Recent content by bushman1872

Ive had the same thing. One hive swarmed with the break in the first lot of bad weather un April and they have done it again presumably either today or last Sunday when there was a bit of sunshine for longer than an hour. This time round room should not have been an issue as they were on a 14x12...

Right I have a small problem which I'm hoping has a remedy. I have 2 hives with 14x12 brood bodies. During the first lot of bad weather in april they swarmed. They both had queens which took their sweet time to start laying. In the meantime we got some goof weather and despite having a super on...

Does anybody know what percentage of water is accepted in rape honey to stop it fermenting I had heard that the number varied between plant species.

I quite agree but there are always one or two who take umbridge when you nick their food lol.

I find walking through a bush a really good way of loosing persistent followers that coupled with a good amount of smoke.

I had a similar thing but with gretaer numbers of dead bees I was worried that they hadn't accepted the swarm and new queen but appears it was just a introductory spat as the queen is still alive with out anymore dead bees.

sounds like a few people have had issues with missing or misbehaving queens. I wonder why?

I'm wondering if swallows got my virgin queens both hives raised several new queens and hatched them and yet none have returned!! I have just had to combine 4 hives to make 2.

i'd double check and look for eggs if you have eggs then 3 days ago you had a queen laying it, if the weather has been that blowy and bad for the last three days then I would bet that your queen is still there. So eggs seen equals bl**dy good look for queen, no eggs equals leave the hive and let...

you certainly can but you will be very lucky to get a swarm from mine. The girls will produce sealed qc's in under 6 days but for some reason the queen doesn't depart when the cell is capped so this buys me time to knock out all the cells. Different bees different characteristics- like us really.

you certainly can but you will not catch any swarms. Whilst the girls will produce a fully sealed queen cell in under 6 days the original queen still remains so no swarm takes place. Everyone's bees are different and have different characteristics same as humans really.

yes it will for 7 days and thats all I need worked last season and is working now. But this technique may well not work for other bees and othe queens!

in your case just turn the frames around, so face the undrawn side in towards the brood. Don't put un drawn foundation or a frames of stores in the middle of the brood as you can end up seperating the brood and then those chappesess get neglected. Bees at the bottom of the garden has a good...

er thats not always the case, I bought a nuc last year which filled out in a month and then needed AS ing, did so they then filled out their new accomadation and continued to make preparations to swarm for the rest of the year so it was essential to visit regularly to check for queen and qc,s...

That sounds like the same mix as used by the author of bees at the bottom of the garden.