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They could from a frame of brood, young larvae and nurse bees but is probably too early for the queen to be mated. If you need to keep the colony going for your friend you could add in a frame of capped brood from a very strong colony now and then in about 2-3 weeks add another frame of brood...

It seems possible to me that bees could be using propolis to protect the wood of their home against decay in the same way we paint ours. Crevices are likely to harbour funghi so will be treated first. In addition since it is hydrophobic propolis prevent condensation soaking into the wood. It...

The upper QE is really only necessary if the Demaree is going to be used to raise a new queen in the upper box. The swarming instinct is thought to be controlled by the ratio of uncapped brood to nurse bees so you are correct this is favoured by providing a lot of new space for the queen to lay in.

Something to bear in mind is that land-fill sites always have a surface and from what I have seen this is often covered in scavenging birds.

Yes I do need to use eyelets so the wires stay tight - I wrap the wire ends around small screws which I can then tighten and retighten as required - a box of empty frames sounds like an out of tune harp!

I collect my wire together and when I have a good bundle put it in in the recycling? Have you seen the pictures of fishing line caught round birds legs - what do you think happens to stuff put in the bin?

What is wrong with using wire? It is easy to get holds of, stretches less, is recyclable and can be cleaned and sterilised along with the frame in boliling washing soda.

I am interested how you can go from making a one year unsuccessful trial to saying that it would take hundreds/thousands of years of evolution? Do you not believe that if you had hundred/thousands of colonies some of them would be resistant now?

Yep, sorry, you are right - I was looking at an old quote.

I agree - it is likely only worth it if either you order a lot of them (postage lower %) or are able to collect - one thing to note 3mm and 4mm are the same price.

I bought 4mm pre-cut polycarbonate board from this company - prices have gone up about 20% but fairly cheap to add an 8mm rim so much cheaper than buying - I am sure there are others and you save a lot on postage if you can collect https://ruudrascottplastics.com/polycarbonate_sheet.php?id=69

[QUO If she is a young queen then it makes sense she is taking a little more time to get going. Also it is likely that if the previous queen died then the population of nurse bees will be quite low which also leads to a slower build up. You could add in a frame of emerging brood from one of...

If you use the same Apidea, etc. you will have to remove the mated laying Queen, and then very soon afterward put in a sealed Queen Cell, but don't you have to be very careful to make sure there are no eggs or young larvae in the Apidea from the previous Queen otherwise they will start rearing...

I have found it extremely difficult to get my bees in Apidea or Keilers to go through a 2nd cycle - they reject QC, virgin queens, caged virgin queens either introduced immediately, w/wo smoke, after 12h, 24h etc. Therefore I now simply combine the Apideas/Keilers containing mated queens with...

I use it all the time and it works - no idea where I learnt it from Not too surprising when you think about it - a strange smell in a hive will put the bees on alert that something has changed

I think it would depend on whether the aspect and direction are very similar or not. If the "look" is nearly the same you still can move directly but I would stick some sprigs of mint or other smelly herb (available from a supermarket?) in the entrance on the first day afterwards you think they...

I used 2 x 3 frame nucs, Apidea and Keilers for mating last year. An advantage of the mini-mating nucs is clearly the reduced numbers of bees needed but they do require a lot more attention to detail in preparing and siting them. Last year I had very poor mating results until I moved the...

They probably need an edge to get started so having a triangle extends the length available to them in the centre of the frame

The wire is a single strand that goes through eyelets on the side bars and round a nail in the top bar - I use small screws to secure the ends so easy to tighten or replace

My foundationless frames look like this - I use ss wire so that I can pass a current through to remove it if I want to make cut-comb. The small triangle of foundation encourages them to start drawing brood comb and is much easier to get straight than a strip - can get lots of triangles from a...