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Rough Cut & Honey Is A-Flowin'!

3/28/2012

So the day after the Dustructor maelstrom, I readied my homemade slatted rack for Boris, and Imrie shim for Natasha if I made it that far. I had to take my lunch at the end of the day from work, scoot on home, suit up and do what I could before the sun got too low. I'd also done some extra research on gentle inspections and keeping calm bees. I'd done enough to anger them, I figured. I also changed the way I used smoke: I start my smoker well before I go to the apiary, so the smoke is cool. And, I give a few puffs and GIVE THEM TIME to go down into the hive and fill their bellies with honey, calming them down.

I suspected I was too late and Boris had already swarmed, even with the 7 frames I'd taken away a couple weeks ago to make two splits off my original hive. I was ecstatic to be greeted by lots of busy bees in the shallow honey super. Even more-so to see fresh comb had been drawn out! The question was, how well on the empty foundationless frames?

WONDERFULLY! They were really drawing out their fresh comb. Half of the super's frames were empty two weeks ago. Amazing how fast they not only draw it out but fill it with honey. You can see they're already capping. This frame was heavy, and attached now on all four sides of the frame.

More progress on this frame. Their comb was still somewhat divided. Previously I'd twisted the left pieces more center, and it looks like that worked. They're still overlapping. But a lot of this is good. I gently pushed in the center piece to better touch the big piece at left. When going foundationless you've got to keep an eye on their progress until they draw out straight comb. I'm hopeful this one will work out. If not, I'll extract this using the crush 'n strain method and harvest the wax. All good no matter what. :-)

Half-way in and no more swarm cells. I moved slowly and kept remembering "gentle, gentle." I'd started my inspection by removing the second frame and putting it in the work box. This gives me extra room to slide over the adjacent frames, lift them out without rolling the bees and put them back in easily. And when I put in that next-to-last frame when I'm done, the bees won't get crushed against the wall of the super, but nestled in-between soft comb. This frame was beautifully drawn and the queen is laying lots up here.

Lots of good drone on this frame, in a tight pattern. As the season progresses, this'll hatch out and I'm hopeful they'll fill the empty frame in the super with honey. I'm not using an excluder. I believe in not restricting the queen's movements. If she needs room, I'll give it to her. I was jazzed to see they still hadn't finished drawing this to the bottom and she'd been laying up a storm.

A gorgeous honey frame, quite heavy. I am ecstatic I'll be getting SOME honey this season. It was so white and translucent. I can't wait for early spring honey. What a treasure! This is a foundation frame. Check out how the honey's been capped in a horizontal line.

My favorite frame so far. Pure foundationless and totally chock full of nectar and capped honey. Compare this to the previous shot, which was a foundation frame. The honey is capped in a more natural wedge shape, even though this comb is being drawn on a rectangular frame. This one still has a ways to go to be drawn out but the natural-sized cells are much smaller. Bigger isn't always better. The smaller cells means more places to store honey. Sure it's smaller, but I've read that they can put more honey and brood in the smaller sized cells.

Also, the small cells in natural comb make a big difference in keeping the Varroa Destructor mites at bay. They can't reproduce as quickly or as often in the smaller cells. Chemical-free, baby! And happier bees, naturally.

Okay, now THIS is my favorite frame so far. Another gorgeous foundationless frame. This all-natural way is WORKING! The proof is in the honey. :-)

The new frames have been heavily worked. You can tell just be looking in-between the frames. I decided to GENTLY smoke the top box from a couple feet away, lid it with an extra inner screen, move it to my work wagon, and go down to the bottom box. I needed to install that slatted rack, and this top hive body was where 4 of 7 frames had been taken for the splits two weeks ago. I will harvest that honey frame from the bottom hive body.

Time to work my way downstairs. No swarm cells in the shallow super or top hive body. I needed to check on the empty frames I'd put in for the brood nest in the bottom hive body. I harvested a single honey frame from the bottom hive body and moved the adjacent frames over to the side. I then put another empty frame in the #3 slot, which opened up the brood nest again. They'll draw it out in the next week or two, and the queen has room to lay another 8,400 or so eggs on natural-drawn comb. Keep 'em busy and give HRH tons of room to lay, and I think I just might convince Boris to not swarm but make a lot of precious honey and wax.

In the bottom brood chamber, one of the empty foundationless frames I'd put in just two weeks ago. Remember how well they've drawn out the empty frames in two weeks on the super? That's nothing compared to this! Almost completely drawn and touching on all four sides (they just attached to the bottom, off-center to the left. You can see them working on it in this shot. Lots of worker larvae in this one, so the queen was here in the last 4-8 days.

The cells will be capped on day 9 and then they'll emerge a day or 3 later. I put in this empty frame just 15 days ago on March 11. IT'S WORKING! The empty frames are being drawn super fast and then queen is laying. Since the larvae has been there for up to a week, that means they drew this one out PRONTO in a matter of days, putting lots of nurses to work, with the queen happily laying in the opened-up brood nest.

I harvested a single frame from the side of the bottom hive body. In goes a fresh, empty frame. I'm going to keep them working on brood comb, honey comb, and not thinking about making swarm cells. Note the starter strip is simply the wedge I popped off and nailed vertically.

The honey frame. I will freeze this for a day to ensure there are no wax moth or SHB larvae in there, and later I'll uncap and extract the nectar and honey. I'll give that back to the bees, and will have empty combs for backup. I may use some empty combs to give my nucs a jumpstart in building a big hive in the fall. In the meantime I'll use a comb or two for putting in a bait hive to catch a swarm or two. AND, I'll have some empty comb for swarm prevention next spring. Always think ahead is what I've learned so far. :-)

I was amazed at the difference my changes in conducting a gentle inspection makes. I installed my nifty 9-frame slatted rack, and loved how it looked. They seemed happy with it. I think they love the smell of rough-cut cedar, too!

Having outfitted and inspected Boris on Monday, with no swarm cells in sight, I did the same for Natasha on Tuesday. The gentle smoke and extra time make a huge difference. I was ecstatic to see this honey super, and all the new foundationless comb she's built in the week since I last inspected.

One gorgeous foundationless frame. I love how they're working in groups. You can see some bees gathering in the middle and have started adjoining the two pieces in the middle. All of Natasha's shallow super frames were filled with spring nectar and capped honey. I'll need to soon make super #2!

And another gorgeous foundationless frame. YES!

OMG, this one's a real beaut! Way to go hive Natasha! All of her fresh foundation is being drawn straight up and down.

The frame on the furthest end, also being drawn down in several groups.

And the last end frame on the opposite end. Three of five frames in the super have been virtually fully drawn and filled with nectar in a short time. And no swarm cells in the super! That cell I saw on my previous blog post must've been a practice cell. I've heard that Russian bees like to build them, just in case and to stay in practice. Seems to be true. Still I take it as a sign to give them more room in the brood nest. Natasha is now my largest hive since the splits off of Boris.

Now this is an interesting frame from the top brood chamber. A large honeyband at top, and some drone cells. But notice it's a foundation frame from last year and still not fully drawn.

A great honey frame from the #2 position, but still not 100% drawn out, though it's at like 98% drawn (there's still undrawn cells along the bottom). Lots of fresh nectar and honey caps. Natasha was getting louder and angrier, as all of her foragers were coming in for the night. I still thought "gentle," used cool smoke and slow controlled motions. I must say that squatting and using my legs to lift these heavy boxes makes ALL THE DIFFERENCE. It saves my back, and so not hurting I stay calm. When I'm working the bottom box I also kneel if I get tired of squatting. Makes a big difference.

I wanted to harvest a single honey frame from one of the deep brood boxes of Natasha and also replace that with an empty frame. This hive is going strong. I was using gentle cool puffs of smoke from a couple feet away, extra inner screens on each box that I removed, slow controlled motions and gentle thoughts. Still, I started getting popped from angry guards. And I needed to get into this bottom hive body of Natasha's for the first time this year. All frames were heavily propolized. The bees were angry with me since sundown was closer and it was cooler than on Monday, about 63 degrees and falling fast.

All hell broke loose when I tried to move the bottom brood box off the slatted rack I'd made. The rack AND bottom board all came up with the hive body; they'd already propolized it in just a week. I slowly returned the hive body, rack and bottom board to its place on the hive stand, apologized to a lot of kamakaze guards hitting me, took deep breaths, pried everything loose and finally separated the brood box from the slatted rack. I got stung through my gloves once, and then again on my right ankle. Then another on my ankle. And then another. It was time to tighten up that boot band! I really need to get some taller boots. I was pleased that I remained calm. I collected my 5th sting of the year, all through protective clothing. Then I put on the extra Imrie shim I made from my brother's free cedar wood (thanks, Dan, I want more!) so that the slatted rack has a proper 2 inches of extra space for the bees to hang out on, between the bottom of the frames and the bottom board. This also opens up the bottoms for the queen to lay in. The drafts from outside and congested traffic from foragers coming and going on the bottom board will convince the queen to not lay along the bottom of the frames. The slatted rack gives her extra space as well and diverts a lot of nurse bees. So in addition to harvesting the honey frame, I also opened up Natasha a bit with the slatted rack. Just like IPM, I'm thinking a combination approach to swarm prevention is key. Fingers crossed, knock on rough-cut wood!

I peered underneath all boxes, tipping them up and looking from underneath. NO SWARM CELLS! I was quite happy. And my stings weren't really bothering me. I must be getting used to this. Glad I had protective clothing, though. She still seems the angrier of the two hives, but look, not a huge amount of bees out front compared to "Dustructor Sunday." I still think the time of day, though, makes a huge difference, and I had to do this at the end of the day. I don't blame Natasha ... at least not yet. If she keeps being angry, though, I'll re-queen her come Autumn.

You can see my work box in the background. You need at least one of these for your inspections. You won't regret it. I also put an extra outer cover in my wagon, which has a little shelf on it. The extra outer cover goes down just a bit in the wagon, making a second wagon shelf. I can fit two hive bodies on my wagon. And, since it's close to waist height it really saves my back. For the first time I'm not killing my back working the bees. Thanks to Gerry Mack for this tip. It really works (that and using your legs to lift).

I put my harvested honey frame off to the side. I brushed the bees back into the honey super. I should've brushed all of them off. A few will fly back on. Usually, after the brush-off, I place the frame off to the side and come back an hour or two later to find it bee-free. This time, though, this group of bees stayed on the frame all night long. Sorry girls. I even put it beside Natasha's entrance, but they weren't budging. This morning, while temperatures were 48F, I knocked the slow moving bees onto the hive stand and took the treasure inside to the freezer.

This latest honey frame was put in last summer. It was a foundation frame and also wasn't completely drawn on both sides. I'd lifted up one foundationless frame from the brood box to find it mostly drawn out in two weeks. I am now convinced that the bees draw out foundation slower than making their own comb. I am definitely switching over bit by bit to foundationless. I'll use the harvested frames for backups and bait hives, and probably cut a few out and melt down the wax for candles. All in all a very successful inspection and past couple of weeks. I think an early spring honey harvest isn't that far away. I'm quite excited! Next up, more sugar dusting and I've got to check out those nucs in a week, about the 23rd day after the split, to see if queens have hatched, matured, mated and are laying. Then I'll have them for backups, or an apiary increase, or for selling.

Varroa Onslought, and Rough Cuts

3/27/2012

Before an inspection, and on the morning after a big rainfall, I took a look-see on the hives, particularly Natasha. The high Varroa count has me a bit concerned. I saw a strange site. They're a bit blurry, but a small group of stunted bees were hanging on the wall outside the entrance, and some on the bottom board. I thought they were burned. They were completely black. Did something weird happen from the storm? Lightning? What the heck is this?! I assumed they were dead.

They weren't dead! They were barely moving. WHAT has happened to my bees? After conferring with "The Beekeeper's Handbook" I realized I was seeing sure signs of "varroosis", or the deadly effects of the Varroa Destructor. The hive was doing early morning house-cleaning. I think they were forcing the stunted bees out. They were drones, the mites' favorite targets. Their wings were withered or missing. You can also see deformed pupae being taken out as well. I saw a house bee fly one out and onto the ground. Action is required! Being chemical-free means a combination of IPM approaches, starting with a powdered sugar treatment regimen.

I just bought a slightly used "Varroa Dustructor" from one of my mentors, Hernan. It blows powdered sugar directly into the brood nest, unlike sifting sugar on the top bars, and really puts out a super fine dust cloud of the sugar. It has been proven to be much more effective than user a sifter. That is, if you use the equipment CORRECTLY. I was very apprehensive about standing directly in front of the hive while doing this. You can see here that I'm holding this in the wrong position, with the sugar canister horizontal instead of vertical.

I should've studied the additional photos Brushy Mountain put online. THE SUGAR CANISTER MUST BE VERTICAL. You pump the bellows from side to side, not up and down. I was just pumping a whole lot of air and very little sugar into the hives, which meant I had to do this exercise umpteen million times to get enough sugar in there. Here you can see one of the annoy aspects of this device: the plastic barrel kept falling off. I had to really, REALLY push the plastic barrel onto the main body of the device.

And the bees started POURING out. Yvonne stopped taking photos and went back inside. Good thing! I was completely covered in bees in no time. I went from hive to hive repeating this treatment. It wasn't until the end that I realized the correct position to hold the Dustructor. I was pleased, though, to see the Kamakaze guards covered in sugar dust. The downside of this method is that you have to be in front of the hive and the powdered bees can still fly and attack. It took me 20 minutes standing far away off to the side to get them to leave me alone. I found out a trick. If you sit down on the grass while waiting they will leave you alone more quickly than standing up. There's got to be a better way to use the Dustructor than directly in front, and secure the barrel to the base. I'm going to repeat the treatments so I've got to figure it out.

So while my angry bees were all now hanging out on the front of the hives, making sure NO ONE came close, I decided to bide my time building equipment. I needed to build another Imrie shim for my homemade slatted rack for Natasha. I also needed to build a slatted rack, this one a 2-inch tall correct version, for Boris. Seeing reduced traffic in Boris this day, though, made me suspect that my original hive had already swarmed on me. I sure hope not. That will mean a big blow to my honey harvest this year. My brother Dan gave me free 1x1's and 1x2's made out of rough cut cedar and gum. I hand sawed the pieces, and used a bit of carpenter's glue, then stapled the corners to hold the frames together. Then I nailed them secure. This worked great. Man, do I love my stapler! I also made the entrance just to see if I could, by sawing vertically into the frame and then chiseling out the piece. Worked great! Man, do I love chisels! ;-)

Here's my homemade 9-frame slatted rack. The outside is cedar. The slats are sweet gum. Sweet gum saws like a D-R-E-A-M!. I made sure I left appropriate bee space, 3/8", in-between the slats (well, all but that one slat on the end ... this wood was rough cut and irregular). I also made sure there was appropriate bee space between the bottom of the frame, leaving the top side plenty of room for lots and lots of bees to hang out. This frees up the brood nest and makes it less congested. It provides increased ventillation, and encourages the queen to lay all the way to the bottom of the frames on the bottom hive body. This expands the brood nest. As a result, it decreases the swarming urge. Or so I've read. Makes perfect sense to me, though. I'm going to build more of these.

See? Room for each frame, while there's room in-between for the mites they groom off each other to fall out of the hive. It would've been perfect if these pieces were 3/4" instead of 1". Some were smaller than others, so it equals out, I suppose. Even the smallest space is 3/8", so we're good here (except for that one end of the right-most slat ... I should've measured again before nailing)_. Building these made me feel quite proud, happy that I saved money building something for free instead of yet another equipment purchase and paying lots of shipping, and a great sense of accomplishment.

Ta-daaa! My homemade 9-frame slatted rack. Because the rack is made out of cedar, I don't have to paint it. That stuff withstands all kinds of weather. I will be making hives out of cedar, as long as Dan gives me the free lumber, making painting optional. Of course I'll still paint at least part of the hives, if not all. I do want to keep my apiary pretty, with lots of cartoon characters on the hive faces. Maybe I'll just paint a patch of color on the front with a cartoon on it and leave the rest rough cut and natural. And cedar and sweet gum smell sooooooo good! :-)

Ventillation, Swarm Urges and a Royal Miracle

3/23/2012

I'd read recently that improved ventillation, along with extra space in the brood nest, can help prevent swarms. I also read that slatted racks were crucial in this quest. They go on the bottom board, provide cool air in hot months and protection from cold drafts in winter. They also give the bees extra space to congregate underneath the bottom bars of the hive body, reducing the number of bees on the frames and lessening congestion. This is supposed to reduce the swarm urge. I had a couple old racks my big brother Tim had given me.

I spent some time taking out some of the slats, since I run 9 frames in a 10-frame deep. I want the mites they pick off to fall down and out of the hive, not onto the slatted rack and back into the hive. Natasha had no swarm cells in my inspection this past weekend, but I felt like it was only a matter of time, seeing so many bees bearding up on her doorstep each day. It was time for ventillation control.

After finishing work on the old, cranky slatted rack, I just didn't like how it looked. Also I'd need something to raise the walls of the bottom board, since the rack will sit atop the board and underneath the brood box. I decided to make my own rack. I had an Imrie shim on hand, and some extra bottom bars. I used my 9-frame spacer to measure out where the slats should go, so they square up underneath the frame bottoms of the brood box. I marked the center point where each frame would be.

I used a tack hammer and some tiny nails to put two extra shim/wood pieces I had on hand (also from my brother ... lots of pieces and parts were given to me, some of which didn't have an obvious purpose). I am now saving all odds and ends wood pieces since they may come in handy. After the two braces were in place, I tacked in the bottom bars onto the braces. The trick, here, in not crushing the small braces with the large bars on top was putting another bar underneath the braces as I nailed, for stability.

The nailing took its effect on the Imrie shim, though. This thing was barely put together! Wood glue and a single staple (sometimes not) in each corner. I stopped construction and stapled the corners back together, nice and secure, after adding a bit of carpenter's glue in the corners.

The staples did the trick. And here's my homemade slatted rack. The racks are supposed to give 2 inches of extra space between the bottom board and the frames. Well, I didn't have 2 inches. The shim is an inch tall. I plan on making shims out of 1x1s (and additional slat frames out of 1x2s) using cheap lumber from the hardware store. I'm tired of buying bee equipment that costs a fortune! I actually saw a piece of wood with a hole in it (a nuc "introduction board"), for $7. Really?!! I'm making my own when I can and as I learn. I'm an artist and apparently becoming a bit of a carpenter as well.

A top view of my slatted rack and my original intention: put the new rack atop the old, which should give the bees lots of extra room to congregate. Unfortunately, I discovered that you also have to have additional wall space so there's not openings around the brood boxes. Oh, well. I'll just use my homemade rack instead.

Here's what my homemade rack looked like atop the old rack and on an old bottom board. The old board had an additional two-inch wall built onto it, making room for the old rack. Not so on my current screened bottom board on Natasha, as I soon found out. So I'll use the old rack and board in a bait hive, or back into storage it will go.

Once my rack was made, out to the apiary I went. I looked inside Boris' super. I'd been inside the brood boxes twice this past week so I left those alone. Here is one super frame with the girls making a nice frame of foundation-free comb.

This frame was near center, and chock full of capped brood. I am not using a queen excluder. Trying that out. And with Boris almost swarming on me, I figured I needed to give her royal majesty as much room as she wants. Plus, once this frame hatches out, it'll be free for honey. Once the flow is really on and lots of nectar is coming in I think they will create a natural honey barrier up top that she won't cross. We'll see. This frame was just drawn out, and is touching in parts on all four corners. She's laid down to the edges, even those not touching.

Another foundation-free frame, beautifully drawn out and not even finished, but half-filled with brood. Looking at brood on the natural comb is different. It looked like almost all of it was drone cells. Actually it was a lot of drone with worker brood interspersed. The laying pattern is nice and tight, though. I am trusting the bees. I think she will lay drone when needed. I am suspecting it is to attract the heavy mite load AWAY from the worker brood, as drones are the Varroa's favorite target.

EMERGENCY BULLETIN: This just in. Look at the bottom center-point of this frame. It's a half-built swarm cell! How did I miss this on my inspection? It's another reason I photograph and blog, so I can review my mistakes (hoping I, and others, learn along the way). I'll have to check this out and see if they're just making these for the fun of it, or if there are others in the hive capped or about to be. Dang it, Boris, please don't swarm on me!!!

The brood had a lot of drone cells on it, and some larvae. A corner closeup. The closer the cells are to the edges the larger they seem to get, especially as the comb rounds out naturally. I didn't see the queen here, but there are LOTS of boys on this frame. Look at all those big eyes. And the super's opened up additional space for the queen to work in. I think it's time to do another reversal on Boris, check out those empty frames I put in, and possibly remove another deep honey frame or two so they'll fill out some more empties for her highness to work on.

I alternated foundation frames with empty frames, to help guide the bees. Apparently I shouldn't have done this. Michael Bush told me that when you mix and match they'll make the foundation comb "fat" and spilling out. He was totally right. Look at this splotch. And she's already laid in it, mostly drone. I'll also be adding in some plastic drone frames, and will routinely remove the larvae once capped, thereby reducing the mite load as they'll head for the drones.

This foundationless frame was odd. They seemed to have gotten off-track and started to draw comb out toward the center. I twisted those gently back into place, hoping they'll straighten it out and connect it all up nicely.

A beautiful start on another foundationless. My first impression was that they'd started work on the foundation frames first and so far more successfully. I was a bit bummed to see this. But the foundation frames already were started with comb coming out, from the hive last fall, so I shouldn't have been surprised. And according to Michael Bush, it was a mistake to mix and match, just go all foundation and all foundationless so they'll draw out uniformly. But look at how they've already filled most of this with fresh spring nectar. I am anxious for honey this year!

Natasha's bees had barely just begun work on their super. I felt a bit relieved, in that she's definitely the weaker of the two hives, still. I think I have a bit more time to avert the swarm urges and congestion in Natasha that Boris has already been through (and apparently is still intent on, so far). I have GOT to improve conditions on Boris, and will definitely make and install a large slatted rack this next weekend.

The super frames in Natasha were quite empty. But a start's a start, after all, and here is her first foray into a foundationless super frame. Since I've started this mix and match experiment, I may have to do some more straightening out. Instead of cutting the big pieces out and getting rid of them, I may use string or rubber bands to put them on foundationless frames until the bees attach the pieces in, just like I would with feral comb from a cutout.

And look at my two nucs. So far they're doing well I see foragers coming and going every day. This past week I was putting some water in the little dish two feet in front of the nucs. As I was squatting and pouring the water, enjoying the calm around the hives, I noticed several orientation flights going on around the first nuc. And then I saw her: THE VIRGIN QUEEN IN FLIGHT, making her orientation. She hovered, then landed on the landing board (see, they're not useless, they're nice). Then she hovered and landed again a few more times. I said a prayer and felt truly blessed to have seen what I consider a miracle, for some small but for me HUGE. I actually got to see a queen in flight. She was twice the length of the other bees, and her black patch on her thorax was super big. I was so thankful to be there ust at the exact moment she happened to be making one of her flights. Then OFF she corkscrewed and zipped past my head. I said some more prayers that she will return safely after successful orientation and then mating flights. Seeing her in flight put all of my worries and stresses of work behind me and gave me a fresh perspective on life.

Natasha had actually started drawing out the foundation frames, which were already started last year. There were two she'd started in earnest. Here's one.

And another super frame, working off the foundation in Natasha.

I took my friend Libby's advice and am now using extra backup screens (I recently ordered a couple more). They're light, and they keep the bees a bit more calm and out of your face. I use them on boxes I'm not working. I removed the second deep off Natasha, then screened the bottom deep and moved it atop the second box, off to the side.

In went my homemade slatted rack. It's small, and needs a larger wall space for sure. But it gives a LITTLE extra room for the bees to congregate. We'll see how Natasha likes it until I can add in another inch of space with another shim on top.

She seemed to take to it immediately. The slats lined up nicely with the frames from the brood box above. And yes, I did test this out, making sure I hadn't nailed the slats in the wrong direction, with an empty deep and some frames ... I do tend to have these kinds of logical engineering issues and put stuff together wrong, then undo it, then back together again correctly.

Nectar is coming in. I'd better be MORE prepared. I put in another equipment order, including two more supers. I am running out of money for equipment. I already had another two ready to be built, so each hive will have three shallows this year. I'll just harvest each hive in batches, is my plan, throughout the honey flow. I went ahead and nailed those shallows together. Olive offered moral support.

After the additional shallows, I had to put together frames for them. I was immediately frustrated as the top bars on a bunch of frames I'd bought last year were too big. I forced them in, and they split several of my side bars. Grrrrrrr! I had to add staples on the sides here for reinforcement, and then whittle down the edges on the remaining top bars with a box cutter until they fit snugly. If I have this same problem on my next batch of frames I'm sending in a complaint, and going elsewhere. Heck, maybe I'll end up making my own.

Let's end this post on a positive note. I went back a few days later in the week. We'd had beautiful 80-degree days, with spotty thundershowers in the early evenings a couple of times. And to my delight I found this. Natasha's congestion out front, which used to be almost DOUBLE of Boris', was now not even half the size of bees hanging out on Boris' doorstep. Seeing is believing. The extra space and ventillation DOES work. I will add another shim for another inch for Natasha. And I'm definitely building a two-inch-tall slatted rack for Boris (hopefully this weekend). Amazing what a bit of air and space can do. Maybe I can keep that in mind for myself, too, and take more time enjoying the spring breezes.
Hari Ohm!

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