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Inspections at this time of the year involve a tilt and smoke of the top box on doubles or a look at 2 or 3 central frames in singles. Any supersedure is evident by an unmarked queen come the last full inspection of the year.

Wax moths are ubiquitous in the UK. Drawn comb is so valuable whether in honey supers or brood boxes it needs looking after. I spray mine with BT. Not had you're problems with mold come spring, fortunately.

What method of introduction did you use? How long was the nuc queenless? Did you keep the nuc in the same apiary as the donor colony so the older bees could fly home and you would be left with young bees?

How long has that inspection board been in place? Take them out after you've done any mite drop monitoring

Each year is different. This year started early and QC's from 3rd round of graft will go into mini nucs on Tuesday. That should give me all the queens I'll need for overwinter nucs. Then one more round of grafting expecting the queen cells to go into mini nucs in approx 4 weeks. I have a finite...

If Tom Seeley needs to move his hives a short distance during his experiments at the new site he closes the hive for 4 days and feeds 'heavily'

From June till Aug/September I'm extracting 4-5 supers a couple of times a week. Extractor gets closed off between extractions and cleaned at the end of the season. I'm lucky to have a separate extraction area at home that doesn't get in the way.

Nectar production has fallen in some breeding systems for OSR. No long before its dried up completely. https://www.rothamsted.ac.uk/news/breeding-oilseed-****-varieties-pollinator-friendly-traits

Why don't you do an alcohol wash? Might get a surprise! Read a report that there's a lot of type B around so maybe we can ease off a bit?

Both of mine have the same potential problem when dealing with 'angry' bees so has only happened twice when I've been dealing with mean colonies. Can be sorted by adding an extra piece of velcro across the bottom.

Your only need to be 'stung' a couple times when the unite failed to then take things a bit more cautiously. I'm an air freshner fan. Also if I'm feeling nervous about the unite I'll stick a push in cage over the queen for a day or so, also work well when boosting weak colonies when adding brood...

I prefer the fence style Found another issue with the interaction between the veil and suit zips. I get it that one side of the veil zips up first but there is still a gap between the 2 veil zips and the suit zip which isn't secured by the velcro flap. 'Persistent / burrowing' bees can make...

Put the bought Buckfast into a nuc. It's too soon to know whether your 2 newly mated queens are up-to-the-job. Assess the performance of your 2 newly mated queens over the next month or so and if one is below par replace her with the Buckfast. Otherwise overwinter the Buckfast in a nuc.

Depends what your local drone population is like and what your definition of aggression is? I buy in Buckfasts and have reared queens from them which have turned out to be much more aggressive than my local flock. No longer rear queens from those Buckfasts.

Me thinks most queen introductions fail either because there is already a queen in residence or the colony can still produce queen cells then decide to get rid of the imposter. If I leave it a week and they produced queen cells then there is a good chance she won't be there. Unless they are...

Those drone cells in the super will be the last to be filled and capped- a right nusiance if you ask me!

This is a well populated nuc ready for queen rearing.

Yes, no technique is fool proof, one just tries to increase one's chance of success. I introduce upwards of 100 new queens each year when setting up nucs or requeening existing stock. I use travel cages when I think the introduction should be 'easy' and a push in cage when 'difficult'. Key to...

Don't forget to randomise your inpections and change bees suit and gloves if colony scores 2 with a sting as it will affect the behaviour of the next colony's inspection.