The bees are working hard and building up well ahead of schedule, as per the continuing theme in many of my posts this year. We are getting some rain, but it seems to be interspersed enough with sunny, nice weather that the bees are not being impacted (seemingly, anyway!) I received my first swarm call this past week, which was very encouraging. I started creating Nucs three weeks ago and have been very worried that the new queens would not have enough drones out there to have a really good mating. But, if Mama Nature seems to believe that the bees can swarm (and have successful mating’s), then those first Nucs have a better chance than I had thought.

As of yesterday, I think I have created somewhere between 15 and 25 nucs. I actually did my first “Nuc check” yesterday, which happens 3 weeks after I create a Nuc. My primary goal here is to find a queen cell that indicates a queen did hatch. It is extremely difficult (at least for me) to find a young queen. She seems smaller and much faster (when I do luckily find her.) So, my primary goal, 3 weeks after creating a Nuc, is to find the open cell (or two) that indicates a successful hatch. If I do not find it, I give the nuc another frame of eggs.

Sometimes, a queen actually did hatch and they tore down the queen cell so quickly that I missed it. When this happens, I find a bunch of capped brood on my follow up “brood check”. This follow up check is 2 weeks after I have found evidence that a queen did hatch (and, thus, 5 weeks after I have created the Nuc). I am looking for the actual queen and at least some larvae or something else that indicates we have the making’s of a good nuc. But, for yesterday’s check, I was looking for signs that a queen (probably a virgin) was in there somewhere, which I found. It’s always nice to have positive news on the first check – today, I will check a few more and will no doubt have some bad news somewhere.

On that same note (was it time to create Nucs, three weeks ago), I found one hive (an overwintered Nuc that I upgraded to a full hive a few weeks ago) that was full of swarm cells yesterday. The overwintered nucs are always a challenge – they come out of Winter like nothing else. This one apparently needed a full hive in February. But, the good news is (once again) that Mother Nature believes we have drones out there for a good mating (this hive will swarm within the next 3 days). So, maybe my early Nucs will be solid!