We opened the hive at 18.40 to check the condition of the colony and the feeder.
Because we had not seen eggs previously this was our main aim. Finally, we saw a good number of eggs and larva in various stages prior to capping.
However, we are concerned that a number of the uncapped larvae looked odd. This may have been due to the angle of our view or the low light.
As a result, we are going to open the hive again in a couple of days to look more closely at the brood frames and the larva. Because we need to ensure that there is no disease in the brood. In particular European Foul Brood, an outbreak of which has been reported not far from our apiary site.
If it is EFB we must notify the Bee Inspectorate who will visit to confirm and depending on the extent make a decision on whether the colony can be saved or destroyed.
The queen was seen moving across the frames and there is a good pattern of brood with drone cells on the outer edges of some frames. This would indicate that at present our queen is not a drone layer.
Wasps have been seen near the hive we will monitor their activity and reduce the hive entrance if need be to allow the bees to defend themselves from the wasps.
The feeder was empty and we have removed as the bees are drawing out the last of the brood frames and drawing out frames in the supers. There are full frames of food in the brood box and two frames in the super have honey in them.
A number of the brood frames had brace comb on the bottom of them which we removed and stored away from the apiary. This may possibly be as a result of my getting the bee space incorrect when building the brood box.