a vary bad idea to destroy a queen cell.  If you think they are swarming, do a split, if you think they are superceding, let them.

http://www.bushfarms.com/beeslazy.htm

(check the section on:  Leave the burr comb between boxes, Stop cutting out swarm cells, Stop scraping all the propolis off of everything,

For more on queen cells:

http://www.bushfarms.com/beesswarmcontrol.htm