Thursday, July 21, 2011

July 19th - Inspection

Poly Langstroth deep and medium
The brood chamber has 5 excellent deep frames with large patches of brood and 2 good frames of eggs, larvae & pollen the end frames are full of mostly capped stores. The medium chamber above (see picture) has been mostly drawn out apart from the end frames 2 each side which are still being worked on all be it slowly, these part drawn frames will be staggered and moved inwards on my next inspection as the colony size continues to increases. The central frames have a nice arc of capped honey across the top, 6 frames in all with a nice patch of sealed brood, plus more recently a patch of 3-4 day old larvae extending the brood area backwards across 3/4's of the frames on 4 of the frames.

Picture - Sealed brood within the green circle, to the right 2" more of larvae extending the brood nest area across the frame. (slightly darker yellow comb)

This colony is off to the heather at the end of the month provided the weather improves although the long range forecast for August is still likely to be unsettled.