I got stung quite a lot around the ankles on Saturday at the allotment. Most of the bees were back to being nice except for the Cyprus queen. That's puzzling as she was nice last year.
Yesterday I put a boiler suit on under my bee suit and laced my boots up to the top becaue I didn't want anymore stings. The bad news is that the swarm that cost me the congestion charge fine that my student had knocked over last week, had absconded. I don't ususally put a QE under the BB, but I do usually put the varroa tray in, becuase I find that they settle better with a dark floor, then I take it out when there is brood.
Other bad luck was that I remarked my old favourite queen and I think her back leg got damaged. She was dragging it a bit. She won't be able to lay properly if it is broken. I'll see next week. There were laying queens in the 2 mating nucs. I realised however that since I haven't been writing everything down, I now can't remember where they are from.
Doh.
I then tried to mark and clip one of them and she flew off. I looked through the nuc again and she had not returned. I later found her climbing up the leg of the empty hive the swarm had left, which was about 15ft from her home. That cheered me up.
The other bad news was that in the gentlest and most productive hive, the fancy queen I introduced to replace the old favourite was nowhere to be seen. Hive full of queen cells.
My fault that I didn't exercise enough patience. I opened the plastic tabs on the cage straight away to save a trip back in the week. I should have left the plastic tags on while they got used to her.
One hive had 4 supers capped and 1 half full. I put another on as there is still a flow, but it nearly killed me lifting those full supers to put them back at head height. (I under super and put the empty super above the brood box.) I think I'll clear them next week. I would rather do just one harvest, but it is just too heavy and too high. I'm not complaining, I'm glad at least one hive is doing what it is supposed to.
Yesterday I put a boiler suit on under my bee suit and laced my boots up to the top becaue I didn't want anymore stings. The bad news is that the swarm that cost me the congestion charge fine that my student had knocked over last week, had absconded. I don't ususally put a QE under the BB, but I do usually put the varroa tray in, becuase I find that they settle better with a dark floor, then I take it out when there is brood.
Other bad luck was that I remarked my old favourite queen and I think her back leg got damaged. She was dragging it a bit. She won't be able to lay properly if it is broken. I'll see next week. There were laying queens in the 2 mating nucs. I realised however that since I haven't been writing everything down, I now can't remember where they are from.
Doh.
I then tried to mark and clip one of them and she flew off. I looked through the nuc again and she had not returned. I later found her climbing up the leg of the empty hive the swarm had left, which was about 15ft from her home. That cheered me up.
The other bad news was that in the gentlest and most productive hive, the fancy queen I introduced to replace the old favourite was nowhere to be seen. Hive full of queen cells.
My fault that I didn't exercise enough patience. I opened the plastic tabs on the cage straight away to save a trip back in the week. I should have left the plastic tags on while they got used to her.
One hive had 4 supers capped and 1 half full. I put another on as there is still a flow, but it nearly killed me lifting those full supers to put them back at head height. (I under super and put the empty super above the brood box.) I think I'll clear them next week. I would rather do just one harvest, but it is just too heavy and too high. I'm not complaining, I'm glad at least one hive is doing what it is supposed to.
