Spring update

Spring was busy, and I missed noting a couple of things: one of my hives had nosema when I first brought it here in early May. The yellow and brown streaks outside the hive were unmistakable, though until now (my fourth season), I'd never seen bee poop except at the end of winter. A few spots can be seen on the bottom board, right.

There were also bees outside the hive, moving around lethargically. When I examined the inside, though, there was no evidence of bees pooping inside, so at least the sick bees were going outside (though not far outside) the hive.

The colony recovered quickly, though. Within a few days, the streaks had stopped, there were no more bedraggled bees out front, and the colony started to really boom.

Both are booming, in fact, so packed full of sealed brood that I keep adding hive bodies. They fattened up on dandelion and apple, and just past, the black locust. Creeping Charlie and Dame's Rocket are good stand-bys at this time of year, too, and the neighborhood lawns have erupted in white clover--no doubt a leftover from this areas past as apple orchards and dairy farms.

The other thing of note was that I got a swarm call on May 16th. Cornell gave my`name to someone with a swarm near my job, so off I went. Unfortunately, the swarm was too high up in a spruce tree for me to do anything about them. Given that it issued in a residential neighborhood, I did have to wonder whose house had a few more guests than they knew of. It's hard to say, though. The neighborhoods are old, and so are the trees, so it's possible the swarm issued from somewhere other than a nearby house. And that the girls found a new home whose mortgage wasn't being paid by someone else.

But I don't think so.