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Yes - as noted, Thornes provide that service and as far as I am aware, Peter Kemble (Kemble Bee Supplies) does so as well. I havent had much dealings with Maisemores but they do a wax exchange service and so may also do a wax processing service as well.

Store your wax until you have over 50lbs available and then pay for it to be processed into foundation and wired (where releveant). This is a much better deal than just doing a straight swap for foundation.

The bees simply changed their mind about raising new queens. When the weather turns cold and wet with little or no opportunity for foraging, you will often encounter signs that a colony has made advanced swarm preparations to the extent of raising new queens and then breaking down capped queen...

The Institute of Northern Ireland Beekeepers hosts its 2017 Annual Conference and honey show on Saturday 21st October. The INIB return to the Lough Neagh Discovery Centre in the Oxford Island National Nature Reserve for the conference. Bookings are now being taken. Once again, the INIB brings...

Enlarged the pic as much as I could and no longer think it is Hawthorne. Don't recognise the leaf at all.

I sometimes see comb nibbling like this when there is no nectar flow or a very weak one. They seem to relocate some of the wax to where they feel they need it... PS - just looked at the picture again... never had a colony chew wax away from the top bar.

Judging by my stocks and those of the other beekeepers I help out from time to time, the June Gap over the past few years has also related to a noticable brood break, not just nectar. Seems to help the colonies keep varroa levels down.

Looks like hawthorne. Tree in picture has blossom going over - starts to brown off and will often have a slight pinkish tinge at this point also. I notice a stronger scent from them at this point also. Some hawthorne has a very pink blossom when in full flower and others are distinctly red. The...

Think I commented about this "incident" previously: http://www.derryjournal.com/news/crime/court-told-of-bizarre-bee-hive-case-1-5256464 People can find queens in a full hive when under pressure. There is a long history of people stealing queens out of beehives just as there is of stealing...

I will not be using one of my out apiaries in which to get Queens mated this year because there is a thriving local population of swallows and swifts. In previous years I have "lost" a higher number of new queens from that apiary than any of my other ones. It is disconcerting working a hive to...

Seeing the first bramble and white clover flowering in my locality and have been keeping an eye on Lime trees for the past ten days - it won't be long before it is flowering also. Agree that we "may" see a July gap this year... just depends how long the brambles keep flowering. My apiaries will...

If you feed this honey back to your bees you are still getting the benefit from it in the long run. If you are set on harvesting this OSR honey and are prepared to sacrifice the combs, you might wish to consider the following process. Use an uncapping fork to scratch the cappings on all the...

How close to each other and to Q+ colonies are your 3 new colonies? Not beyond the realms of possibility that your queens tried to go into the wrong hive, uninvited... Swallows, Swifts and House Martins can have an appreciable impact on queen rearing efforts...

If the queen has only been laying drones, this colony will have no material from which to make a new queen... unless its a drag queen of course and I don't think the colony would survive that...

"unite" individual supers to different colonies.... removes the really heavy lifting and means you just have to deal with the brood box. If I had an agressive colony still around at this time of the year, I would split it up into Nucs and add new queens to those. Let us all know how you get on...

If you create a Nuc from the hive (call it hive 1) referred to, make sure you do not add the newly laying queen to the Nuc.... Your profile indicates that you have three hives. Can I suggest that you shake a few frames of bees from the supers of hive 1 into a nuc and then add a frame of bees and...

Do not overlook the possibility that you could create a Q- Nuc and introduce a mated and laying Queen to it. If you do this, you could "start" a Nuc later in the season. Having additional colonies, you are in the position that you could transfer frames of emerging brood to boost a Nuc later in...

G'day Gary. If in doubt, send a sample to Archie Murchie or Ivan Forsythe in the AFBI laboratory or request an inspection via Tom Williamson, the Senior Bee Inspector. A few questions for you: You refer to a layer of dead bees on the floor of the hive. Define "layer". Was the entire floor...

Just starting to see numbers of bumble bees around over the past couple of weeks in my part of the world so I would imagine that St Ives would be a "few" weeks ahead... always lovely to see Bombus spp out and about, often on plants that honeybees largely ignore.

Keep an eye to see if there are any major nectar flows going over. Was chatting to a few beekeepers on Saturday morning and a couple commented on colonies becoming cranky as strong nectar flows went over. Their suggestion was that the bees knew their "income" was going to drop off (June gap) and...