Honeybee_ Lessons from an Accidental Beekeeper - C. Marina Marchese [40]
William then asked me to look for the queen. This would involve removing many frames and inspecting them on both sides, and also possibly removing the top deep box to check the frames below. I had removed the top deep in my own hive, so I was aware that the deeps could be heavy. A hive in late summer would be filled to the brim with honeybees, honey, pollen, and brood, making the deeps a challenge to lift. Beekeepers have to stay in shape to be lugging around such heavy equipment.
One by one, I began removing and inspecting each frame for the queen. This was no easy task. What a beekeeper really needs to find the queen is a keen eye and knowledge of the inner workings of the colony. It also helps to be orderly during such an inspection. First, I checked the center frames before moving on to the outer ones. I systematically moved my eyes across each frame in an organized pattern, without missing a section. Then I checked for circles of attendant bees, who would be surrounding the queen, most likely in the center of the frame. Luckily, I spotted the queen without having to remove the top deep box. She was placing her behind into a beeswax cell, contentedly laying eggs. Carefully, I returned the frame to the hive so as not to crush her by accident. Then I returned the rest of the frames that I had removed, and we closed up that hive and moved on to the next one.
Each hive had its own distinctive personality. In some the bees were defensive, and in others they were quite docile. The hives sitting directly in the sun were bursting with honeybees fanning their wings at the entrance, working to keep the hive cool. The hives closest to the flower beds had very little activity, since most bees were out foraging. When we reached the seventh hive, William pointed out that it had very little activity at the entrance and scarcely any bees bringing in pollen. And we noticed that some of the drones at the entrance had deformed wings and could not fly. How utterly sad this was—helpless bees who could not fly. These details were reasons to take a closer look. Inside the hive I saw that there were more than a few empty cells among the capped worker brood. William told me that when the queen does not lay an egg in every cell, but leaves large areas open, the result is called a spotty laying pattern. Other cells looked as if the worker bees had destroyed them.
Then William asked me to do something unusual: he told me to poke open a capped drone cell with my hive tool and expose the unborn bee. Inside we discovered a white larva with strange reddish spots. The spotted larva was a sign of the all-too-common Varroa mites. These minute parasites cling to drone larvae inside their cells, feeding on their blood. Taking a closer look, we could see that there were also mites visibly clinging to the adult bees inside the hive.
Unfortunately, it was already late summer and this colony’s ability to survive the winter was severely compromised. By the time a colony is found to have disfigured bees, it is, more than likely, doomed.
That morning, I learned that a large part of keeping honeybees was preventing and diagnosing diseases. If hives are left unchecked, their honeybees can spread diseases and pests to other hives in the vicinity.
By the time William announced that it was time to break for lunch, the sun was directly above our heads, and the humidity had become unbearable. It had to be close to noon, and I was relieved to take a break. Working our way through so many hives in the middle of August was brutal. I began to appreciate the hard work and long days put in by the migratory beekeepers