This weekend my bees discovered the joys of reading Dan Savage. I can't argue with them, I love the guy too. But let's back up a bit...
I recently acquired the space to start a new apiary in South Corvallis. I moved two hives from other places here last week. This is going to be an interesting place to have bees - they grow lots of chinese medicinal herbs here, in addition to blackberries, blueberries, and tons of vegetables.
The bees in Green (H1) have been going nuts lately. So much so that I needed to reduce their population in the feeble hope of reducing the likelihood of swarming.
Look how covered this one is with pollen!
I grabbed a variety of frames from Green and put them in a new box on top of Blue, which had a smaller population (and only two brood boxes). When equalizing hives you try to transfer as many nurse bees as you can, spray them a bit with sugar syrup, and separate this box of strangers from their new colony with a layer of newspaper. By the time they chew through the paper they should be fairly acclimated to the smells and order of their new hive.
Hence Mr. Savage is in my hive, probably having his face chewed on by hundreds of bees as we speak. He has probably written about bee fetishes, don't you think?
Green and Blue have cute apiary buddies now, too...
