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I’d imagine pollen would affect the crystallisation of the honey. Pollen also contains yeasts so that also may have an affect on the honey in time. Honey with added pollen isn’t often seen for sale, i’d imagine there are good reasons for that.

Yes, that's him 👍

definitely an elusive wee haggis!

May fly out after a few minutes and there are literally none after half an hour. If it’s v young bees you can simply put them at the entrance if you want, probably easier to spot them than if in the grass.

Yes those things, I tend not to inspect in the rain if possible even in the shed. For me it was a space thing initially. The shed was where I wanted to put the hives in the garden and wasn’t used for much so I started looking into keeping hives in sheds, which brought me to the AZ’s.

Yes basically! Just inspect as normal. I have a window that has an opening, the rest have the blinds closed so they head to the light, or I can leave the door open, and they clear in minutes. I also have a light to help me see what I need to see.

What I found working with AZ hives (my personal experience only, others may have a very different perspective): The frames are fiddly, you can really pee off the bees when you can't quite get it to slot in properly at the back (you can't see into the back easily so have to just get it right)...

However... I do still have a bee shed, but I have changed the entrances to work with national hives.

I sold all my AZ hives 😆 !

How did this go? I'm thinking of trying this next year.

I had a fruit fly infestation in my wax stores this year (pre rendering), disgusting things!

That all sounds really exciting! So you’re going to try cardboard versions as opposed to the wooden ones. I had good success with ross rounds this year but I really dislike the plastic content.

Did you try these?

First time seeing it last month. I’ve now become an aurora chaser 😂. I have trees in the way so have to walk up to the fields to see but even then the trees can be in the way of the hills where most of the activity usually is. It’s often not visible to the naked eye and only gets picked up...

unless you live in Scotland!

I know plenty of beekeepers who go to the Fife branch to collect in person when there’s a sale on. Definitely worth asking.

I know it’s not ideal but you can usually collect from Thornes in Fife as well.

Ok I’m not as experienced as some who have commented here but I’d definitely want a bee inspector to have a look at that. I see many sunken cells, a slightly off white twisted larvae, what looks like a melted brood on the bottom of the cell and lots of holes in cappings, I don’t think it’s...

It sounds varroa related to me, they don’t just cause DWV, but all sorts of other issues and this time of year, mite loads can be high.

In addition to the above i’d go through and check they’ve not made more queen cells on older larvae, if they can replace with their own they’d rather do that i’ve found. They’ll keep the new queen long enough till their own queen mated. Like you, recently we caged queen to stop her laying...