Search results

Indeed - but at these flight distances at least I stand a chance of getting something reasonable, not just a queen mated by a drone from the box of anger I've got at my house right now!

Great - thanks! That cheers me up no end, as it means that she was well within the range of the drones from the out apiaries.

We get removable labels from Label Planet (online at labelplanet.co.uk). They work really well, but aren't cheap.

That would be good news for us, as we brought them home after the cutout, rather than taking them to one of of the out apiaries (so we could monitor them for disease before moving them out to the other hives) and so the original bees were the only colony on that site when she would have mated...

Thanks all - I will leave them for a while longer and see if they can turn it around. I wat to bailey change them anyway, to get them off the comb that we put in from the cutout, so maybe I'll give them a new bb and some syrup and leave them to it.

Here's the history: We did a cut-out for a neighbour and took home a box of bees and comb. The area was left completely clear of bees and wax, and we checked later that night and again the following day for stragglers - it was still clear. We put them in a hive, with some of their comb tied...

He did, in 2002/3: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/2860995/Dyson-production-moves-to-Malaysia.html Anecdotal evidence from some US companies suggests that the factors that Roche and AlanF describe together with higher shipping costs have resulted in "on-shoring" some production again (back...

In my (limited) experience, our colonies tend not to do much housekeeping in the winter and we have seen a build-up of muck on the OMF. We do a spring-clean and switch the floors out for clean ones each year (one more floor than hives, each floor is taken out, flamed with a gas torch and put...

Ha! I didn't think of it either. I either read it here on the forum on in a book... I can't remember which it was, so if you are reading this and it was your post on the forum, thanks from me too.

One more thing to ponder... If you put your entrance reducer on over the winter, you might consider putting it on the other way up, so the opening is above the floor. The idea is that the bees are less likely to get blocked in by any debris that builds up on the floor of the hive over the winter.

I have in the past: 1. made horseradish sauce for beef; 2. made a hot relish / chutney with it (but you don't need much); 3. used it as a chemical weapon (put a big bit through a food processor and let someone else take a good big sniff to see what I mean); and 4. given it to Jewish friends for...

Mixed year so far. We have from 6 hives on 4 sites - 5 of our own and one hive that we help manage for the local WI, From these 6, so far this year we've got: 75lb off one hive 50lb off another 15lb off a third Nothing at all off the other three - but they are: one new cast from this year...

Here's a photo of the top of the frame - there are two frames, each about 2.5 inches square, with a plastic starter strip about 0.5 inches deep. Thanks for your replies - I will report back once they have had some use (if any of my grafts have been accepted).

This is our first attempt at raising queens, so it's good to hear that someone has had some success with this kit (although I guess that means that failure is just down to me then... same as ever). I will go with painting the starter strips. The crown board plastic bag is a useful tip - thanks.

I think we must be looking at different boxes. I won't post a link to a supplier site, but they are still there this morning "micro mating hive" at £11.12. They've got plastic frames with an embossed starter strip in plastic. Maybe you spent the extra £3 and got a warnholz (which I am now...

Does anyone use these mating nucs? Dave Cushman's website suggests painting wax on the frames (which was going to do) - it also suggests geting the tiny frames draw in another colony before stocking the nucs (which I hadn't thought of). Do you get the frames drawn in another hive before using...

I stopped calculating her average labour rate about the same time as I stopped working out the all-in average cost of each jar of honey we produce...

We’ve had one big cut out and one small cast collection. The cut out was behind weatherboarding on the side of a house. It was two stories up, but luckily all the weatherboarding was being replaced so we had scaffolding in place and we could remove the boards as we wanted. The cast was about...

There is some discussion on queen problems here in Essex and some investigative work is ongoing, I think. There is a bit from an Essex blog here: http://www.honeyhouse.co.uk/?p=150 which gives you a little bit more information. There was also a bit in a newsletter - I can't find it at the...

Are they bees, rather than larvae? What colour are they? Are they all over the frame, dotted about on the frame or in lines on the frame? How many are there - entire frames full, some in odd places on a frame, or somewhere in between? I agree with Enrico, this is quite late in the year to...