Ruthless Virgins

So, let's get the bad news out of the way first.  Nuc 1 (at left) isn't doing great.  They seem to have failed to raise a queen from the limited queen cups they had remaining after the Small Hive Beetles had their way with the comb, and two frames had to be frozen as you will remember from Pests!.  At this point, the plan of action is likely to re-join Nuc 1 and Nuc 2 into a single hive.  At this juncture, it would probably be too late to get a viable nuc before winter.  While this is unfortunate, it's not entirely unforseen.  The hope now is just that we can get two good hives through the winter.

Now, on to some good news!  Nuc #2 (pictured at right) is doing just swimmingly.  They have hatched out a virgin queen, and that queen has taken her nuptial flight or flights.  These flights send queens into Drone Congregation Areas (or DCAs.)  In the DCA, drones from several colonies congregate together for the purpose of catching a virgin queen on her nuptial flights.  There is no known rhyme or reason to the choice of location for DCAs, but they typically occure anywhere from 50-130 feet in the air.  When the virgin queen flies through, she will attempt to avoid being caught and bred, allowing only the fastest, strongest, and longest enduring drones to breed with her. (A special nod to our old buddy Chuck Darwin!)  As many as 10-15 drones will mate with her, after which they will immediately plunge to their death.  The now mated queen will return to the hive, after which she can begin laying fertilized eggs that will grow to be worker bees. 

The picture at right shows two of the four queen cell husks in the nucleus.  We have talked several times about queen cells, but never about them hatching.  As you can see, these two cells appear to be ripped open from the side. Inside the queen cell, the larvae grow head down, and when they are ready to hatch, they chew a circle around the bottom of the cell, letting it drop open like a hinge.  So, how are these cells blown out the side, you ask?  After the virgin queen hatches, she moves around the hive destroying any other queen cells she can find, and engaging in a fight to the death with any other virgin queen she finds.  When destroying queen cells, the virgin will come at it from the side.  Unfortunately, the husk that contained our hatched queen had already been mostly torn apart by the bees, and the picture quality wasn't good enough to see what I've described above.  Our queen has now laid some eggs in the nuc, and only time will tell if she has been properly mated, or if she failed to do so and will only lay unfertilized eggs that will become drones, but I am hopeful that things will go well. 

Finally, I am glad to report that hive #1 is doing so well that they are ready for a honey super.  This smaller box sits on top of the two deep hive bodies and is for the sole purpose of collecting honey.  A queen excluder is placed in between the hive bodies and the honey super, and is a framework of holes that will allow workers to pass through, but keeps the larger queen out.  The workers will fill this extra area with honey that we will be able to harvest and keep, as the hive bodies hold enough honey to sustain the hive through the winter. 

I would also like to let all of my wonderful, loyal readers know that we will soon be coming into more posts about other "Back 40" topics, so it won't be ALL about bees.