I've got Brood and a pest

It has been 2 weeks since I put my package of bees in and when I checked my hives today, I have brood. Nope it is not disease or anything weird like that. Brood describes all immature phases of the bee: egg, larvae, prepupae, or pupae. This will be first batch of new bees. It takes 21 days for a worker to go from egg to bee. So the next week I check out my hives I should have more bees!! Maddy is doing the best and I am a little concerned about Sam. Sam seems to be a little slow but at the same time it had more brood. Maddy has drawn out 7-8 frames while Sam has done only 6. I'll just have to keep an eye out and see how it goes.

I hate to say it but both my hives have a pest. I thought I might avoid it but they say you can't. I saw 3 small hive Beatles and was only able to smash 2 of them. They say you have to watch out for these little creatures or they run your bees out. I'll eventually put a trap in the hives and see how they work but for now I'll just smash them until there are to many.

Looking Good

Well it finally warmed up into the mid to high 60's so I decided to remove the empty packages from the hives and insert the 5 remaining frames. I used the smoker for the first time but barely used it. I didn't know what they would do since they don't have any honey to eat. They say when you use the smoker they start eating a lot of honey thinking that their hive might be on fire and they may need to escape the fire. Since they eat a lot of honey they become lazy - just like us at Thanksgiving. This allows the bees to stay calm while the beekeeper works them. Even though I used the smoke sparingly they were very docile. Hopefully I have some very non aggressive bees. Both hives seem to be doing very well - They are both very active and actually Maddy is a little more active than Sam is. They are both drinking their sugar water and are going through 3/4 of a quart per day. When I looked into the hive I couldn't tell if they had started making wax yet but I will check it out this Saturday. That will give them 1 whole week since I inserted the bees. Hopefuly I will be able to see the queen and make sure she has escaped the container she came in. The place I bought the bees from did not mark the quees so it is going to be tough. I may get my instructor to come out to my house and see if he can find her and mark her for me.