As ten o'clock approached 30% headed on to town for a few essentials and TP* surfaced from his lair and started assemble a rather sophisticated breakfast of coffee, croissant and scrambled eggs. Once sufficient caffeine had hit his blood stream I engaged him in basic conversation. I informed him that I planned to do an inspection of the hive and asked if he wanted to join me. He agreed with an amazing level of enthusiasm for a nineteen year old who had only been awake for twenty five minutes.**
Once breakfasted TP was quickly dressed and we were soon wafting puffs of smoke at the entrance of the hive...
... I must have been distracted when I reassembled the hive last week as I had put the crown board on upside down and the frames in the Super were perpendicular to those in the Brood Box rather than parallel.
This hadn't seemed to have affected the colony at all and the frames looked marvellous. Last week I had noticed that I had young larvae up in the Super and was working on the assumption that the Queen had made her way up there, before I had installed the Queen Excluder, and laid in the freshly drawn foundation. The larvae cells were now all capped and there was no sign of fresh eggs or larvae. This suggests that my assumption was correct. All being well the larvae will hatch in a week or so leave the cells available for honey production.
The brood box below the queen excluder was also looking very healthy with masses of capped brood and stores of pollen and honey. We saw the Queen working her way across an empty frame, obviously busy laying. Reassured that all was well, the hive was reassembled ... with the Super and Crown Board on the right way this time.
In the afternoon BMS and SMS*** joined us for afternoon team and we spent several hours sat in the garden catching up on each others' news.
Today had been far less busy than yesterday and it was great to simply relax in front of the television once our guests had left. It may have been a more relaxing day, but I was still shattered and was snoring on the sofa a little after ten o'clock.
Thank Heavens tomorrow is a Bank Holiday.
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* TP: The Progeny** He has actually been surprisingly interested in the arrival of the bees and loves to come out and work with his Dad and the colony. Apparently he was even discussing it with one of the regulars when pulling pints at work a few nights ago.
*** BMS & SMS: Bad Man Senior and Step Mum Sue.
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