Silverback Bees

Hannah & Gil have ended up with an extra half a shift this week - luckily the weather was kind and allowed us to visit this evening. We were really pleased with the news that Steve told us about the return of the lost colony, but as they had been "allowed movement from the hive" for 24 hours, we were dubious if they would be still there. They were. . .

In fact they were more active than we remember them being originally. The feeder in particular was nearly empty of syrup, but full of bees feeding.

We had forgotten to bring the hive tools for opening up the bars, and separating the comb safely, so we decided just to feed them and return again tomorrow evening.

Hive 1 was an absolute buzz of activity. It was noticeable that the bees have been foraging the surrounding fields of Himalayan Balsam, as their backs were stained with silver pollen.

  We also took a film of them flying into the hive - just to show how rapidly they were returning.

It is necessary to slightly open Hive 1 to see the level of the feeder (which was also nearly empty) - when we did so we realised that the bees are even building comb on the feeder bar:

There really is no stopping them !

We also did another 'hive dive' of Hive 2 - which shows the bean plant that they were returned on and the feeder in action . . . 

Can you see the little bit of comb at the end.  It looks much more "parallel" to the bars this time (they've obviously been watching the olympics) - and have got more of the idea. Hopefully this will mean they will be easily inspected from now on . . .