Guilfordbeekeepers.org

I killed the grass first and then put down mulch. It works great.

Photobucket is obviously the way to go.
Thanks Wally for sharing it with everyone.

Locust:
If you end up with half a dozen supers on top of your hives, won't it become difficult to manage?
Seems as if your hive stand is a little bit too high!

I am not going for honey now. I want the 2 deeps for 4 potential hives. The supers on top were there before the 2nd deep. The one on the left has almost ALL frames drawn with comb. That would be in the new deep AND the medium on top. Quite impressive if you ask me but I am a rookie so I don't have anything to compare it to. The 2nd deep and the medium were put on together only 13 days ago. They are working there little stingers off. The one on the right is a little slower. But drawing comb none the less. The picture maybe a little deceptive in the height. When you walk behind the hives, the ground is higher than the front. So it is no problem for those of us who have a little height from their genes. Now my kids may have a problem....but only for a couple of more years.

Here are a couple of pics from the deeps that I added a couple of weeks ago. Please give a desription of what you see so I can tell if I see the same thing. Thanks.

http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u183 ... 0_3483.jpg
http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u183 ... 0_3482.jpg
http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u183 ... 0_3477.jpg

L&H

First
What I see in the pictures you posted are - brood in a football shaped pattern, some pollen around the outside of the brood and then nectar or syrup around the pollen. Looks like a text book brood pattern. Also nice pictures.

Second
I tried the chicken Waters as a feeder, it was a little messy but worked. Today I tried to refill and it leaked and ran on the inner cover down into the frames and out the front entrance. BIG mess. I am going to get another hive top feeder. I have asked Wally to bring one to the field day.
Chicken waterer NOT recommended as feeder.

Noted about chicken feeder. That was wierd for me to see the frames I had because they looked "clean". That is what I would have pictured a hive looking like before I got into the hive for my first time. Now I expected the comb to be dark. It wasn't, so I was second guessing my evaluation. Thanks for the reply. I am going to try a split Friday. Wish me luck!!!

New comb is a pretty site.

Good Luck, But I don't think you will need it.

L&H how did your split go?

It went wonderful. Thanks to Wally. I asked him to help out and now I feel as though I could do a split anytime. He really helped out. I feel good about the split and will count down the days till I get to go look for queen cells. This is the part that I really like. The hands on stuff. The bees were wonderful and let us look at them for a long time. They knew they had better behave because the big chief was there. Here are a few pics.
http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u183 ... ure017.jpg
http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u183 ... ure016.jpg
http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u183 ... ure014.jpg
http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u183 ... ure012.jpg
http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u183 ... ure010.jpg
http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u183 ... ure007.jpg
http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u183 ... ure005.jpg
See you tomorrow!!!!!!!!!!!

ABSOLUTELY UNBELIEVEABLE!!!!!! Check this out!!!! Someone PLEASE explain this to me.

http://lennytaylor.freeyellow.com/Feral01.jpg
http://lennytaylor.freeyellow.com/Feral02.jpg
http://lennytaylor.freeyellow.com/Feral03.jpg

Explain this to me. This is not bearding...right????

http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u183 ... 0_3541.jpg
http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u183 ... 0_3537.jpg
http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u183 ... 0_3534.jpg

Good Question.

I have seen Wally pick up a wad of bees hanging like that. Maybe you should try it and see if the queen is in the middle??

That is kind of different. I will be interested to see the reply. Is this a one time occurance or do they do this every day??

Here are my bees.

http://s94.photobucket.com/albums/l98/N ... At%20Home/

Great pics. Now I understand your hive questions better. I do better by seeing. Why the empty hive? In case of a swarm?? How many frames in your deeps are fully drawn?? Are you planning on keeping 2 deeps??

These were taken about 9:00PM tonight. Just hanging out.

http://i173.photobucket.com/albums/w45/ ... ome004.jpg
http://i173.photobucket.com/albums/w45/ ... ome002.jpg

They have been crowing the porch Evey night but this much.

Cool pictures L&H
Ron how did you get the picture through the SBB your hives look low to the ground.

I shined a flash light along the SBB and you see a lot of bee feet moving around.

I posted the same pics on another site and they said this WAS bearding. They said it was normal and to try raising the top cover about one inch to get the air flowing. I am afraid to do it due to robbing concerns. I don't have but two hives with SBB on them and they are not doing the bearding thing. Man that sure was some good english. Education is still paying off.

You can call it what you want. I guess you might even call it bearding. I would call it normal bee activity.

This is what I call bearding.....

http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sra ... c62a92.jpg

The empty is just there. I actualy had the empty turned upside down beside a five frame, with no frames of course, and had an un-attached deep with five frames sitting on the bottom board when I transfered the five frame into a ten frame. I did that so I would not have to pull the staples out in order to combine the swarm with the other colony. It just seemed to work. Looked a bit odd to have a ten frame box sitting on the ground with a bottom board on top, then a second ten frame.

I do plan on keeping two deeps on both hives. It is easy for me to feel more comfort when they are in two deeps, with lots of stores. It does come with a price when looking for the queen. However, I found her in the hive on the left the other day and was not looking for her.

The empty is now back in storage, and the two hives are both covered witht he copper tops.

I like the plan Ron. I hope all goes well. It seems so far so good.