Inspected South hives today. The package hive looks exactly like it did a week ago - second box has sever frames drawn and full of brood. Very little honey. They have not touched the third Medium I gave them last week. I know last week when I inspected I saw a couple frames of honey, but it looks now like they have consumed it. I think that means the summer dearth is here so I mixed up some sugar water for them and put it on last night.
The swarm hive from Essie's has drawn out six of the ten frames and will probably have to get another box next week, especially if I start feeding it. I saw eggs and brood in the top box of that hive, so the queen that they raised seems to be working effectively.
I did a split on June 21st from Essie's hive and added an open queen cell from the Ohio Queen Program. It is supposed to emerge sometime next week. I opened up that 6-frame medium nuc box to see if the bees had started drawing out the comb on the two empty frames. They hadn't. I would put a jar feeder on top of this hive but the feeder hole is right over where I stuck the queen cup between the frames. I really don't want to drown the queen cell in sugar water! I'll figure something out...
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