What did you do in the Apiary today?

[drex]

3 weeks ago I cut out the comb from 4 frames from one of my my nationals and tied them onto the top bars of my old empty KTBH, which I run just of interest. Today had a look and have 15 bars, virtually fully drawn of nice straight comb. Good Job I made my own Warre type hive tool last year..

Also have set a Warre box on top of one of my nationals, with a cut out blanking plate. They are now drawing out two nice bars in the Warre. One was a bit wavy, so have straightened it out.

Inherited both the Warre and KTBH, and just doing it out of interest. Amazing.

 

[SDM]

I always thought the water spray was supposed to reduce the number of flying bees. In the light of Seeley's temperature increase seems it may be right to us it but it may have been used for the "wrong" reasons in the past. Or maybe it does both.

Mostly it's just to tighten up the cluster so it doesn't fall apart when you move it.

 

[Tomlow bee]

Found on the hive floor

I have been a little slow in changing the floor on one of my hives. This was a swarm that hived itself last july in a stack of boxes that i keep in a field near my house. Sorted them out last august and only had a mesh floor with a normal entrance to use.

When changing over to an underfloor entrance, i found a dried up corpse of a shrew which had managed to get in through the small entrance and obviously the bees had killed it as no damage to any of thr brood frames. Colony is going great guns and on around 9 frames with the queen (spotted) laying well.

The many shrews around will not get in through my L shaped underfloor entrance!

 

[gregior]

Inspected 6 of mine today,11 days after last inspection should have done it sooner but just haven't had the time.

Hive 1; 12 frames bias (9 last time) Q cells with larvae.Eventually found the Queen so dd an AS on it.

Hive 3; 14 frames bias (up from 8 frames bias 11 days ago!) Q cells with eggs and 1 with a young larvae AS'd this one too after another long hunt for the Q.

Hive 4 ; 8 frames bias (5 last time) no sign of swarming.

Hive 5 ; Demareed this last visit. No cells in old brood boxes and 3 frames of foundation in new bottom box drawn with eggs in.

Hive 6 ; Demareed this one last time too, again no cells in old brood boxes and Q laying below.

Hive 7 ; 16 frames bias (14 last time) Sealed Q cells but eggs still present ,went through the hive 3 times (it was heaving with bees) but couldn't find Queen (clipped) so It looks like they recently swarmed and the Q is lost in the grass somewhere.Gutted as this is my best colony but on the bright side I made 3 nucs up from it so could have some good new queens on the way.

Phew busy day mostly spent looking for Queens in very strong colonies-great fun!

Some of the supers have a little weigh to them now and i've had lots of frames drawn out nicely over the last couple of weeks. Every piece of kit i own apart from one entrance block is now in use.

 

[Somerford]

2 nights ago did a talk to a WI group - went well great feedback and they tore the honey for sale off my table after

Today ..

Took delivery of a new load of bulk invert sugar syrup for the

Had a tidy up of the main bee store to see the wood from the trees

Strimming around the paddock and dropped off 10 Jerry cans of syrup to one of the maiting Apiaries

Evening spent getting honey orders together

 

[simonforeman]

Bees having a field day on the OSR.... there are bees coming in covered in yellow...

2 day beekeeping course tomorrow and Sunday, looking forward to it.

 

[sean-a]

Checked on my bait hive (a grotty old woodpeckered bb that caught a large prime this time last year)

It appears pied wagtails have got in first, dont know who was more suprised, me or her !

I have been using an old BB as a hive stand.
The colony died out in March, despite going great guns in February
I needed the hive to do an AS and was cleaning it out.

There was a load of detritus on the bottom of the BB stand I wanted to clean out, and when I lifted it there was a big fat mouse under there with her family.
She dashed off into the ivy with her family clinging to her like fat sausages.

One baby left, so I replaced the BB

 

[ianorsven]

Went to check for EQCs after carrying out an artificial swarm (Pagden) and on entering the apiary spotted a big old hornet flying from one of my hives. First time in 8 years they've been around my bees as far as I know. Will keep an eye out now and hope to ID it (as European variety!).

 

[The Poot in Somerset]

Inspected both hives. Buckfasts on brood and a half (by default!) filling the shallow with brood. Drawing out foundation in the super above, now that QX taken off. First frames being drawn are foundationless with starter strips and kebab sticks - natural drone cells being produced. Hive 2 (from swarm last year) - added second brood box last weekend, beneath original. Super above QX full of bees drawing out comb and lots of nectar in the cells. Found the queen - unmarked, very dark and slender compared to the Buckfast queen in Hive 1. Didn't try to mark her as I'm likely to squish her! So both doing well and both have lots of capped brood so populations on the rise. Both have room for expansion at present. No swarm cells found. I just wish the Buckies would stop gluing the top frames to those beneath them!

 

[Brigsy]

Not strictly apiary activity, but went to a Healthy Bee day today. First hand examination of the major diseases invaluable.

 

[lilybetbee]

Checked my colony that was Q- in April, (but had a lot of bees), the new Q they raised from donated eggs is now laying.

Took down extra QC from nuc I set up.

 

[Erichalfbee]

One Pagden
One Queen in nuc
More to come and the sun is still shining

 

[Eyeman]

One Pagden
One Queen in nuc
More to come and the sun is still shining

I thought you preferred Snellgrove II as per Wally Shaw?

 

[Brian Bush]

A friend came over today to help me with a large colony that had to be placed on a double 14X12 brood box. The hive is bursting with bees and space to lay was becoming limited. We decided to demaree the hive and I placed a grafting frame in it yesterday. This morning we set up the demaree, placed the queen in the lower box, 3 supers ad then the upper box reconfigured and containing the graft frame. We then went on a journey to collect a frame of young brood from another apiary. When we returned the bees had settled down. When we removed the graft frame they were already roping and trying to draw wax on the cells. We sat down and Sean gave me a simple lesson in grafting and we replaced the graft frame. I will wait 3 days and then check the queen cell situation removing any cells they have tried to raised other than on the graft frame.
I now have my fingers crossed!!!

 

[Zante]

Brood pattern is a lot better, the workers must have moved stores around to give her room to lay. Also more bees and more brood. Also almost no brood left on the old black frames, just a few large grubs. Later on I will remove those frames once all the brood has emerged.
Didn't spot the queen, but there was plenty of young brood.
I removed the queen excluder. Despite the BB being fairly full of bees they seem quite reluctant to go up in the super, and there is plenty of honey in the BB, some frames quite heavy with it, but none in the super. We'll see if it makes any difference.

One thing I've noticed is my bees REALLY like to draw wax, especially between frames. I'll have to arm myself with a knife that's sharper than my hive tool to clear it a bit, I always seem to make a big mess with the hive tool. I'm always worried that I might squish the queen between two pieces of wax when repositioning frames.

Acacia is almost gone, but there is almost no honey in the super. I'm thinking the colony came out of winter in quite a bad shape and had a harder time building up. Not to worry though, I will still have plenty for myself at the end of the season and plenty for the bees to overwinter.

This is already shaping up to be a much better year than the last one, rain-wise, but just to give you an idea of how dry last year was, once it started raining again, it took 2 weeks of rain for the rivers to start swelling, and the reservoir still isn't back to its normal level, after a quite rainy winter.

With acacia written off I'm hoping for a bumper crop of chestnut and bramble. Lime would be nice, and there are loads of lime trees within range, but they were pruned down to the trunk last year. They seem to have recovered, having a nice "bush" of leaves halfway along the trunk, but I don't know if they're in any condition to bloom this year or if I'll have to wait for the next.

 

[madasafish]

Finished the inspection I started on Thursday (lots of beekeeping in between- none of my bees). Sunny and 16C with a moderate breeze.
Lang jumbos in good shape biggest filling two supers so added third. Weakest on 6 frames brood.
Jumbo nuc which overwintered in a 4 frame HoneyPaw nuc on 1.5 sides of bees now on 4 frames bees so into a frame nuc.
TBH going great guns but sealed and unsealed QCs - looked like swarm cells - so broke down all but the one sealed one.. to find queen 4 frames further on.. (Bees should read books).

Mini nuc (5 frame) left busy raising own queen after last one died/disappeared..

Only had to use the smoker oone one hive and only one sting - TBH for both. So much for natural beekeeping giving happier bees...


Breeze kept me from cooking.. lovely..

Now for queen rearing next week

 

[JWF]

Inspected the home apiary.

Hive 1 (14*12) is expanding slowly and there was evidence of DWV so I will vape them soon. I transferred two frames of bias from another colony at home which is bursting atvthe seams.
Hive 2 (sad nat) has a DLW - will shake out when I get round to it
Hive 4 (14*12) is now on four supers, as the third is now filled but not capped. I had to steel myself to go into this colony as they're huge, even though they've been donating brood to give 1. They were good natured though, and I used water spray for the first time which does seem to be effective in keeping the flyers down.

There are loads of tree blossom at the moment, including an impressive display the hawthorn. The OSR is now going over but there's been very little sign of my bees foraging on it so far, so fingers crossed for a nice runny spring crop

I hope some of the supers get capped soon as I have two shops waiting for an order.

 

[Brigsy]

Also trying nucing the queen this year as my main hive has queen cells rather than the Wally 2 that I've used before.

 

[Erichalfbee]

I thought you preferred Snellgrove II as per Wally Shaw?

I did. I thought it worked with the bees better
But I had two fail last year with the repatriated queen being killed.
The Pagdens done last year worked well. You just need to be really on top of queen cells.

 

[Angry_Mob]

Moved my Q- hive 8 days after I did the padgen AS. The Q+ hive looked strong so I decided to put them in a new Abelo 14x12 hive and I guess it will only get better as the flying bees return from the Q- hive.

I took the poly nuc that they were in, and set it up as a bait hive. Advantage over my old bait hive is its now in a tree and bees have lived in that box so fingers crossed.

My super that was almost full (they had a tiny patch capped today) is now on the Q- weaker hive, should I stick a clearer board on it and put it on my Q+ hive or leave it where it is?