Why are they doing this? (The yard so far)

[Kris^]

Here is the yard so far:





The hive on the right in the first picture was a walkaway from the original two-box hive that was sitting in the middle in the second picture.  The queen was moved with the the walkaway.  When I inspected it last weekend, I saw the queen, and she was going about laying eggs, and a decent brood pattern was in place on a few frames.  But I also found a long queen cell in the middle of a frame, which I may have damaged when I pulled the frame out.  So I put the frame into the cutdown and replaced it with a frame of brood from another hive.

I inspected the hive again today and there were lots more bees in it than last week.  I didn't spot the queen, but I found ANOTHER long queen cell in the center of a frame.  This time I left it there, figuring the're making it for some reason.  But I don't know why they are drawing one queen cell each week.  There aren't enough bees in the two box hive to be overcrowded, and the queen seems to be laying well.
As for the walkaway, the cell I put in there last week disappeared.  I've been poking in there regularly since I split on April 2nd, and the've made two queen cells on brood frames I added earlier.  I'm just going to let them go at it, since it is still a very strong hive.

By the way, the left hive in the first picture was the one that was near death at the end of February.  It's filled one box so I added the second one today.  Having frames of drawn comb really seems to make a difference in building up colonies!  The other two hives are really strong now, and storing nectar in the supers (and a little drone brood, too).  And no sign of varroa in any of the brood I opened in any of them.

Still have two packages coming in next week.

-- Kris