What did you do in the Apiary today?

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Making up nucs to over winter and cleared/blowed out the bees from 139 supers in one heather site, then moved some of the hives back to their wintering apiary... without blocking the entrances on any of them, bees sit tight and are very calm when being moved.
 
Making up nucs to over winter and cleared/blowed out the bees from 139 supers in one heather site, then moved some of the hives back to their wintering apiary... without blocking the entrances on any of them, bees sit tight and are very calm when being moved.

Never had the guts to leave the entrances open when shifting them in my vitara HM :icon_204-2:

I might try it what could possibly go wrong :spy:
 
Just sealed up hives before they get transported to their new home. It will be strange not having colonies about, but I'm going to continue to work on them for another 9 months.
 
Dodged showers/torrential rain to introduce a queen into a failed mating supersedure queen at the Gelli apiary, then same at the association apiary to put clearer board on ready for tomorrows class.
 
Done a second vape and fed all three colonies i also put six half full super frames above the crown boards near the feeders in the three hives for the bees to clean out, there still bringing pollen in from somewhere not ivy though as it is not in flower, it has me scratching my head where it is coming from.
 
Removed dummies from two hives and added some frames of comb for laying space. Strange mix of torrential rain and sunshine, the bees were calm and well behaved.
Last supers come off next week, the Ivy has begun to break.
 
I didn't do anything.
Pouring with rain all day
SO
I sent Stan out with the dog to count the drop from one colony.......
(Dog needed a walk anyway ;) )
 
I noticed Ivy here starting to open, so spent the day removing supers and reducing to 1 commercial brood box applying first of the apiguard treatment and feeding.
Both mated queens introduced last Friday have been accepted by the looks of it with fresh eggs and larvae present.
My last virgin queen I've been praying on successful mating has mated and has laid up 3 frames of brood.
 
Supers off, feeders on, bee's bedded down for the winter, extracted into the wee hours last night and have the thick end of 200lbs of honey to shift now.
 
If a survey was done on poorly mated queens of this forum I think you would find it stems from early in the season. Someone told me that Roger Patterson's queen rearing problems arises from letting nucs raise queen cells.
 
If a survey was done on poorly mated queens of this forum I think you would find it stems from early in the season. Someone told me that Roger Patterson's queen rearing problems arises from letting nucs raise queen cells.

If 'letting nucs raise queen cells' were something he started doing in recent years, I'm sure he will have seen that correlation.

If he has done so since earliest days, then it's not an explanation.

What he has described is a decline in queen performance since his beginnings in beekeeping, 1963 iirc.
 
If a survey was done on poorly mated queens of this forum I think you would find it stems from early in the season. Someone told me that Roger Patterson's queen rearing problems arises from letting nucs raise queen cells.

Please expand....

We have noticed many of this years crop of New Zealand Italian yellow stripey bees have been superceeded on being placed into a nuc ( Incubator raised... open mated... checked laying good brood etc etc) F2 to F3 in one fell swoop!

Nos da
 
Someone told me that Roger Patterson's queen rearing problems arises from letting nucs raise queen cells.

Perhaps if he stopped raising queen cells all his queen rearing problems would go away, He does talk some ....polite phrase....malarkey.
 
Hive maker

Funny you should say that makes moving quicker, I have started doing the very same thing, same result, very rare any bees come out while travelling and no chance of forgetting to pull the foams on new sites
 
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Did the first of 4 planned vapes on all mine after removing the last of the honey today.

Bees still working the balsam hard but it's coming to an end now,probably a week left of good forage on it.

It's been a fantastic season for me around here,i've increased from 4 to 8 colonies with swarms and splits,extracted 400lbs of honey and have 140 pieces of cut comb.Also had 6 boxes of foundation beautifully drawn out.All colonies are really strong too going into winter with very good queens.

:winner1st::winner1st::winner1st:
 
planned to take an early lunch break after a teleconference to start putting clearer boards on at the out apiaries seeing as it was fine but with showery weather forecast. Then my mobile rang and it was a delivery driver with a pallet of invert syrup for me - three days early!!
After frantic shifting of older stock to make room then moving the new stuff in place I finally managed to load the truck and set off - as the rain clouds gathered. managed to finish in between downpours (that is, in the heavy showers between downpours) and vape one colony which has shown signs of DWV so needed doing as a priority - the rest will be done next week.
The bees still busily foraging despite the rain. Making the most of the balsam at some apiaries while it lasts.
Few more hives to do tomorrow then supers off Sunday, extraction starts Monday.
 
Checked nucs and topped up feeders at out apiary. Started what looks like being 3 days of extracting, picked an F1 weekend to watch while spinning it off to make time go quicker.
S
 

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