What the ....

So last week we trooped off down the garden to see what the results were of the early "Shook Swarming" of my hive, and to continue it with Tom's two hives.  We began by opening my hive.

The minute I took off the roof it was obvious there was no-one home.  They have gone.  Gone, gone, gone!  My glorious Blue Queen and all of her bees - gone.  They clearly did not like the new frames, the new foundation, the new box, and the intrusive nature of the manipulation.  She simply packed Her bags, collected Her entourage, and left the building.

Sob.

After taking a moment to absorb the full impact of the fact that I now have no bees, we closed the box up and carried on to Tom's hives.  They were all doing well, but it was quite astonishing to see so many Queen Cells.  How and where and when did they get those built?  We didn't see anything seven days before this.  Nevertheless there were Queen Cells, and some of them were already sealed up, which means they were at least seven days old.

Tom's hives were Shook Swarmed.  It is an awkward, hard, sweaty job and it disturbs the bees terribly.  I can completely understand the motivation to remove all the brood with its varroa load, but it is awful nevertheless.  However in this instance we took some frames of broods, and all the frames with Queen Cells on, and moved them to my empty box.

A last desperate attempt to recreate a colony for me.

But as I sit here, a week later, I am wondering whether they even had a chance.  It has simply been too cold, and there would've been no active foraging bees in my hive to keep the brood warm.  I am convinced I will go there tomorrow and find everything dead.  Dead from the cold wet spell we have just been through.  And then I have to consider that, perhaps, now is the time for me to quit.

When I first took up beekeeping I was with Guy, and we could afford to share a house with a large garden.  And it was always about having bees at the bottom of my own garden, where I could visit them every day, watch the action at the hive entrance, and inspect when ever I wanted.  I am finding the regimen of visits every Sunday too prescriptive; much as I love them.   

I have taken a hive box and assembled it at the bottom of my own little garden here in Amersham.  It is empty but it gets the neighbours used to seeing a beehive there.  I will ostentatiously parade around every now and then in a beesuit.  And maybe one day, I will have bees again.

But not, I think, today.