Hive Visit

The hive is nearly as tall as me!

Last week we decided to put on another super, the bees are doing well and we don't want them to swarm. The weather had been good and we want to make sure they have enough room if they need it. We bought a super and the frames and built them all up on Tuesday. This morning we went over and did a quick inspection and add the super.



Super making essentials! you can see the foundation in the top left corner

They are doing really well, you can see them bringing in pollen which is always a good sign, they have strong pollen and honey stores this year and the brood looks good and healthy.  We have lots of honey in the supers- we have nearly a while super capped, another one is drawn out and ready for them to fill with honey (which they've already started to) and now a fresh new one!


Foundation

I'm writing this realising I've probably never explained what a super is! A super is a smaller box of frames beekeepers put on to collect the honey. These go on top of the brood and a queen excluder stops the queen going up there to lay eggs meaning you get frames of just honey making it easy to extract. the frames are wooden and have foundation in them (a starter grid of wax for them to build the cells) they draw out the cells with wax and then fill them with honey. We put 10 frames in ours, they can hold 12 but by spacing them out a bit more they draw them out more meaning you get more honey! Initially the honey has a high water content, the warmth of the hive as well as the bees fanning the cells with their wings lessens this and it becomes thicker. Once the water content is lowered the bees cap the cells with wax- once they are capped they are ready to harvest!