survey: 23% hive loss this past winter

http://www.wtop.com/884/3622770/Quarter-of-nations-bees-died-this-winter

Beekeepers nationwide lost about 1/4 of their hives, so I won't lose any until I have 4, right?? :)

WTOP: Local beekeepers grow population as activists target garden centers

http://www.wtop.com/41/3618254/Local-beekeepers-grow-population-as-activists-target-garden-centers

News about beekeeping program at American University, and talks about a petition to get home centers to remove neonicotinoids from their stores.

http://action.sumofus.org/a/home-depot-lowes-bees-neonicotinoids/8/12/?sub=fb

quick hive update

Just returned from a weekend trip, here are some external observations on the hives. we can see good activity at each hive, see pollen coming in both. Hive 2 has many more bees on the bottom of the hive, outside the screen bottom.

hive two installed

picked up a nuc form Chris H. and installed them to hive two. Queen is marked red.  five deep frames; the outers were hardly drawn out -- smaller than our other nuc. put into a new 8-frame deep super on a new bottom board next to hive one.

Did a quick check of hive one; Lisa spotted a queen running around! a few of the queen cells are opened and there are about 5 more that are still capped.  So we have a hatched queen just about when predicted; she should be mated and laying (and killed the other hatching queens) by the end of May.

hive one still queenless

Lisa and Tyler checked hive one on Tues 5/6. did not see a queen, queen cells all still capped.
I think the old queen has left with a swarm that we did not see at some point.

hive one update - queenless

Inspected on Saturday 5/3.
No queen, hardly any brood left. 3 or 4 closed queen cells. much capped brood still.
Observed swarm of bees leaving hive earlier in the day. Did not see where they went.
Lisa inspected 5/1 saw capped queen cells.

They should hatch by 5/7. then 16 days +/- 1 after emerging should be laying, or by 5/29.