Last week after Karl opened up the hive, he decided he'd like a second opinion on how everything was doing. A neighbor who is an expert beekeeper who manages hives across the city said that she'd come over and check things out with him.
They opened up the hive, found the queen, put her in a quart mason jar which they set on the window sill and finished checking everything out in the hive. All looked great -- there was larvae, eggs, honey, no wax moth larva, few small hive beetles.
So queen bees don't fly because their abdomens are too large. Apparently our queen bee is not a normal queen because when Karl turned around to put her back in the hive she was gone.
They looked all over the porch, in our yard, in our neighbor's yard, but she was gone. Toni, Karl's beekeeping friend, thinks (or rather hopes) she got out of the jar and snuck back into the hive while they weren't looking. Karl's not that optimistic and has already contacted some folks about buying a new queen.
Ugh. And they were doing so well.
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