Bee guys, I have a question.

Does this look like my hive is splitting? This is my first year at this.

Why are you so angry? The red angry guy by your name says so.

No it's called bearding. They do that when it's hot.

Just got a call back from a local guy. He said the same thing. I thought with the clumps that I saw that they were starting to split. The hive has been doing very well. They filled up the first brood box pretty quick before I added the second brood box. They filled that one before I thought they would. The second brood box was full of honey so I added a supper on top of that about a week and a half ago. I thought I might have waited too long to put the supper on.

Thank you for the reply.

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If I am on the internet that means that I am not out doing what I would like to be doing. That makes me angry.

If its hot there take out that entrance reducer it will help with the bearding.

Also might want to take a look inside and see if you have queen cells started. Or a laying queen.

Take out the entrance reducer and place a small shim under the roof so they can get some air flow. A couple nickels used as a shim will help a lot. You can also cut vent holes in each box and screen them for more air flow

This is my first go at this. I sent a email to a local organization about getting someone to come out and take a look at my hive and give me pointers, but no-one got back to me. I will admit that I have not been opening the hive and looking at it like I should be. Mostly because I really do not know what I am looking at or for. I am not scared of being stung, got stung a few times and it doesn't hurt. I am more worried that I will do something wrong. I know a few other local bee keepers, I will have to talk to them and see if they will stop by and give me some pointers.

It looks like I will have to go through the hive tomorrow.

Thanks for the replies. I am open to any and all tips that anyone has to offer.

When you pull frames look for young eggs. One day eggs will look like a dot or period. Two day eggs will look like a - 3 day eggs will look like a coma, starting to curl around. Then they start to look like a grub , at 7 days they are capped. If you have young eggs and caped worker brood your good. Some drone brood is normal but if it's all drone, and you see more than one egg in a cell than you lost your queen and have a laying worker.

I didn't do my hive inspections on time and notice I lost my queen on 2 hives. They developed laying workers and I ended up dumping both hives.

You will also want to do a mite check and keep your eyes out for hive beetles.

Also check your honey super if they have it partly filled . I would take it off and add a second super. Just above the queen excluder, then replace the partly filled one on top. This will give them more room, I have 3 supers on several of mine now, top two are full and mostly capped. Your hive looks really strong, give them lots of room.
Get into your brood frames, check to make sure queen has room to lay . If there is a lot of honey in brood boxes . Remove it and give her a couple of frames of drawn comb, or foundation. Don't be afraid to get in and inspect the brood boxes, you will learn , to recognize things as you play with them.

If you have a 5 frame nuc box , Take a couple of frames of brood, with day old eggs on it. a frame of food and a couple of frames of foundation. They will start queen cells and make their new queen, always handy to have a spare one around. You will have to feed the nuc, sugar water. Have fun with your bees. old243

Just to hot lately as well you should remove the entrance reducer until fall. I have one hive body and then queen excluder and now four honey supers. I am going to pull honey this weekend as it looks like good weather in MN.

Use a veil or a jacket and gloves have a well lit smoker and give a puff at the entrance before you start. Also a puff of smoke as you crack open the boxes. Once you take one box off give another puff of smoke gently across the top of the bees to drive the down in the frames so not on top and in the way.

Then push/pry the frames all to one side and pry one on the edge back and take it out to make room to work out the other frames. lean it against the hive ,bees and all. Then do the next one the same way gently lifting each frame up and inspect it. Gently put it back in the box.

First look for your queen , marked I hope. See if you have young brood and capped brood. Eggs are hard to see, you need sunshine at your back when you look, they are small. Dont worry as long as you see very young brood in all stages.

If the bees are getting angry and attacking your hands give them another puff of smoke across the top, and make a cloud in the air around you to calm them. Always move slow and deliberate.

Look on the bottom of the frames for conical cells hanging down might be a queen cell. Knock it down if you see one or more if you see you have a queen. Some are drones on the bottom of the frame.
Make sure your queen has open comb to lay in or she will swarm away. Make sure you have space in your honey suppers as well, have one half empty at all times.

Put all frames back the same position that they came out.

When your flow is over in the fall extract your honey, treat for mites, and feed until they wont take any more and wrap.

If you take pictures of your frames and post them we can help here.

Good luck.

Did you ever get a permit from the PA Dept. of Ag.? When you do this you get on a list to have your hives inspected. I think it's $10 for 2 yrs. regardless of the # of hives.

Yukon, has very sound advice...The only thing I'll add about keeping your hive a bit cooler is to consider screened bottom boards...

I also have screened inner covers, 2 inch hole . Creates lots of ventilation, the bees will close it up a bit , if they want less. My big hives the lids are propped up . This helps them get rid of the moisture from the nectar before capping. Those bees that are bearding on the outside. Need to be inside , fanning and concentrating , your nectar. Give them space. Watch your bees , they will show you , what they need. old 243

I'm glad I don't live in such a communist state..

Bees are hot and desiring more ventilation/space. Remove entrance reducer as others have said. Check top honey super to see it is filled already and they need another one. Top lid looks like it is not sitting correctly flat. Make sure you run an inside cover and then that telescoping top cover. Shim it like said if still too hot. Appears you also are running an excluder to prevent queen from coming up. Pop the honey super off and check first deep box to make sure you have uncapped larvae and new eggs. If you see new eggs that look like tiny grains of rice in bottom of cell - you know you are queen right and don't need to look for queen. Looks like a healthy hive with not enough space.......bees can fill a honey super quick in a good flow. Make sure you check it and super up if they are out of space.

My bees do this every year during the heat of summer, even at night they hang out outside the hive

Sorry for not getting back to you guys sooner. I went through the hive yesterday. My wife took pictures for me on her cellphone. She has not emailed them to me yet.

On the honey supper, they have started to draw out the frames with some honey in the middle. Below that is the queen excluder. Below that is the second brood box. It is all full of caped honey. On the first brood box the outside frames are honey and the inside frames are a mix of capped brood and pollen, nector, honey. The pics will clear it up if my ole lady ever sends them to me.

I did not remove the entrance reducer, my smoker was running very low and I just plain forgot. I think I saw the queen on the first or second brood frame (bottom box) that I pulled out. Not sure if my wife got it in the pic.

I do not recall seeing any very small eggs. I did see ones that were older (comma stage and older). I will admit, I was melting and I really do not know what i am looking for.
I know there were some late stage ones that were attached between the first brood box and the second one. I know this since they were torn open when I took the second brood box off.

When my wife sends the pics I will post them. I am not good with words and a picture is worth a thousand.

Thank you to all the have responded.

Between the frames is often from brood. Purple eyed drone.

Once I see young eggs I back out. So that point I know I have a good queen and there is no point going any further. To me it just unnecessarily disrupts the hive and adds more if a chance I may inadvertently hurt it kill the queen. It's easy to roll one between the frame and side of the box.

The first one is of one of the supper frames. The queen excluder is below this supper.



This one is one of the outside frames from the top (second) broad box that I put in after I removed the feeder box. The others are all full and capped.


This one is from the bottom (first) broad box from where I had taken the feeder out when I placed the top (second) broad box on.


This is the third frame in on the bottom (first) broad box. The other side had more capped broad.


This is the next frame over, same as the previous frame.


I have a few more pics. I will add them shortly.

PS. Sorry for the crappy pics. My wife was using her cell phone and didn't want to get too close.

Finally got the rest of them done.

Pics come out great
Your wife sure gets alot closer than mine lol

Lol. That was me making them bigger when I was editing them. I had to walk 15' from the hive and then she would stay a good 5' from me.

She will get over that with more exposure. Mine feeds them while I'm away for work filling the quart jar feeders 2xa day with no suit or vail most of the time. One hive didn't get feed the 2nd time today because they were heavy bearding and several hundred on the jar.

I forgot to mention that this was a nuc that I bought back at the end of March.

How do they look?

Looks like they are capping you some honey. Good deal.

Your queen is laying great,

But I see a supersedure cell or a swarm cell on your third picture of capped brood. If its capped your queen might be already gone.

They might be making a new queen and let it happen if you dont want to go in and shake all the brood frames and knock down the cells. Half might swarm away. you make sure you find your queen of course before you destroy the cells. They are usually on the bottoms of the frames hanging down.