2011-07-31: Reaching for the Skies

[30 second counts 7 Juno, 59 Artemis, 42 Blue, 17 purple, 22 Red]

Today's plan was to add a 3rd super (medium) to Artemis since the supers already there seemed to be getting close to full (and I had just finished assembling the frames and thought 'why not!') as well as a third deep brood box onto Ceres. The deep on Ceres was not for honey, instead it was part of my plan to try to have each hive go through the winter with 3 deep boxes. 2 deeps are considered to be what is needed to get a hive through the winter here in Vermont, but a third deep would add a big safety buffer if the winter proved especially harsh. Also, Artemis went through the winter with 3 boxes and it worked for her.

Also, I wanted to experiment with increasing the ventilation of the hives, so I drilled a hole into the top of the super to be added to Artemis and the deep to be added to Ceres. The hole was drilled to 3/4'ers of an inch of I remember correctly, this was to allow them to be stoppered easily with a cork.

Here are the hives as they looked at the beginning of the day.

 

Juno had a trickle of foragers. I would have shaken out her workers previously, but I was afraid her laying worker would find her way into one of the nucs before the queen had a chance to assert herself (a laying worker should not be a problem in a hive with a strong queen).

 

Ceres has been gaining strength through the summer. Here is the top of the 2nd box before placed the third on top. Previously, I had seen bees only around one frame.

 

The double nucs (had a nice number of foragers coming and going, though things looked to be a little chaotic around the entrance... some kind of landing board might help land easier.

 

Here is Artemis standing tall with a new super on top.

 

Here is Ceres with her third deep box.

 

Here they are again at the end of the day.