Spring Report

Spring has over-sprung here- its like extra Spring this year- in more than full force,  and everything seems to be flowering and leafing and flying around at once. Its lush, and pretty, but also a little creepy- whenever there is record weather of any sort, its just a reminder of how topsy turvy things are, even if, as in this case, its pleasant.  And I love seeing the Spring this year.

For the first time in a lot of years- I am seeing these huge mason bees on my mason bee hives- for some reason, they disappeared for a long time-like 10 years- (I had plenty of other types- smaller ones)- but these are back:

2x4 mason bee block above- quick and easy- with commercial  plastic ones in a homemade block below.

Mason bee this afternoon on the 2x4 block.

And my neighbor's pear tree is in full flower- and two of my hives sit in his yard (thank you Kevin), as that is where I often have caught my swarms.

 I spent the day in the shop- cleaning up and improving my vent boxes. I took off the fabric- which seem to get really messy, and the bees seem to pull out the fiberglass fibers and get tangled in it. I replaced it all with 1/8" hardware cloth, and will now lay light gauge filter fabric in each box so I can add the shavings without them raining down on the hive (makes a big mess on the mite boards). I also add a 1/4" strip at the bottom, so I can stack them on top of hives after I have removed the winter feeding tray. I might put these back on this year- at least for the coming month- as a number of hives have lots of moisture.

Vent boxes- rebuilt and scraped and ready for paint.

Its also apparently not too early to think about swarming. Below are two queen cells just built, in a perfectly strong, uncrowded, hive, and it makes me want to go through all the hives to be sure its not further along than I thought

I put the boardman feeders back on- just in case, but I haven't seen any levels go down. I have never really seen any robbing with these- but as I could not get my new invention figured out- I had to go back to using them.

And I got the garden turned over- but the two hives seen here are going to have to move. I am hopefully moving them to a nearby farm- but first I have to move them 3 miles away somewhere, so its a lot of moving around.