Starting again, all bees dead

Four hives dismantled, cleaned and tested.  Six hives contained dead bees that were in a bundle, suggesting they had frozen to death. Ample food remained in most hives. The exceptions were one hive that was still occupied by a plump mouse.  Another hive was probably home to spiders,  only piles of bees wings remained and many webs, but no spiders seen.  All eight hives were dismantled and quick lime was worked into the soil at their location.   This year the the new hives were relocated.

 Only the two hives with the least objectionable microbial counts were used. The UV was not as effective as expected, probably due to missed spots.

This yeast was most abundant on a blood agar plate specific for Strep.
 
No id attempted on the fungi.

long winter

two hives checked and bees frozen,  6 more hives to go.  Will check them today 04/01/2013

Here's A Picture

Another New Picture

Working with the bees.

New Photo.

BioTechniques - How Diet Affects Genes: From Honeybees to Humans | Epigenetics Feature

BioTechniques - How Diet Affects Genes: From Honeybees to Humans | Epigenetics Feature

another swarm and not as easy as the last oner

Another hive swarmed and choose an old satellite receiver. Hilary moved them into a new hive but after two hours they left the hive and returned to the satellite receiver. It is anchored on a hollow pole and the queen may be there, inaccessible. So, Hilary moved them again to a new hive, we will know tomorrow if  she got the queen or they decide to stay in the new hive.

 .................

The flowering trees should provide ample food for the bees. They seem to prefer wild plum and choke cherry.  As usual, I can not locate their main food source but it does not seem to be any of these blooms.  The bees use the spring fed pond  for water and yesterday toads were also there in abundance.

Their charming  sound is almost deafening.  They have been active for three days and are very docile when approached slowly from the water.  Thirty years ago there were very few, if any, toads at this location.  Although I gardened a lot, I never saw one.  The area had been exposed  to a lot of chemicals for corn.  About fifteen years ago,  Hilary and I stopped on a highway to avoid hitting hundreds of toads. Many were crushed by cars.  We scooped up as many as we could, helping them cross the road, and took about twenty with us and released them here.  We have had toads in abundance ever since.