Seven is the magic number

On Sunday I opened a hive and found 7 frames with brood on. Not just national frames, 14×12 national frames, the ones with more cells per frame than a commercial !

7 is the magic number, it translates as time to put a super on.

Hooray, honey time !

In not so good news, I have lost a queen, my favourite one. Her colony was trapped in because the mouse guard got blocked with dead bees. I merged her colony with a neighbouring one because it was too small to requeen.

Oh and on one hive on Saturday I had 9 queen cells, half way to being capped complete with growing larvae inside. They are making an early start of that then… it may involve a lost queen though so…

…and how are your bees?