When I first arrived I noticed an odd cloud of activity in front of one of the double nuc entrances. I was afraid that I might be witnessing a robbing event. I went back to the house and donned my suit and returned, I was hoping that perhaps if I worked the hives and puffed some smoke I might break things up. However, when I returned I found that things looked normal around the double nuc, but instead there was a great deal of activity in front of Ceres (the blue hive). I didn't think it was likely to be a robbing event since that was a strong hive. 15 minutes later the activity was back to normal. *shrug*
I opened up Artemis and was happy to see brood, the best indicator that the new queen successfully mated and is now laying. While the interruption in the laying cycle will likely set the hive back, on the plus side it should also knock down the mite population since they need brood to breed.
As I stated in the beginning, I then took a break from the hives to put a couple of coats of paint onto the second stories for the double nucs. I like to have each hive to have its own color. Some say distinct colors help the bees find their hive. However, the biggest reason is that my mother and I like the look of the beeyard with each hive its own color. For the double nucs the distinct colors for each nuc also helps to make sure I don't accidentally put the wrong second story on the wrong bottom if I ever have both off at the same time (or if they tip over). The danger of that is that if the two queens end up in the same space I will likely end up with just one queen and a hive with no queen.
When the boxes were dry, I filled them with four frames each with new foundation for the bees to draw out. The theory is that these double nucs will draw out foundation very quickly and that I have to keep an eye on them so that they don't get crowded and swarm.
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