Recent content by Ian123

Bees will respond to weather and available forage. Some years brood rearing will continue till the end of November to some extent, if they can get out and forage on the ivy the queen will continue laying. Quite frankly the weather at the moment has been poor for a few weeks so the bees will...

Consuming those would often be an improvement on the normal serving!

If you have a decent box of bees ensure any brood is adjacent to the entrance and close it down to a couple of inches you can also reduce entrance height by half if your using a standard floor that normally allows about 18mm. The bees are then generally able to look after themselves.

If the situation is that bad with stores I’d get some syrup on forget the fondant..

More likely the source of nectar/plant they had been foraging on. Whilst they will add water for their immediate use and thin down honey, they wouldn’t add water to stored….. I think? Or at least the stores liable to be extracted.

I’ll second that always had decent and reliable queens off them and I do rather like the poly nuc boxes!

You could of course try both😉

My partner said I must be Welsh……..finished before the serious bit started😉

Plenty of honey is sold with royal jelly but I’d doubt it’s anywhere near 8% volume. They don’t extract brood frames, they graft into frames with racks of cups just like queen rearing. They have small pumps maybe similar to what a dentist used to suck your saliva😂

Just save yourself the trouble and get the normal 1…..it’s really a non issue!

isn’t cedar meant to be naturally repellent?😂

As above, have you treated?

That’s odd…. I suspect the vast majority of us use pine frames and indeed many hive bodies are made of pine. In fact in some countries Pine would be the norm for hive construction. I’ve not seen any reporting issues with bees entering or using boxes or even frames?

Really?……..

Forget the insurance for hive parts it’s a pittance although may come a bit closer if using seconds frames it certainly doesn’t cover hive boxes. These are also generally cleaned and retained. The only part worth while is the liability!!!