I was just out looking at my hive after dark tonight and noticed just how much air the bees can move through the hive, I have a bottom entrance with no reducer at all, I was picking up an odd looking honeybee crawing in front of the hive and my arm passed close to the entrance and I felt warm air coming out.
Interested I took a dial thermometer and measured the temperature outside which was 72 Deg, but in front of the hive opening it was 81.
I also needed to take a quick look at the top feeder to see how much they had used this week, I briefly lifted the top long enough to check the level and took around 15 seconds total when the cover was back on, I looked back down at the thermometer and in that short amount of time the temp dropped to 75 deg out of the hive, another thing I noticed was that warm air was only coming out of the left front side of the entrance, the bees must be organizing themselves in a fashion that causes air to be drawn in on one side and blown out of the other, I apologized to the bees for messing up their air conditioning or heating whichever they are doing tonight and wonder how these bugs with such a small brain can do so many things, interesting not even the most powerful computor in the world today can equal the little brain of the bee. (if it had to mimic the bee to decide all the things bees decide in the life of the hive).
the strange bee has me wondering what Im seeing, not a drone and not a queen (at least I dont think), about 25% larger than the workers but not with the bald spot on top of the head, maybe a stunted queen? the bottom chamber has foundationless frames filled by the bees, the top chamber has standard foundation that is drawn out, could I be seeing the difference due to cell size? I havent been able to do a good inspection since the hive got a little testy after filling both chambers, I have a suit getting here this week hopefully and will know more when I feel safe enough to get in there and see firsthand.
Jimmy