The One That Didn't Make It

Last weekend I saw there were no bees flying in or out of hive #2.  So I took a quick peek under the roof, and my fears were confirmed - unfortunately, the colony hasn't made it through the winter.

There are a number of reasons why a colony is lost over winter.  Starvation is one, but I know that's not the case - there was still plenty of honey inside the combs in the hive.  Another possibility is infection - which can be caused and/or exacerbated by Varroa infestation.  I did see a couple of bees with mites on them, so this could be a possibility.

However, one of the more likely possibilities is that the colony was too small to keep warm through the couple of cold snaps that we had this winter.  I knew the colony was small - they'd been moved from the nucleus at the end of July, and their queen was a July hatchling.  This meant they were very late starters, and there was just not enough of the season left for them to build up numbers.

So, on Saturday, I went over to take a few photos and then brush all the dead bees off the hive floor, and burn the frames.  Here's a photo of what was left - you can just about make out the queen (with a pinky-red mark on her thorax) towards the top-right of the picture:

It's not a disaster - hive #1 will start making queen cells within the next six weeks and I'll be able to re-populate when I split the colony to prevent swarming.  But it's one of those setbacks that happens from time to time, and a reminder that beekeeping doesn't always go to plan.

I never got round to announcing the name of the queen of hive #2.  Regular readers will know that I always name my queens after scientists and engineers.  So, I've decided to posthumously name the queen of hive #2 "Maryam", after Maryam Mirzakhani.

Maryam Mirzakhani was a mathematician, and professor of mathematics at Stanford University.  She was the first - and to date, only - woman to receive the prestigious Fields Medal, which is the highest award in mathematics.  It really is a big deal - the Fields Medal is like the Nobel prize for mathematics (except there is no Nobel for mathematics - the nearest equivalent is the Nobel prize for physics).

Maryam was also the first Iranian to be awarded the Fields Medal, which she received for her work in the dynamics and geometry of Riemann surfaces and their moduli spaces.  She was a member of the United States National Academy of Sciences, and an associate to the French Academy of Sciences.  Asteroid 321357 Mirzakhani is named after her.

You can find out more about Maryam here:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maryam_Mirzakhani