Recent content by SS_Smith

I've been watching some youtube about splits and queen refering by some guy from up north who sells queen's. In one of his videos he says that over the years raising queen's has got worse and that this year he thinks he got about 30% success rate and next year he's going to inseminate. Hardly...

I didn't see any evidence of wax moth or other issues. It just didn't seem to take off, I re-queened with a purchased Queen and all seemed good for a few weeks then it went down hill. Seems as though she just stopped laying late in the season. About 2/3 was capped honey the rest uncapped...

I had a hive die out last year, but left the Brood box with honey in it sealed until now on a spare hive stand next to my other hives. Half of the frames contained honey and the others were drawn but not used. So the honey has been sitting there for some time and I think is fermented Went in...

I'm thinking of getting a few more hives. A lot can change in a few years. Anyone purchased from Caddon recently and what do you think of the quality?

I was also thinking of starting to feed syrup this weekend. My two hives have had some activity over the last couple of weeks and I've seen some bees coming back with pollen. I added a clear bag of fondant above the crown board about 4 weeks ago on both and replaced the insulation above that...

Im using 2kg sugar to 1L water cold. Sometimes I add a little more water. Make it in a petrol can £4 from Wilko. Never has anything in it before. Give it a good shake and leave it overnight - find that leaving overnight helps went it comes to dissolving. Give it a shake an hour after mixing...

Drex - That sounds like a great idea for finding out if I have a queen or not. The queen in my other hive doesn't seem to be laying too well at the moment, but I'll try and find a frame with some eggs or young larva on it.

Hi All Seems as though my split made by adding a bought in queen has gone pear shaped. https://beekeepingforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=42795 Checked today in my new split hive, numbers are down, no brood larva or eggs. No marked queen found. There are a couple of empty queen cells so I’m...

I thinking of trying kitchen towel as a filter in the oven on a low heat. Similar to this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3jOP-O3020

I've only had one winter. Empty super on top with a thick block of cellox insulation inside. Made a cube out of the cellox for around the outside held in place with a bungee cord and some tape. All fine, will do the same this year.

Thanks all Queen in today after 24h of being Queenless. All looked good when I arrived and on opening the hive their numbers were more than I was expecting - though some of the brood may have hatched. Sandwiched the new queen between two frames of capped brood. Knocked down the start of some...

It's not a Nuc, I was running double brood and split it in two. Both have OMF and vents covered by wire mesh in the roof. I think there are enough bee's but they certainly weren't bursting at the seems. My new hive has capped brood on 2-3 frames so in a few days the number should be going up...

Just done my first split, will be getting a Queen tomorrow. Made a tunnel (150mm in length), shimmed to 20mm with some thick cardboard. Tunnel design is the same as Millets. Bee's hadn't emerged from the tunnel but while I was there a wasp found it's away into the tunnel. I bunged it up with...

I went through winter ok last year nervously with 1 hive and am thinking that I might split and make two hives. This year it's been brood and half most of the year, but about a month ago I made it into a double brood and put a QE between the brood and old super. Then I checkerboarded new...

Thanks All Think I'll stick with what I've got and use the chart in the image on post 2 to work out the moisture.