Went out to my apiary yesterday to see if the bees were doing okay and noticed one of my hives had chunks of weird looking comb all over the entrance. The bees were still coming and going normally, bringing in tons of pollen. I figured they were just doing some house cleaning. I took a stick and was going to help them out a little by sweeping out some of the bigger chunks deeper inside. When I stuck the stick inside I felt something squishy and resistant. When I pulled the stick out, the biggest fattest field mouse I've ever seen FLEW out the entrance!!!! I haven't had a chance to take the hive apart and check how much damage this mouse has done and it doesn't seem to be affecting the hive right now. I had surgery on my right hand a week ago and still can't lift anything yet and my brood chambers are 3 deeps, so it takes some heart surgery to dig into these. I'll take some pictures when I dig into it. I guess this is what I get for not putting entrance reducers on last fall!!!
Sean Kelly