What did you do in the Apiary today?

[Queens59]

I'm back and wish I wasn't!!

Hive 1 - RICHARD 1 x sealed QC. No brood any stage, quieter, may have swarmed.

Hive 2 - BARRY Q- AND VERY AGRESSIVE

Hive 3 - IVY - Q- but MAY have a virgin, as they are nowhere near as aggressive as Barry! Seen nothing though

Hive 4 - ANNEKA - Swarm found in apple tree (don't think ours) No queen seen, but not unhappy of aggressive.

Hive 5 - SIAN - Swarm from Venn Ottery Barton chimney 27/5. Queen seen (bright orange bottom) but has not started laying, Varroa treatment may have delayed start. Removed treatment due to low drop

Any suggestions apart from wait? The forecast says Tues/Weds. might be nice if a virgin is waiting to mate, but no true way I can find out?!*&^$)*!?

 

[Mike a]

Off to Manor Farm this morning with a swarm I collected yesterday. All being well this swarm will feature in a upcoming TV documentary life on a farm during the war. They will be put into an old fashioned 2 tiered skep and filmed over the next 3 months.

You may of noticed I haven't put in any frames, I'm hoping they will cluster up so when I tip them out in front of their new home it will look good to see them running into the skep when filmed.

Whilst I was collecting the swarm above, I was called to collect another swarm but by the time I got there it was raining and 21:20hrs so will go back later today to collect them.

 

[scuttlefish]

New equipment - yay! Proper feeders and clearer boards Put together another super and some frames in possibly-misplaced optimism.

Checked all four hives for supplies after the bad weather, the two full hives (#1 & #2) are fine but the hived swarm (#3) and the A/S (#1a) are both very low so the new feeders went straight into action with a litre of 1:1 for each (we're promised better weather this week and the clover's out, so don't want to give them too much just yet).

The queen cell that went into the A/S open is now sealed, and will hopefully have hatched by next weekend, so apart from possible further feeding if the weather doesn't improve I'll be leaving that one alone for a couple of weeks now until she's mated (and here's hoping for better weather for mating flights over the next couple of weeks!).

The hived swarm has fresh larvae, building up slowly, hopefully the clover and some sunshine will kick them off a bit without needing more feeding.

Had a peek up the skirts of hive #1 which has the old queen (hopefully), supers, older bees and 1 frame of brood after the A/S, only two-three seams of bees in the BB there so at next weekend's inspection my main task is to check that they're Q+ (but if there's no flow, and they don't draw comb for HM to lay in, that might be easier scheduled than done).

 

[oliver90owner]

I'll be leaving that one alone for a couple of weeks now until she's mated

More than that, I would suggest, if she is not due to emerge until late this week. Do your sums, draw a time line?

 

[scuttlefish]

Thanks RAB - lazy language on my part, mea culpa, I should have said "...a few weeks..." - I'm allowing three until next inspection, one to eclosure and two for mating (or three for mating if the weather's dreadful that fortnight). Next check on #1A is in my diary for the weekend of 7th/8th July.

If #1A ends up queenright and #1 isn't (due to me messing up the A/S most likely - which should be clear by 7th/8th July) I'll probably be re-combining them, otherwise if they're both Q+ #1A will become #4.

 

[YorkshireBees]

Finally got out to my hives yesterday after nearly, or in some cases) over two weeks without inspection!
The gap was partly due to weather and partly due to having visitors the weekend before and not having a spare minute.

Anyway, I haven't had any hives swarm, lucky for me. There are 1 or 2 starting to prepare.
In my Q- hives I pulled a couple of queens and ended up with far more queens than I had places for!
So much for thinking I had knocked down all but 1 qcell!
Found and marked 3-4 Queens that are now mated and laying well.
No hives were short of stores but far from honey blocked like they almost looked last inspection!

 

[Essexgary]

What a day yesterday! have two colonies in the Beehaus (following AS). All good but had to leave them for 2 weeks as was travelling for work. The AS side - didn't see the queen but a couple of eggs and slightly bent eggs (4/day old).. lots of brood, and 5 sealed queen cells. Decided to knock all QC's off as haven't got equipment for another AS and the queens are so swarmy - decided that I want to requeen anyway. The hive looked really packed so guessed they hadn't swarmed.. but were about to. My plan was to look again this friday - if emergency cells, then knock off and combine with the original hive (with new queen and doing well).

Closed up and went inside. and then all hell broke loose, bees slamming against the window trying to get to me, buzzing around, stung the dog.. neighbour texts me to say that bees are really aggressive and he has 'about 20' buzzing around a bush as the back of the garden.. I go and look and find a swarm - no doubt from my hive.

Collect the swarm and give away to another beek - with a swarm warning!. add paper inbetween the two colonies in the Beehaus and instant Karma.

Very stressful. note to self, don't knock off all QC's until you are sure about what's going on!

Gary

 

[Gardenbees]

Hefted hives, checked varroa board and looked for signs of queen activity. Bees calm and very busy now the weather's nice.

Found the new queen in my split hive. Rather small but laying nicely, with about 6 frames of almost solid brood except for the edges. She's incredibly calm. Well, I thought so: picked her up for marking and she sat there politely, then gave a big wriggle and got a smear of paint across her back... She trotted back onto the frame and started laying again, without much reaction from the workers, so hopefully she's OK.

My biggest colony has been waiting for their queen to get mated for weeks now. Today I saw her - hurray! A nice, big, plump-looking Q, a little secretive but not dashing about too much. She's got yards of polished cells to fill, and has so far put eggs into about half a frame, so hasn't been going for long. After botching the previous one I didn't bother to mark her... no need really.

After 5 days there were two varroa on one board (the really big colony) and none on the others, which is acceptable.

I wasn't sure whether they'd need feeding, but I think not. They have quite a bit of honey, although the chomped edges and recent re-filling suggest they had eaten nearly everything in the two supers full which they made a few weeks ago.

I can't believe they're doing so well after such a long spell of poor weather. Little stars!

 

[eleanor20]

Got stung? That's what I did!

 

[psafloyd]

Checked one of mine with a full brood (mostly stores) that I put a super on last week. Not a bit of the foundation has been drawn. Will go back and spray some sugar water on it, maybe tomorrow.

 

[Summerslease]

Watched the front of the hive I put a cast in on 5th June. I had been concerned that the queen hadn't been mated because of the weather (no pollen being taken in). When...... she landed on the front of the hive and ran straight in with something white protruding from her abdomen. I presume she was returning from a mating flight. I couldn't believe my eyes. 4pm and 20 degrees.

 

[Outlander]

First inspection of my first hive today. Everything looks fine; lots of brood at different stages stores appeared to be fine but being new to the art will monitor this closely. Found queen merrily going about putting her but down holes. Oh and my first ever sting to my belly, she just waited for me to take of smooch.

 

[Polyanwood]

Had to put syrup on 2 nucs and 2 artificial swarms today.

 

[madasafish]

Inspected all 7 - no now 8 with a swarm - colonies. Smoker lit but not needed. Bees very low on stores but with current good weather did not feed.

Building insulated TBH nuc in between DIY/garden/plumbing.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Yesterday decided to put syrup onthe hive in the out apairy (low on stores and struggling to expand during the cold weather. Clattered around in the hive shed (old covered dog run - ideal for the job) to get all the kit and popped down to do the job. Unbeknownst to me i had dislodged the crown board i had covering a nearly empty super i'd taken off one of the home hives to put syrup on last week. When i got home shed and garden alive with bees madly robbing out said super doh!
Today spoke to a very nice man who runs a business fitting out the inside of vans with plywood liners and shelves. Asked him if I could cadge the odd offcut from his skip - he said 'take the lot if you want, I only have to pay to take it away' a lot of it had been there a while and beyond salvage or reach. but I piled in a load to the jeep. Already cut out 15 crown boards and have the raw materials for a couple or so bait hives and nucs. He's keeping the good stuff to one side for me in the future And the bees are going flat out, so syrup off tomorrow i think and supers back on.

 

[blackcavebees]

Break in weather allowed inspection of hive, my girls VERY irrate and grumpy loads of stings in my suit and gloves, not usual behaviour at all so closed up and they chased me down the garden into the house. Guess what, one hour later a thunderstorm! Heard about this but never experienced till now

 

[Dusty Rhodes]

Took off the feeder I needed to put on, on Friday.

Replaced with super they'd had on previously and done nothing with Took a peek later (polyc. crown board) and they were all over the super!

Think my lot have suddenly discovered what a super is for!

Bit of a relief.

Dusty

 

[meidel]

started at crack of dawn - due to beeb forecasting rain all day, made up syrup and trudged down to OH's small nuc to feed with 500 mls

later in the afternoon as forecasted rain hadn't arrived went down and looked through some of my colonies - the one which had started to lay seems to have stopped completely and one supersedure cell can be seen hanging down the middle of a frame. Bees here were calm. enough stores so closed up with mixed feelings.

2nd colony with possible drone laying queen, eggs are now singly at bottom of cell and a few capped worker cells. The rest of the frame seem bumpy, not distinctly domed caps but not exactly flat either. darned bees, why don't they produce anything that look like the pictures in the books??? bees calm despite my efforts to locate their queen, in vain.

Now my main colony, the one which I thought was settling down, (after swarming twice previously) raising own virgin which had laid up 5 frames of brood and filled a super and a half. When I last looked on 9th June they'd torn down the 4 QCs and I saw the queen and eggs in the frame she was on. I even marked her! When I looked today, the bees were a tad tetchy and I saw neither eggs nor queen. I have a feeling they swarmed earlier when I wasn't looking as there was a swarm cell at the bottom of one of the frames.

 

[oliver90owner]

Already cut out 15 crown boards

Intentions are to expand your colony count?

Leave them as crownboards for now, and convert some to feeder boards and some to clearing boards later? The feeder and clearing boards can be pressed into service as crownboards, but the simple crownboards are so much easier - no bothers if moving colonies (if on OMFs), easy to clear off any bees when replacing the roof, etc etc.

RAB

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Already cut out 15 crown boards

Intentions are to expand your colony count?

Leave them as crownboards for now, and convert some to feeder boards and some to clearing boards later? The feeder and clearing boards can be pressed into service as crownboards, but the simple crownboards are so much easier - no bothers if moving colonies (if on OMFs), easy to clear off any bees when replacing the roof, etc etc.

RAB

I've always had separate boards for feeding, clearing and a 'crown board' just now i've got extras for high days as well - all cut to size for easier stowing, i haven't put the edging on yet. I was going to make two PH style clearer boards to try out this year and yes, the intention is to expand (haven't let SWMBO know) I'm on half clearing the plot behind the garden (anotherr large garden sized area) so the plan is, the two 'decoy' hives in full view of the kitchen window and then a few more right out back. Not to mention an ever lengthening list of apiary sites offered - but nice and slowly for now