Apiary Surprises!

A few post back we tried an experiment using a cast off Queen from another hive. Sadly she died in the Queen cage. I prepared for inspections today totally expecting Hive 4 to be drone filled and no Queen. However, to my surprise it was quite the opposite. I first took out this frame and low and behold, two baby bees were emerging from their cells! Above in the picture you can see them emerging and in the top right, bee larvae in the cells!

The next frame was loaded with all different stages of honeybees! I was positively shocked!

And then, I found her! The Queen, unmarked that I quickly trapped in my new Queen cage! I love this new style. It's so easy to get her in there and even easier to mark her. You put it over her, a small door slides under her and the a small lever brings her upward. So much easier than the old conventional markers.

She of course was marked green for 2019 and was not too happy about it! Once she was dried off I released her back into the hive. Mind you I am still in shock by this point...

but what surprised me the most they had all the frames filled with brood, pollen and stored honey, capped! So they got a new box that they were quickly exploring. This hive is extremely docile and calm. Good genetics there!

I inspected the other hives and found that they too are filled to the gills and were in deep need of new boxes. So once again the Apiary leaves me speechless as it was quite the opposite of what I expected.