How can you tell whether or not they are bringing in nectar? I can see the pollen :)
Well I can tell because I'm opening them up and their honey frames are empty still. I had several of these hives start out with a few frames of honey leftover from winter and now they are empty and aren't being refilled yet, which is highly unusual for my location. Even the honey frames I gave them a week ago are now empty or filled with brood.
Just from observing the entrance you can sometimes notice bees returning with filled crops because their landing sequence will be a little off because they are carrying a heavy load, and they'll kind of crash or land heavily on the landing board. Someone described it to me once as "a B-52 slamming onto a runway."
I did my first hive inspection today. Bees were installed Wednesday of last week and I verified the Queen was released Sunday. The first few frames didn?t have much and not many bees. The third frame had some wax built out with lots of bees. The fourth frame was nicely built out with some eggs and larvae. I saw one of the worker bees feeding a cell. I also saw the Queen! She was calming laying eggs. I carefully replaced the frame and didn?t look any further. I moved the other frames back in place. I refilled the feeder, left in the pollen Pattie?s and closed the hive. This took about 10 minutes and I used minimal smoke as they were pretty calm. Watched the ladies for the next hour coming and going. The pollen started coming in late in the afternoon. I realized that I didn?t notice any drones.
I?m so relieved to see the eggs and larvae as I know my bees are aging every day.
Is this good progress? Or, should there be more frames built out by now?
I think that all sounds great! Packages are often slow to start up, as they have absolutely nothing to start out with and have to build the whole entire hive from scratch. It wouldn't surprise me if you don't see drones for a while, as only strong hives have the resources to "waste" on them. Good job seeing what you needed to see and then closing them back up again. As a beginner (or as an intermediate beekeeper
) it can be hard not to just sit there with the hive open and watch them work.