Search results

I have a hive with only a few frames covered although there is a laying queen. I want to move it into a nucleus box for the winter. What is the best time of the day to do this?

I carried out a split on my single brood box national hive 9 days ago by placing 3 frames of bias ( and nurse bees) in another national hive with two frames of stores and two of foundation. There were no queen cells in the hive at the time of the split. Top feeder with 2:1 sugar soln added to...

Thanks Erica. Very clear answer and very helpful. I thought I should take it away but was worried about taking their stores as I managed to let a hive starve last year and it was a very dispiriting sight. I don't ever want to do that again. Julie

When do you intend to take them off? Is there a danger of taking stores away too soon? Will you take them off even if they contain eggs/ brood? Why wouldn't they contain eggs/ brood if there is a laying queen in there? Just trying to understand the rationale. Thank you.

Should the queen excluder be put under the brood box to avoid the queen laying in the nadired super?

I have the same issue and hope there will be some helpful replies. I only have single supers, partly filled, on two national hives with single brood boxes. Probably 3-4 brood frames in each hive full of capped honey too. If I take them off how should the partially filled frames be stored?

National hive, single brood box, bias on 5 frames but still empty cells on most of these (half to a quarter of the area) about 3 frames full of mostly capped honey, a couple of empty, only slightly drawn foundation on the outside. New queen towards end of last summer. Bees flying in with lots of...

Do you have any suggestions re. books that may cover these issues. The books I have seem to assume everything goes according to plan. As for a mentor, I have been trying for two years without success. The influx of new beekeepers is outpacing the number of people in my local BKA who offer mentoring.

Thank you for your help.

I have a swarm in a 5 frame nuc collected on 13th May from my own hive. It has been fed with two litres of 1:1 sugar soln. Inspected yesterday. Lots of drawn comb, not too crowded but no sign of eggs or larvae. Bees have been busily flying back with pollen whenever weather reasonable. Is this a...

I have two hives, both of which have swarmed, one on 12th May, the other on the 14th May. Both hives are brood and half and prior to swarms were storing honey well, in fact there were two supers on each although the second ones hadn't been used significantly. Frames are mostly uncapped. The...

Does anyone have any views on the Unimel 3 frame stainless steel extractor being sold by T*****s?

Yes, sorry. What I didn't say is the reason I want to put the swarm in the hive is because it's currently in a nuc which is too small. Is chucking them in the only way I can transfer them from a nuc? (Paynes poly)

Did an AS 3 and a half weeks ago. Have inspected the new brood box(supposed to have the old queen in) three times over the last 5 days and have seen no queen or evidence of there having been one for at least 20 plus days ( I.e, no eggs larvae or sealed brood). I was about to add a swarm...

Thank you for all your helpful responses. It seems the consensus is that the nucleus is probably going to be a bit snug. Is there any point trying to return some of the bees (without the queen obviously!) to the hive they came from? I take it the point from weatherman re. putting nucleus...

I'm hardly likely to try weighing them when 10 ft up a ladder with a cardboard box in the middle of the night am I? You have managed to write quite a lengthy response without saying anything remotely useful. Probably best not to bother in future. If you needed more information to be able to...

I have just collected my first swarm ( yes in the dark!). It came from my own hive and had attached itself to the side of our caravan. I have put it in a nucleus box as I had no full sized hives empty. It wasn't a huge swarm - about 12 inches diameter and an inch deep. Assuming it stays put is...

I carried out an AS on 21st April - a very strong hive on brood and a half which had already laid down about 8 frames of honey in a couple of weeks, some capped in the one super on the hive. The super was put back on top of the new hive (single standard brood) with original queen etc. The old...

Really?!

How do I decide when to extract OSR honey and can it be extracted using a normal spinning extractor without heating it beforehand? How critical is the time window for extraction? OSR has been in full bloom here for over a week.