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After some advice please as not sure what to do - I have 1nuc (F2 buckfast in progress currently in mating period) and 3 hives - 1off F1 buckfast 2021 queen, 2off F2 buckfast 2022 queens in a garden which borders onto a neighbours garden with a 2.5m high conifer hedge in between. I have kids who...

Ah. I like it.

I learnt the hard way that you need to site them wherever is most convenient for you and / or your neighbours. Last year I realised that where I had put them which was text book south facing with trees overhead for summer midday sun shade + early morning sun resulted in bees flying across the...

It’s a rollercoaster for sure….I did 4 demaree’s last weekend and first 3 went ok but 4th I couldn’t find the queen so shook the bees in. Did an inspection weekend just gone (week later) and in bottom brood box of the one I shook in it was all good with eggs and larvae. Did top brood box and...

That’s good to know as was worried what to do if I can’t find the queen.

Hi. I’m about to do a demaree for the first time. I assume the reason you shook them all out into the bottom box was because you couldn’t find the queen ? If so is it guaranteed that the nurse bees will find their way back up to the top box to look after the brood ? BTW I took a hit to the chin...

Hi. an update…..so dropped in a frame of bias 18th march and then checked on 17 April (4 weeks later) and there was some capped drone brood and 1 capped queen cell. Found a jet black queen and marked her. Several frames had cells polished in the centre ready for egg laying. My thoughts are...

Thanks all. I’ve given it ago to save the colony recognising it’s much higher risk doing it at this time of year. Yes I am probably more of an experimental person . I dropped in a frame of bias from another colony on 18th march and plan is to check mid April how they are getting on when I...

Thanks. I’ll checks it out.

My mum just sent me this article from the newspaper. I was ignorant of this before I started bee keeping 2 years ago in fact I never really used to like honey as I had only tried the supermarket variety. Now me and my family love it and have really got stuck into trying different varieties -...

Made up some frames for my swarm box. Using a 14x12 nuc same as last year but putting 2 boxes out this year and instead of being empty I’m filling them with wired frames and starter strips. This is my first one.

Looks like there’s a few young bees in there and it’s one of the most active colonies I’ve got but not sure how long it’s been like that. Should have mentioned that I spotted a couple of open queen cells with royal jelly in as well when doing the inspection . i Assume they are trying anything...

Had a quick look yesterday in 1 out of my 4 hives. Reason being as i was suspicious that it was behaving different to all the others at the entrance and there were a few drones. Was also 14 degrees and in a weeks time I’m away for 3 weeks. It’s on 14x12 and around 7 seams of bees. It was a...

Yep that was my worry as well as the bees would have to drag the dead bees up the side wall then through the small plastic opening on the inside of the hive wall before then doing a 90 degree bend to pass through the big hole in the side of the hive.

Sounded to good to be true that you can manage bees without varroa treatment and give them protection from wasps etc and a more natural environment and better access to supers so more honey etc. Hence why I wanted to try and back it up on here (the forum) to see if there were any independent...

Doesn’t seem to be mentioned on the website but the short informal presentation given to us at the bee keeping show by the owner of the company was that by having a solid Floor and these small entrances it increases the humidity and temperature within the hive and that more closely represents...

Saw a presentation from the company showing how this works at the bee keeping show a few weeks ago. You change to a solid floor , fit these entrances to your hive parts and away you go. The proposed benefits are that it helps with managing varroa without using treatments along with other...

Last year I put a bs honeybees 14x12 nuc up on top of a pergola so about 7ft up and caught 2 swarms in it at different points in the year. Nuc was empty except for a thin board in the bottom to cover over the mesh floor and some bits of comb and a couple drops of lemongrass oil. I checked on it...

Loads of activity last couple of days. Spent 10 minutes watching them coming and going and on the nearest hive I noticed that they were by far the biggest in terms of level of activity but they were also ejecting bees that weren’t dead but clinging on to the landing board. 5/6 needs trying to...

Thanks. Will keep an eye out for getting that low.