Capped Brood!

Today was an eventful hive-observation day. It was interesting to watch one of the worker bees who had just come back from the "field" with massive pollen sacks (orange pollen) finding just the right cell in which to unload. The worker, much like the queen, lowers her thorax into a particular cell and begins to rub her legs to remove the pollen. This was about the same time one certain girl didn't appreciate my face on the glass and came right after me! Pretty nasty sting; it swelled up a little and is still tender to the touch almost 10 hours later - worst sting so far.

Later this evening, my friends Micah and James had their maiden bee voyage. I thought that I would go in and make some close up observations of the comb (with my smoker - wow, does that thing work well!) I am leaving the center most combs alone, but chose to lift one in the back - and there they were - LARVAE! HOW COOL!!! Lots of larvae at different stages of development- including capped. The brood pattern seems to be VERY healthy, as the queen didn't miss one single cell on this particular hand-sized comb. What was most surprising was to find brood on this one...I thought they would be more centralized in the hive. Through the observation windows I have seen a few capped brood cells on the center combs; however, since everything is so interconnected in the middle, I am leaving it well enough alone.

Thanks to the smoker, I was able to move enough bees out of the way to remove my "vent board" which made the entire lid an unwanted sheltered entrance. Now the only way into the hive is the correct way through the front. My only concern now is that the bees will attach the lid ... or they will continue the comb onto the lid - since that one bar still can't be inserted due to my delay in queen cage removal.