September Hive Inspection

We attempted to do an inspection of the hive today. This was to be the first full inspection since we put the supers on and removed the honey. There was some good news and some bad news.

The hive presently has two deeps and we removed the honey supers 2 weeks ago.

First the hive seemed very strong, even on a hot, calm day when many of the bees were out foraging, the hive was very crowded. We also found pollen stores, brood, larva and even spotted the queen in the post-inspection review of the photos. (She's in the photo above.)

The bad news, after combing more than a dozen close-up pictures later, we did spot one bee, tending the larva with varroa mites on her back (center in the photo below). This means we must start treating for the mites.

Even after our first freeze and several frosty mornings, we still have many warm days and many flowers still quite active in our garden. On warm days we see many bees on the late blooms including: aster, butterfly bush, spirea, russian sage, salvia, stonecrop and other hearty perenials. The photo below shows one of the workers on an aster, taken yesterday.