What did you do in the Apiary today?

[VEG]

yep I didnt go in when i was in london

 

[Headnavigator]

View attachment 7282

Was a bit worried today by the presence of this on the hives, but a bit of research identified it as Hornet Hoverfly (Volucella zonaria).

Not a very nice looking beastie, rather bigger than a Queen bee, but apparently harmless.

At least it wasn't the Asian Hornet I feared it might be for a moment.

 

[Dusty Rhodes]

Not nice to be told there was a 15 quid charge to get into St Paul's and 16 for Westminster so in 2000 years here we are full circle - I bet the pharisees and moey lenders are chuckling away to themselves

Rather ashamed at that, Jenkinsbrynmair.

Come to Manchester Cathedral and I'll show you round for free...

......if I can have a return visit to the chapel?


Dusty

 

[Sadders]

Popped in to apiary to put a reduced access entrance block in to reduce robbing. Also replaced a frame of stores that I removed The other week.

 

[Headnavigator]

Have tilted a pane of glass over each hive entrance - bees are smart enough to fly round the side of the glass and find their entrance, but it fazes wasps and I hope other marauders. Have seen a rat close to the hives twice recently but last time I set a rat trap the only thing I caught was my fingers, I'm rather averse to poison, and I don't have the patience to sit there for hours with my air rifle. Has anyone here suffered rat damage to hives?

 

[jackbee]

Saw eggs, saw eggs , first time ever on my hives, maybe it'll be easier from now on

Put apilife on swarm hive, and porters on larger so I can take super off and put apiguard on there tomorrow.

Bees were lovely today, no prob at all, so mild.

 

[Moggs]

Bought sugar - 3x25kg for the start of the autumn feasting. Really pleased to see that the late-captured-mini-swarm-in-polynuc has a prolific laying queen. While I was just going to unite (assuming healthy), I'll now give them a chance for a build up for overwintering.

 

[Luminos]

Have tilted a pane of glass over each hive entrance - bees are smart enough to fly round the side of the glass and find their entrance, but it fazes wasps and I hope other marauders. Have seen a rat close to the hives twice recently but last time I set a rat trap the only thing I caught was my fingers, I'm rather averse to poison, and I don't have the patience to sit there for hours with my air rifle. Has anyone here suffered rat damage to hives?

Not a chance.
17 cats.
And a few of their friends.

 

[Chris Luck]

Not a chance.
17 cats.
And a few of their friends.

I guarantee you that if you are in the French countryside you have rats, even with 100 cats and a healthy wildlife population you will have rats.

Rats are everywhere, they are real survivors.

I've only ever had them in the roof of a TBH but all my other hives have mouse guards anyway.

As an aside, since March this year it has been illegal to deploy poisons in an exterior situation in France, only interior use is allowed.

Chris

 

[Luminos]

They don't survive long here

 

[fatshark]

Removed the cleaned out supers, replaced the QE and added one block of fondant and a tray of Apiguard per hive.

That's it ... the end of the season

The only thing left is to keep feeding up the mini-nucs and prepare some winter projects.

 

[Walrus]

Bit of a depressing day for me today.

A hive which I combined a couple of weeks ago has gone Q-. About 8 charged QCs & bees quite bad tempered.

Another hive which had a young queen in it has no eggs/larvae and not much sealed brood. Can't find the queen but they are calm & no QCs. I introduced a frame with eggs/brood today to see what happens.

Both were 2012 queens.

Had a good chat to Hivemaker and decided that I'll need to combine the two weaker colonies, and depending on the test frame I may need to buy in a mated queen.

Oh well, at least I have a chance of going into winter with 2 colonies that have a chance of making it to spring. Oh no.....2 colonies.....Finman will be after me.

 

[Headnavigator]

They don't survive long here

No cats to save birds from a grisly death.

No birds now as I stopped feeding them to discourage rats, except the pigeons which eat all my veg, assisting the slugs.

Seems like rats are the only wildlife left for me to 'enjoy'.

Except for the bees of course! Good old bees, they make up for it all.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Rather ashamed at that, Jenkinsbrynmair.

Come to Manchester Cathedral and I'll show you round for free...

......if I can have a return visit to the chapel?


Dusty

Sounds like a great idea - I'll take you up on that one day

 

[The Doctor]

Took off supers yesterday to extract. Miserable amount of honey. One hive had very little (now feeding) and in another the bees were so vicious that I could not get the super off as they tend to go off and sting one of the neighbours if they can't get me.

I would say 10kg honey for 3 colonies - miserable. Hope next year is better and won't have the problems we have had this year - swarming like mad, missing queens, drone laying queens, laying workers, granulated honey in frames......! at least there are very few wasps around this year. Must have been a bad year for them too.

Ah well, lets hope next year is better.

 

[greengumbo]

Nothing. Have left them to accept a new mated queen.

Will feed a bit, take the cage out in couple of days and then leave for a few weeks to get on with it.

I'll monitor varroa drop and consider re-starting apiguard at some point.

 

[user 6228]

More metal bashing and foam cutting for hives
I now need a plan G for the cushman floors

 

[abi-e]

Checked the feed on one hive - it was being robbed out, so reduced the entrance space and took away the now empty feed!
Put in the first tray of apiguard in the second hive and trimmed all around it so it is not overtaken by the surrounding jungle. Bees were very chilled out and let me get on with it - probably all out robbing the other hive!!
Saw 1 solitary wasp trying to access the stronger hive with no success.

 

[WelshPaul]

Checked my hive today, stores were halved from last week so gave 2 litres of ambrosia, will check again on the weekend.

 

[madasafish]

Re-fed all nucs.

Checked varroa drop on all hives: Total fall from 3 days over 6 hives and 3 nucs: 6 varroa. (This is during treatment which started last week)

Nice weather today : dry and sunny from 9am: best day of the summer so far.

Thirty plus peacock butterflies, 2 red admiral, 1 comma and 2 small tortoiseshell.On buddleia and other flowers in garden

Best display for years...

Three wasps: worst display for years. I blame neonicotinoids.