kenny took out the empty queen cage from the hives yesterday!



when the bees are shipped to you, they separate the queen from the workers by sending her in her own cage. she and the worker bees eat their way through a sugar cork at the end of the cage. this way, the workerbees have time to accept her without harming her. once she is free, the workers do their thing to feed her and produce more workers with her.

the following picture shows the beginnings of some comb that the bees made since they arrived last week (this was on the side of the queen cage). the orange and brown bits are pure pollen (different colors from different plants!) and smell like a big fat bouquet of flowers (strong!). you may even notice a bit of raw honey between the pollen.