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Converted the last of 5 long-TBHs I acquired to a national bb. Well, the last one was actually just a big wooden box as deep as it was wide with the comb attached to both the sides and the floor. Two hours later, brood, stores and a marked queen all in a more manageable bb. In the last pic...

Ditto - typically nothing to worry about. I've noticed it more often when there's been a drop in temperature or it's been raining. This one's on OMF.

This queen hatched from a ripe queen cell, I'd guess at no more than 12 hours after adding to the mini nuc. I'll have to check on the other mini nuc to see how that queen is doing. Oh well. C'est la vie

It's possible, although the lowest temp over the last week or so has still been in double digits (degrees C).

So I thought I'd try a couple of mini mating nucs this year - I normally just use normal national size nuc boxes. However, I was suprised to see a small cluster of bees on the ground in front of one mini nuc this afternoon with the queen amongst them, but her wings appeared to have been...

Just purchased 50 x 1kg bags for 45p each from Farmfoods - all to go into storage until next year (less any the wife wants). Used their 2 bags for £1 offer plus a £2.50 off voucher when spending £25 or more. The voucher turned up with the local freebie newspaper, but can also be downloaded...

Unless it's on a label like this...:laughing-smiley-014 picture source http://goo.gl/wXLK0W

Commonly known as great willowherb, great hairy willowherb or hairy willowherb. I've got loads of it alongside my out apiary and the bees love it.

I usually store mine wet and the only mould I get tends to be where there's pollen, but I just scrape it out - the bees soon repair any damage.

As enrico said, don't despair. I'm not too far from you and have noticed my supers dropping in weight lately due to the bad weather, and this despite being only a mile from a relatively small field of OSR that I did think I'd get an early crop from.

I've been informed that some of the boxes and frames may have CBKA marked on them.

If I need to inspect both boxes then I do similar to James, but inspect the boxes while still apart. i.e. inspect one over the floor and the other over the roof. Then a quick puff of smoke under the top box and over the bottom box before putting them back together. This way I'm less likely...

I'll ask and post back here.

Received the following email today about a break in at the Coventry branch apiary. I've anonymised the address. --- Coventry Branch Apiary Break In Just to let you know in the last week our branch apiary at ***** has been broken in to, different types of beekeeping equipment has been stolen...

For now I'll just keep an eye on them and requeen them if the supersedure doesn't work out. Steve

Took advantage of the lovely weather today to do my first proper, but quick, inspection of the season. All hives doing nicely, but one looks like they are well down the supersedure route. The hive in question is not as big as the others with just a couple of frames of eggs and brood in all...

Mine is just an old fridge with the cooling mechanism removed, and a 100 watt bulb controlled by a dimmer switch. The piece of wood with the tin foil plate wrapped around it is just to prevent a hot spot forming on whatever is above it. Since taking this pic, I've since replaced the dimmer...

Ditto, but I do wear a long sleeve top and a baseball cap under either together with wellies.

I posted an email to the site owner stating concerns of vandalism and theft and received the following response: I was trying to help boost young interest in bees and there importance. I had sent emails to a number of bee keeping organisations stating the intention and got nothing back...

It's not a dumb question, but no, the bees aren't attracted to the jam, or most other sweet things you could use (with the exception of honey!). A similar sort of cheap diy wasp trap can be found here. They do fill up quickly so need checking regularly; otherwise you've just introduced an...