What a Difference a Week Makes

Every week I see improvements in the Sasha hive. Last week, the bees had cleaned house nice and tidy, removing the debris from the dead was moth larvae. This week the bees have filled in the damaged areas with new comb and the queen has finally spread out her laying to 3 full frames, both sides! In this photo you can see larvae in the spotty holes of the brood and the nice tight brood elsewhere. Nice honey going on in the corners, too.

This frame of brood pictured is on one new frames finally being used by the queen. Lovely eggs, larvae and capped brood! I'm pleased with this progress.

But I was surprised to find two dry queen cups, one each on the bottom of the two center-most frames. Being Russians, I would usually not worry about them but they worry me today because the bees have yet to draw out five of the frames. There is room to expand! Also, one frame next to the three brood frames is full with nectar and pollen, and the frame on the other side of the three brood frames is not yet drawn out. Perhaps they feel confined?

I'm not sure if this will matter to the bees but I moved the nectar-full frame over and placed a very partially drawn frame closer to the brood and then put the top feeder back on. The bees had not been feeding from it and I've been dumping out spoiled sugar water, but as we're nearing the end of our major nectar flow am hopeful the 1:1 syrup will encourage the now larger population of bees to draw out the comb so the queen has a place to lay.