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So, might a plan be to move just one hive at a time, leaving a week or so between hives? I presume that the flying bees from the first hive will return to the old Apiary site and, finding the hive not there, beg their way into one of the other hives that are still there? That would reduce the...

OK.... And if that isn't possible/practical/easy what are the downsides if I just move them the 400m? Presumably the flying bees will tend to return to the old site. When they find that there are no hives there, what will they do?

I need to move my hives a short distance (400m). I'm aware of the 'not more than 3m; not less than 3 miles' mantra. So in practice how does one move hives as I need to?

Yup. I think I screwed it up. I was too cautious moving frames up. Lessons learned.

Inspected today. One colony is set up as a Demaree. Found 2 charged QCs in the top BB and 8 in the lower one. The other two colonies are not (yet) Demaree'd and found 4 charged QCs in one and 1 in the other. Supers all filling fast.

OK. Can you have laying workers in a colony if you have an active Queen there? And is it a case that workers move eggs? I've read people saying that they can/do and also others ridiculing the notion. Any definitive views?

I did an inspection today. I have three WBC hives, all with 2021 queens. All seem strong. In one of the colonies I found Drone brood on a strip in the bottom of thee of the super frames. These frames are above the QE. I located the Queen in the brood box (9 frames of brood) and confirmed that...

I'm a beginner, going into my first full season with 3x WBC colonies, two of which were swarms taken in May last year, and one was a split from one of those swarms. All seem to have survived the winter (so far). I did an inspection on a warm day 10 days ago and found all three queens present and...

Thanks. That's very helpful.

Does anyone know what an empty WBC hive weighs (stand, lifts, floor and roof)?

OK, I took off the three blocks of fondant today. Each of the three hives are now at 2-3 on your finger-scale, so I'd say that they're OK for a while but I'll keep monitoring. Interestingly, one of the colonies had hollowed out the block and consumed, I'd say, about half of it (6kg) since it...

That's useful, thanks. I started weighing the hives a few months ago to try to keep track of consumption. I use a digital baggage scale and just weigh one side since I assumed that I'm less interested in the actual weight than in the trends. Each of the hives (WBC) are currently at about 24kg...

As a matter of interest, what do you do with unconsumed fondant at the end of winter? This is my first season so I'm not at all experienced. I'm watching as two of my three colonies chomp their way through a 12.5kg block of fondant each, but I suspect that they won't have finished it when Spring...

Sorry, I replied to the wrong post. Doh. I meant to reply to elainemary's.

Interesting. I also have WBC sliders but without the notches. That looks like a really good idea. I might modify mine.

OK thanks. Just been out watching the bees around the hives. They seem to be bringing in modest quantities of some dark orange pollen which I would think is probably snowdrop pollen since they are more or less the only flowers out at the moment.

I understand the purpose of Mouse Guards. My question is, why aren't they left in place all year rather than being removed and re-installed annually?

Thanks. I think that at this stage until I get the hang of it my objective is to reduce the likelihood of swarm preparations.

So am I right in thinking that it would be OK with just one super between the LBB and the UBB and then another super or two on top of the UBB? So: LBB; QE; Super; Demaree board (with QE); UBB; super; super?

Most of the literature I’ve seen on Demaree refers to putting two supers between the LBB and the UBB. Why is that? I would have thought that if you want the Queen's pheromones to percolate the UBB in order to suppress the building of QCs there then you’d want the minimum gap, say one super. Can...