Recent content by No Neo Nics

Blinkin' 'ec. That's reassuring. Unknowingly I may have got something right!

This is similar to what I did. I'd leave a lot for their winter breakfast, lunch and supper but anything they hadn't eaten through the winter I'd harvest, not steal, in the spring.

Thanks for that inspired explanation. Maybe I used the wrong word or maybe I have just been doing it all wrong. Sorry, and shame.

Doesn't that depend on how much of their honey you steal? I left as much as I could for them to get through the winter. Maybe I got that wrong?

We are emigrating so I'm giving up after about 9 years. Looking back. I found collecting swarms really exciting. I found the 'beginners course' nothing but confusing, and even more confusing once I got some bees. The most valuable learning I had was attending 3 or 4 course run by 'The Natural...

I was surprised to have my bees inspected and I never knew about it until a few weeks later when a guy at the allotment told me the inspector had been. I wasn't asked, I wasn't told, and there was no evidence he / she had been. Very odd.

What you describe is what we were led to believe would happen, and hoped it would, but sadly it never did. It wasn't a great course, sadly. Maybe I felt isolated, such things are often 2 way and yet we often like to 'blame' the others. I'm not great at socialising, I'm a bit of a loner and as...

This is a really interesting thread. I'm a radiographer and am lucky enough to have my 4 or 5 hives at the allotment. It's fun; I'm very 'hands off' and found the BBKA methods confusing and sometimes unkind to the bees, so I feel as if I've gone much more along 'natural' bee keeping lines, and...

This is not a hugely friendly forum, is it? Kinda puts me off getting involved.

Thank you Gilberdyke J. A very helpful reply. No ... the BB is not fully drawn, so I suspect I put a super on too soon. No, I wouldn't recognise the egg laying characteristics of a normal queen as opposed to the RAB. I will follow your advice, thank you. I feel I may end up putting the...

Hey!! Thank you very much for your quick advice ..... I wonder how the queen got upstairs? Ok that's one thing I've done 'wrong' ...I added a super too soon.

I had a look into a hive yesterday. The colony in the brood is small - about 7 frames. There are only 3 or 4 frames in the super. On having a look at a couple of these frames in the super I saw larvae - so there must be a queen. Between the 2 is the queen excluder. So, what has happened and...