Found!

In the last few weeks I had been so busy that I hardly had time to update this blog even though I have been checking the hives to see how both are developing.

The good news is that I was wrong and HV1 has a queen after all. Last blog recorded that I put in a frame of eggs and brood from Hv2 into Hv1 hoping the workers will raise a queen bee, but this prove to unnecessary. When Christine and I checked HV1 just over two weeks ago much to our surprise we found another frame full with sealed brood cells. We quickly discount the possibility of laying worker as the sealed brood cells pattern was very evenly spread, which is very different to the pattern of the brood cells of laying worker bees. This meant we had in fact failed to spot any eggs when we checked the previous time and the queen is definitely was around.

Last Saturday we checked again and finally found the queen bee. We were delighted and agreed that she is very health and good looking. So at last I can relax. Had we not had a queen and the workers would not raise one I would have to consider either buying one in, or merge the two hive. So, all's well and ends well and the news of the the death of the queen in Hv1 was somewhat exaggerated.

Meanwhile I had a quick look at the super at Hv2 and found that the bees are busy drawing out the comb (photo) getting ready for storing honey - I hope. What happened to the the queen in HV1(when did it went out and mated?) and the old green queen is still a bit of a mystery, but this is half of the fun keeping bees I suppose. You keep them and keep you guessing.