Recent content by Monsieur Abeille

Coming out at great speed in our corner of Lincs as well. Local wisdom is thinking it will be a short season though, and as colonies not all up to speed yet it could be a relatively poor year.

Seen last week in a New Zealand shop catering to the Japanese market, 2NZ$ = £1, so 500g for £900ish. Also had propolis toothpaste which sounded a tad sticky!

Didn't know, thanks. Guess I'll try something else (unless the remaining 3% is something magical)

I've been giving my bees Neopol every spring for the past few years to give a hand building up numbers for the OSR harvest. They certainly like it, choosing it over fondant, but how much good it actually does I have no idea, not having enough hives to try any control groups.

Friend I passed my hives to has one that continues to have a pretty heavy drop after 5 treatments with a (roughly) 5 day gap. Just came on here in fact to see if there were any limits I/she should be aware of. Think I'll probably recommend one more vape then leave until the depths of winter...

Likewise - good plan

Give your entrance reducers a dual function by banging in pins at distances wide enough for a bee or two, but too narrow for mice. Halves the amount of times you have to disturb the bees.

For those not on Big T's emailling list - they mixed up some thymol and oxalic crystals :

If painting a feeder, mix some sand in with the paint to aid grip for the bees

Entrance reducers with nails banged in giving <10mm entrances. Put on before first proper frost

Are you sure there aren't any measuring spoons in the box?

Quite surprised no one has posted this (or maybe its elsewhere) but Big T have a 10% 24 hour "Flash Sale" on at present for non sale items. Use discount code DISCOUNT10

On the assumption that you can't/dont want to move them 3 miles away from both first, think I'd wait until they are clustered mid winter, then move and leave some twigs etc around the entrance.

Can I ask what type of feeder it is

Just sealed up hives before they get transported to their new home. It will be strange not having colonies about, but I'm going to continue to work on them for another 9 months.