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We just extracted ours and got 80kg total from two hives, I think the split was something like 35kg/45kg. I didn't think we would get as much as we had a number of queen deaths, an artificial swarm and the fact that we had one hive at the start of the year and split it into the two.

We did our second honey harvest. This year we got about 80kg, which is pretty nice for two hives! The bees were good, in the end the only sting we had was because we didn't see a bee stuck to a frame during uncapping and I poked it with my thumb. :p https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qT-67JQmf4c

Only a very quick tidy up today as I haven't managed to save enough energy since last inspection to do a thorough job. The bees have started to get quite a lot of honey capped in the supers which is nice to see. I'm going to feed the honey from the brood frames I took off back to the bees and...

I kept the original one, the one I bought, not the one they made. The bottom of mine doesn't get too hot. Having said that I didn't even think about this so I will now do a test to see exactly how hot it does get. Good catch. :p

Now that the queen should be emerging in the extra hive I made during the Artificial Swarm it is time to unite it back with the original hive. I had fun finding with the search for a queen, I cut a LOT of searching from the vid :p, but it all worked out in the end...

I keep bees in a small back garden surrounded by houses in York. I would suggest 4 things to help make it successful: 1) Buy a queen from a breeder that is proven to lay friendly bees. I use the imported buckfast queens from bshoneybees and they are as friendly as bees can be. 2) Make sure...

I removed all but one queen cell in the colony that was split off the second hive during last weeks artificial swarm. I put the remaining queen cell in a cage so when I unite it back with the second hive I won't have to search for her, though I am going to have a good look anyway in case I...

I am considering doing a Shook Swarm on my hives next spring as I seem to remember reading somewhere that this reduces the chance they will swarm later in the year. Has anyone noticed if this is true? I don't mind the potential to get less honey as I am getting plenty for my needs. I like the...

I'll do that then, cheers!

I'm keeping the original queen as she was only introduced in a split on the 8th of May and is the pure Buckfast I want for my hives.

I performed an AS to, hopefully, stop a colony from swarming. I would like to reunite them as soon as possible so I get more honey, but I don't want to do it too soon so they start to think about swarming again. Any advice on a good amount of time to wait? Cheers!

After receiving good advice that the colony that produced the swarm cells, queen cells that have eggs + royal jelly/larvae in them, could swarm at any moment we rushed to perform an artificial swarm to head that off. Hopefully that will stop their swarming impulse and get them back on track...

I worded that badly. Here is the bit: As soon as a larva is seen in a [queen] cell, shake the bees from the combs and search for and destroy all queen cells. .... [After all cells are removed] the hive [is] closed down until next inspection. When next examination of the colonies is made, some...

That's interesting because in Guide to Bees & Honey by Ted Hooper he says that it is possible that if you remove the queen cells they will not swarm. He goes on to talk about checking if the queen is still laying fresh eggs (which mine was) as an indicator of whether this will work. My initial...

We found the queen we added dead outside the hive that suffered supersedure so we must have either missed a queen cell or a queen had already hatched. Today's job was to find that rogue queen and catch it so I can order a new Buckfast queen to keep our stock the friendly bees we love. A...

My drink of choice is a teaspoon of honey in hot water rather then tea, I also like it in other things like porridge. I am one of the few beekeepers who, over the year, will actually use the full honey output of at least one hive and maybe two. :D

Yesterday we went through the hive that had lost its queen and, hopefully, got rid of all the queen cells. That way there shouldn't be any queens to usurp the Buckfast one we added today. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wxb6HCk6UBg

Thanks for the replies. I also found it odd at the time as it didn't look like any other queen cell and was flush to the comb as well as the wire at the bottom looking almost like there was no wax over it at all. Fortunately my energy is fairly consistent, it's just that it's consistently very...

I have chronic fatigue, which means I have bugger all energy. Because of that I can only have the hives in my back garden and I can't reliably inspect every week in swarm season. The Buckfast queens I am using are friendly, good for our garden and neighbors, not swarmy, good for my inconsistent...

I am using Buckfast queens rather then letting my own develop. The small expense of buying them in every 2 years is worth the advantages they bring for me.