Today July 6th, 2008 was the 64th day that we have had our Honeybees in our two Hives that we purchased back in March of this year from Long Lane Honey Farm. So far everything is still going very well with both of the Beehives. The Hive Bodies on each of the Beehives are almost completely full of Brood and Honey and the Frames in all four of the Hive Bodies were completely covered in Bees. It looked like we have a really good population in both of the hives, so far. Today is also the day that we got to add our first Honey Supers to both of the Hives. We used the Shallow boxes that we made to hold our feeders earlier when we were feeding the bees to get the comb drawn out quicker.
The frames that we are using in the shallow supers will be for cut comb honey. They have no foundation, but we used 40lb. test fishing line to cross wire the frames to support the comb that the bees will draw out to store the honey. We had our cut comb foundation ordered over a month ago from Dadant in Hamilton, IL, but due to the bad weather they have had and the high water from the Mississippi river, we have not received our order of the foundations as of yet. We started of this morning by doing our regular checks of the hive's bottom boxes. We were checking them for their brood pattern and for anything that looked out of the ordinary. We were also checking to make sure that the Queens were still in both of the hives also.
We did not see the Queen in either of the hives, but with the brood pattern that we found on the frames, in both of the hives, she surely has to still be in each of the two Beehives. After doing our checks we added the Queen excluder to both of the hives, just above the top Hive Body. This is used to keep the Queens below where the honey will be stored. Otherwise the Queens will lay eggs in the frames and will not be good with the honey. Now it was time to add our Shallow Supers on to the top of the Queen excluders. After adding the Shallow Supers we installed 10 frames into each of the Supers and then replaced the inner covers over the top of each Super that the bees will use to draw out the comb, used to store the honey. With the Supers full of frames and the inner covers replaced back where they belonged we then
replaced the Top Covers and our Concrete blocks back on top of both beehives. It sure was getting hot and humid outside by the time we finished up today. Looks like we are done for the day. With great results and being very pleased with how everything was looking in both of the hives. So far the bees have been some work, but our entire family has had a ton of fun working with them and just sitting outside watching the bees work the yard and fly off to wherever to bring back their stores for the hives. We also got to see two bees emerging from their cells today to join the ranks of the hive, but the pictures did not turn out well enough to see the new bees.
Today July 6th, 2008 was the 64th day that we have had our Honeybees in our two Hives that we purchased back in March of this year from Long Lane Honey Farm. So far everything is still going very well with both of the Beehives. The Hive Bodies on each of the Beehives are almost completely full of Brood and Honey and the Frames in all four of the Hive Bodies were completely covered in Bees. It looked like we have a really good population in both of the hives, so far. Today is also the day that we got to add our first Honey Supers to both of the Hives. We used the Shallow boxes that we made to hold our feeders earlier when we were feeding the bees to get the comb drawn out quicker. 
The frames that we are using in the shallow supers will be for cut comb honey. They have no foundation, but we used 40lb. test fishing line to cross wire the frames to support the comb that the bees will draw out to store the honey. We had our cut comb foundation ordered over a month ago from Dadant in Hamilton, IL, but due to the bad weather they have had and the high water from the Mississippi river, we have not received our order of the foundations as of yet. We started of this morning by doing our regular checks of the hive's bottom boxes. We were checking them for their brood pattern and for anything that looked out of the ordinary. We were also checking to make sure that the Queens were still in both of the hives also. 
We did not see the Queen in either of the hives, but with the brood pattern that we found on the frames, in both of the hives, she surely has to still be in each of the two Beehives. After doing our checks we added the Queen excluder to both of the hives, just above the top Hive Body. This is used to keep the Queens below where the honey will be stored. Otherwise the Queens will lay eggs in the frames and will not be good with the honey. Now it was time to add our Shallow Supers on to the top of the Queen excluders. After adding the Shallow Supers we installed 10 frames into each of the Supers and then replaced the inner covers over the top of each Super that the bees will use to draw out the comb, used to store the honey. With the Supers full of frames and the inner covers replaced back where they belonged we then
replaced the Top Covers and our Concrete blocks back on top of both beehives. It sure was getting hot and humid outside by the time we finished up today. Looks like we are done for the day. With great results and being very pleased with how everything was looking in both of the hives. So far the bees have been some work, but our entire family has had a ton of fun working with them and just sitting outside watching the bees work the yard and fly off to wherever to bring back their stores for the hives. We also got to see two bees emerging from their cells today to join the ranks of the hive, but the pictures did not turn out well enough to see the new bees.
