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Try a few drop of Olbas oil on your gloves. Also you can wear cuff-sleeves to bridge the wrist gap. Don't be tempted to switch to thick leather gloves. You lose your touch, you can't clean them and you will squash bees - which will make them even more grumpy.

I'm afraid it is even worse than that. If some local beekeeper decides that he is going to "improve" the local stock by drone-flooding his "better" strain of bee, then all your patient work is undone. I doubt that a dog, chicken or pigeon breeder would be pleased if I tainted his stock by...

I would be be seriously annoyed with any beekeeper that open-fed sugar near me. I do not feed sugar to my bees (except in rare emergency cases) and would not be pleased to have my honey adulterated.

Can you not fit hair roller cages?

I suspect the dry/cold/wet spring did for the queens.

As I was adding another box (super) to a hive this morning, I noticed a gap between them. "I'd better tape that up" I thought, "or else the wasps will get in.". Then I realised I have not seen a single wasp at all, this year. After last year, which was a wasp plague here in Suffolk, that is...

I don't have the reference but I heard of a guy in USA who got stung all over his body (for science!) to make a league table of pain. The septum was no. 1.

Lime in full flower in Suffolk. Amazing scent and the whole tree(s) buzzing!

Thirded

All hail the "Ignore" button. Just because someone is experienced does not mean that they have the right to make uncalled-for arrogant and insulting remarks. Moderators should stop such posts, not make excuses.

They certainly do seem to cap the honey in brood cells later than those in the arc above.

I think once a week or fortnight is OK. You can read what is going on in the hive during the winter, without opening it up, by inspecting the debris.

The worst offence, in my opinion, is the "shook swarm"; not withstanding the merits or otherwise of the procedure, it should be a "shaken swarm". (Unless it was first used by the famous German beekeeper, Herr Schuck.)

The wax is not destroyed, just melted. Surely it ends up in the strainer and can be recovered?

EFB is bacterial, not viral.

Caesar adsum iam forte, Brutus adsum tu.

Just tight little buds in Suffolk.

If you use Celotex/Kingspan/Recticel, it has an aluminium coating which the bees cannot chew.

I made the same mistake. They all look the same on the outside. You need https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/265159545575?hash=item3dbcbd92e7:g:~N0AAOSwwYldR~v1

Doesn't always work though - We used to use it as a practice target.