Slow Beginnings

After a very quiet day yesterday in the hive (probably due to cold weather), my bees seem to have started establishing themselves in their new home.  I'm still waiting for the appropriate amount of time to pass before opening the hive top, however, it seems as though they've assigned guard bees at the entrance and have a tentative flight pattern.  Their supplemental feed remains relatively full, but there are several blooming plants and the pollen patty for them to eat, so they are no doubt taking advantage of our spring abundance.  If you are using an inverted feeder with channels it is important that you put small stones in the channels for the bees to stand on.  Otherwise their wings get sticky and they drown (and that's no good!)

As a side note, my bees seem to be late risers.  Most of their outside hive activity doesn't begin until after 11:30 am or so in the morning.  Logically, this is probably due to the colder weather.  Today's high was 62 degrees, and the low was 42 degrees.  I personally like to think they don't get up early because they've been off doing something fabulous all night.  Perhaps raiding the annoying neighbor's swimming pool, deftly stealing sugar water out of hummingbird feeders, or doing their cute little bee communication dance.  I suspect that this behavior will change as the days get more reliably warmer.

In the mean time, I'm counting the days until I can do my first open top hive inspection and see their progress!

My cat Black Jack is an excellent assistant beekeeper.