Recent content by MrGrumpy

Split and recombine. If you've not enough space/stands for more hives, you can split them with boards (Snelgrove or similar). You can also make up nucs, but I'd leave those in reserve. That's the theory, though it's rarely as simple as that, and you will need both luck, spare brood boxes and a...

I suspect you're being optimistic. What's most likely to happen is that the duties of the inspectorate will be 'devolved' to associations, with a multi-million-pound office, employing a dozen press officers and a panjandrum, established to regulate the associations, and another...

It's years since I could be bothered to look it up, but I think that signifies a specific procedure involving certified, calibrated scales, comprehensive records and the chance of having your bottling plant inspected. Because it allows a degree of under-weight as well as over-weight, within...

I think the aim is to divert any water streaming down the front of the lifts to the sides. That way it doesn't flow over the front of the porch and pool at the entrance. Although the landing board slopes down, the water can run back (as per windowsills), especially if the wind's blowing towards...

It's just a thought, but have you ever wondered where the Apiguard goes?

I feel better already.

Do you mean selling or producing? Selling cut-comb is relatively easy, as it more-or-less sells itself - provided it's as premium a product as it should be, and looks like it as well. There aren't many packaging options, and the same labelling regulations apply as for liquid honey (except it...

Well, perhaps, maybe. Most colonies appear to unseal and throw out diseased or dead pupae, at least at some stage. But how rigorously and quickly they do it varies. There's a fair amount of current (i.e. unfinished) research on what makes a colony 'hygienic' or not, and on "varroa sensitive...

How long can a colony be shut into the hive? The show is three days long and it will not be safe to have flying bees at the event. Will they be okay for three days? I don't want to show a hive full of bee poo and dead bees by day three! Observation hives are usually fine for three days, but...

Either you missed a queen cell, or the workers moved the eggs through the excluder, or the queen got thin enough to get through it herself, or the workers have been laying eggs or you need to throw some money at an optician. Workers can, and will, shuffle eggs through an excluder whenever they...

It's probably advisable. It may be a relatively humble role, but I presume you need the ability to assess some fairly dry documentation and communicate it effectively to those of damper tastes, as well as prepare statistical reports to a higher standard than, say, a mere economist. It's bees at...

I have never found this to work with standard deep boxes. At best, the bees spread the brood nest through both boxes, the queen laying roughly in circles around the new mid point. That's fine if I'm planning to run double-brood, and does seem to expand the nest nice and quick, but I'm not sure...

It will vary from association to association, but if an association is required to attest to the competence of a beekeeper, by directly or indirectly being asked to recommend a swarm collector, then they can't, in all conscience, send just anyone with a bucket and a beanpole who fancies a go at...

Robbing, no. But absconding (or 'starvation swarming') is a distinct possibility. As a rule of thumb, if bees are able to fly, they're able to abscond. It's, happily, not very common. But it does happen. Whether it's lack of food or something else (disease? woodpecker damage? damp?) that sets...