I was able to conduct some hive inspections on Thursday after work; the temperature was warm enough to completely inspect one hive thoroughly while the sun was out… and two other hives just enough to get an idea of how they were doing. At the time I last checked these three hives, I had one with a queen and two that were queenless. They were actively bringing in pollen, reassuring to see after so many weeks of winter weather.

I found the first hive that I opened to be queenless, and it was the one that had a queen going into winter. Fortunately, the population seems strong enough and there is enough stored honey and pollen for it to make a comeback.

The two other hives I checked briefly on Thursday did NOT have queens going into winter… and I debated last fall whether I should just take the honey and start with fresh bees in the spring or leave them be and deal with it in the spring. I chose the latter because, frankly, I was too busy last fall to do anything else. The second hive I opened was also (still) queenless but had a strong population and good reserves of honey and pollen.

The third hive I opened on Thursday was a surprise - it was thriving with honey, pollen, a huge bee population, and eggs and larvae — they have a queen in there! It was starting to get dark and bees are notoriously cranky when the sun starts to go down, I did not want to risk getting stung and was not able to get into the lower box to see if there was a lot of brood. It was great to find the hive in excellent shape considering I wrote it off last fall.

My plan is to transfer a frame of eggs and larvae to each of the queenless hives on the next warm, sunny day and give them an opportunity to raise a queen. In the meantime, I have beehives to build in preparation for more bees from New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania in the spring.

Honey bee eggs, larvae, and capped brood