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Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology

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Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology <[log in to unmask]>
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Mon, 16 Jun 2008 15:59:05 GMT
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I thought I would share in my cinderblock removal experience.  I have completed the removal of 2 out of the 3 colonies in the cinderblock wall building.  About 10 lbs of bees, two queens, and the combs.

On a relative scale, a cinderblock removal is not much more involved than a 2x4" wall removal.  In some ways, I found it easier.  We broke through the outer face of each cinderblock with a sledge hammer to expose the combs.  After that, vacuuming the bees and cutting out the combs was straightforward. 

The larger of the 2 colonies was in about 14-15 cinderblocks.  The other was a somewhat new swarm in 7 blocks.  The facilities man will install narrow cinderblock in the space of damaged blocks - it's not difficult.

The trickiest part was heading off the bees and queens retreating in the face of the assault into the blocks beyond the extent of the nest.  Came up with a simple technique for this.

One of the queens was very dark with only some orange-brown at the bottom of the sides.  The other one less so.  Both colonies were loaded with healthy looking drones - ~95% of them pitch black.  [My drones come out light brown where I mate my queens.] 

All the bees were very healthy looking.  Not a single shriveled wing or wings at 90 deg. to the body.  Tight brood patterns.  Good honey stores.  With all the banging, these bees were well behaved.

I had a surprise about the honey combs.  I had expected them to be parallel to the blocks.  Most on them run on a diagonal and they were mostly continuous in crossing over from one block to an adjacent one.  It made sense to me afterwards, the middle comb provides the greatest surface area in this odd cavity geometry for optimum brood-rearing and overwintering.

Waldemar 

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