G’day members just a quick update on the progression of the bees & the beehives on course.
It’s been a little over 3 months since the hives were installed & much to our delight, they are going beezerk. We started off with 2 hives both containing a 5-frame nucleus which is basically a mini hive containing 1 -2 frames of honey, 1-2 frames of capped brood (baby bees in the larvae stage), & a frame of pollen/nectar. We installed another 5 empty frames of waxed foundation to make up the current 10 frame brood box. Within this box the bees will draw out the wax foundation with their own produced wax & fill each cell with whatever the queen bee decides. Bee it eggs, pollen, or nectar the queen (like most households) is the boss.
Currently the bees have filled out 90% of the hive & their numbers have gone from 5000 bees upwards to around 20 000 bees now calling the Golf course home. They are quiet to handle & always beehave themselves on our fortnightly inspection. They, like the turf on the golf course slow down during winter but have lots of honey in their hives to get them through the cooler months ahead.
We will continue to monitor their beehaviour and if they have built up a strong brood box coming into spring, we will put a honey super box on top.
Fun facts……….
A queen bee lays up to 1500 eggs a day & can live up to 5 years.
The bee life cycle of egg, larvae, pupa, adult takes 24 days.
That means 1500 new bees arrive into the hive every day after 4 weeks.