Honeybee colony I rescued out of a family room ceiling - optimistic update
I was worried last fall that it was too small to survive the winter since I rescued it so late in the year. For those that watched the original video, I saw the queen fly off, but found evidence two weeks later that she came back! Based on last weeks inspection, it looks like they will make it! Before the cold set in, I fed it two gallons of sugar water, and then I added 9 cups of sugar mush on a top feeder as the cold set in. I was surprised how little sugar mush they ate, but I guess with a small colony that makes a lot of sense. Two of my other colonies ate two complete bags of sugar mush, and two others, one ate all and the other ate almost all. Even a fifth (smaller colony) probably ate 80% of their sugar mush.
In the video below, which is 3 minutes, there is a link to the rescue video. I think I have watched the rescue video about 25 times. I wish I had someone to go out and do all of the work and film it so I could just watch it.
No honeybee colony is ever out of the woods given all of the challenges they have (environmental, neighbor pesticides, varroa mite that was imported from the far east, etc.) but I am hopeful these ladies will make it. Happy to answer any questions. Going into the spring with six colonies. I expect swarm calls to start in the next few weeks. It will be a good distraction to all that is going on...