Honeybees at the COC

Beekeeper Fred Davis updates us on the honeybees that live on the roof the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts. located at 145 Queen St. W., here in Toronto:

Another beekeeping season has passed and I am putting final touches on the hives by feeding them in preparation for what is forecasted to be a long, hard winter. Each hive should have about 140 lbs of food stored and available for the smaller "staff" overwintering with the queen. All the boys (AKA drones) have been kicked out and now the girls rule the roost. The queen will lay eggs that will hatch to be males again when things start to warm up next spring. They need boys to fertilize the next virgin successor to the throne. But I try to stop natural succession to the extent I can, and try to control the genetics in the hive itself.

Let's all keep our fingers crossed and hope that our honeybees come out healthy and happy when I unwrap their hives next Spring.

Thanks, Fred! Stay warm, bees!

Beekeeper Fred Davis updates us on the honeybees that live on the roof the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts. located at 145 Queen St. W., here in Toronto:

It's been a long, tough summer for all the honeybees in Ontario. I've been reading quite a bit and speaking with a number of beekeepers and the indications are that the extreme heat and humidity really played havoc with the flowers and the amount of nectar they were able to produce.

Read more...

Beekeeper Fred Davis updates us on the honeybees that live on the roof the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts. located at 145 Queen St. W., here in Toronto:

We installed five new queens just over two weeks ago and, based on what we see, they have all been accepted by the hives. Plus I created a new hive by moving some queen cells to a distant location on the rooftop. Remember each hive has only one queen so I removed the under-performing queens before I introduced the new queens. We now have healthier hives with new queens rearing more brood!

Thanks, Fred!