Reply Beefriendly

[Millet]

I know this is only a laugh but i have had to copy and paste this as the forum will not let me reply directly .

Millet just for you from 2016. Module 1.
Q1 Give one method of spacing brood frames.Hoffman Castlasiion plastic clip on spacers sorry ……………………………………………..…………………..
Q2 How wide is bee space? Theres two bee spaces , one inbetween comb and one elsewhere anyway 6/8/9/10mm……………………………………………………………………………………….
Q3 Name a method of replacing
all the brood frames at once. Add a new brood box full of frames………………………………………………………………………………….
Q4 What nutrient does pollen provide
as a component of the honeybee diet? Protein is my guess ………………………………………………………………………
Q5 Using the International Queen Marking system,
what colour will queens be marked this year? like the sun……………………………………………………………
Q6 In which month does the main UK heather flow take place? I,ll say July………………………………………………
Q7 What is meant by drifting? Hand braking your car on a wet road.lol…………………………………………………………………………………….
Q8 What could be fed to a colony
to stimulate the queen to lay in spring? Pollen substitute……………………………………………………………………..
Q9 Name one type of feeder. English and proud lol……………………………………………………………………………………..
Q10 Supply the missing word in this piece of bee equipment. Porter bee _Rubbish whoops Escape.__________…...……………….

 

[Beefriendly]

I'll put you down as a fail...must try harder

 

[Millet]

I'll put you down as a fail...must try harder

Dam i blew all that money in for that, if i give you a clotted cream scone with strawberries and some home made slow Gin, will you please pass me..

 

[Beefriendly]

Integrity is very important and their can be no exceptions....
But 2 bottles of sloe gin.....hummm....passed.

 

[Beefriendly]

Here's one that made me laugh.
"A strong colony of bees in a brood box and one super over a queen excluder, situated in a
remote rural apiary, belonging to an experienced beekeeper has become vicious and a
nuisance. List the steps to be taken by the beekeeper to re-queen this colony".

Forget about the answer, but a "strong" colony in one brood box....oxymoron surely.

 

[Millet]

Here's one that made me laugh.
"A strong colony of bees in a brood box and one super over a queen excluder, situated in a
remote rural apiary, belonging to an experienced beekeeper has become vicious and a
nuisance. List the steps to be taken by the beekeeper to re-queen this colony".

Forget about the answer, but a "strong" colony in one brood box....oxymoron surely.

I Read through and through this and i was confused but then all of a sudden the penny dropped, one brood box is a good colony (a normal colony) BUT not a strong one,Two brood boxes below a Q-excluder is a strong one surely.

 

[maddydog]

I Read through and through this and i was confused but then all of a sudden the penny dropped, one brood box is a good colony (a normal colony) BUT not a strong one,Two brood boxes below a Q-excluder is a strong one surely.

Doesn't say how big the brood or super boxes are though

 

[colinc]

Doesn't define strong either, if this is just emerging from winter on 8 frames it may be a strong colony [emoji6]


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[Beefriendly]

I was also thinking what is an experienced beekeeper doing to let grumpy bees get to that stage, should have been re-queened much earlier...But in reality these things do happen to the best and worst of us.

 

[Finman]

.
Millet, medication!

 

[Fusion_power]

Forget about the answer, but a "strong" colony in one brood box....oxymoron surely.

If it is a square Dadant brood box, it can hold about 60,000 bees which I think we can agree is a pretty strong colony.

Presuming this is a very strong colony in early summer and I have a couple of weeks to deal with them, here is how I would requeen.

Set up a nuc with 3 sealed brood and 2 honey frames from one of my existing colonies, including the queen, and filling the box up with drawn frames. Give that colony a new queen and move the nuc to the location of the aggressive hive. Swap the nuc with the aggressive colony so that the nuc gains the field force from the aggressive hive. Place the aggressive hive a few feet away with entrance facing a different direction. In 2 days, the field force of the aggressive hive will be in the nuc and the beekeeper can open it up, find the queen, and replace her. Presume she is very difficult to find. Make a square brood box with a queen excluder attached to the bottom. Place the excluder above an empty box with bottom board and start shaking bees from frames and smoking them enough to push them through the excluder. When the queen shows up, off with her head. Put the colony back together so the bees can cluster on the brood frames. They are now queenless. Either give them a new queen or do a newspaper unite with the nuc. Special note, 8 days after killing the old queen, go through the hive again and squash all queen cells. By that time, there won't be any larvae young enough to start another queen so the bees will accept the new queen or unite readily with the nuc.

Have I done this? Yes, just 2 weeks ago. I had a hot hive that was located in a horse pasture. I used this process because it does not create an unnecessary disturbance in a hive with a full load of mature foragers.

Why use the queen from an existing hive to make up the nuc? Because she was an older queen and if the bees killed her I would not care.

What if the bees were in a heavily populated area? I would seal them up and transport them to a location where I could work on them without risk to other people.