Bee update

 
 A recent check of all four beehives revealed mostly good news.  Two of the hives are doing extremely well, one is pretty good, and the last hive is in trouble.  
A sample comb from one of the strongest hive.
 On sample combs examined from the two strongest hives there was definite signs of hive growth.  In the above photograph most of the comb's cells are capped brood cells (colored yellow) with only a small strip of capped honey cells (colored white) along the top of the comb. 
The troubled hive shows signs of strong initial growth with a recent massive bee die-off.  I am still unsure of the cause.  The queen is still alive, so there is a chance the hive could pull through. 
 A few days ago we started experiencing continuous rain and temperatures ranging between the mid-40's and high-50's Fahrenheit.  Not wanting to chill the hives by opening them to add more sugar syrup, I instead decided to employ an emergency feeding technique of pouring dry sugar through the entrance of each hive.  As it was raining and the hives didn't seem too active so I decided not to wear the bee suit, which was a mistake.  The first two hives were the weaker hives and gave me no trouble, however, when I started pouring sugar into the third hive, several bees started to crawl out of the hive with one bee flying straight up and buzzing around my face.  I tried to retreat, but it was too late and the bee stung me on the neck.  I removed the stinger as soon as I could and then returned to finish the job wearing the bee suit. 

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