What did you do in the Apiary today?

[Heather]

half a gallon of food? Why? 2 supers of foundation - surely not.

Witchcraft. New bees on a nuc should have enough food there that you just add a couple of frames of foundation either side and then a dummy board- and let them go for it.
A swarm- don't feed for 2 days- then maybe 1 pint to give them a little boost of food to draw foundation.
Dont add a super till most of the brood box is full. They will be overwhelmed at such an addition

 

[greatbritishhoney]

I got my first bees yesterday - so I set them up in a nice newly planted orchard and watched them enjoy the sunshine. Came back later and added 1/2 gallon of syrup to help them draw out the two supers of foundation I added too.
Fingers crossed
Mark

Mark, one thing to be careful of - if you are using syrup to get the bees to draw out your supers you need to be careful that they don't start storing the syrup in the newly drawn comb, otherwise your honey crop will be tainted with syrup.
It would be nice if bees would use up all the syrup to fully draw out all the super frames, but what usually happens is they'll partially draw out the middle frames and immediately start filling them with the rest of the sugar syrup.

 

[Erichalfbee]

Mark, one thing to be careful of - if you are using syrup to get the bees to draw out your supers you need to be careful that they don't start storing the syrup in the newly drawn comb
It would be nice if bees would use up all the syrup to fully draw out all the super frames, but what usually happens is they'll partially draw out the middle frames and immediately start filling them with the rest of the sugar syrup.

Would there be a case for giving say half a litre, waiting a couple of days after it's gone then giving another increment in the same way? I realise this would be easy only if you had hives in your garden or nearby.

 

[witchcraft]

Thanks all - I was simply following the instructions that came with the colony.

I'll take a look tomorrow anyway

Mark

 

[freethorpe bees]

Where abouts in Suffolk are you Mark? (not exactly, just roughly)

 

[witchcraft]

In the middle of a triangle between Stowmarket, Lavenham and Hadleigh.

And I should add I have a full (8 frames of brood) colony that came with an extracted super - hence me adding the extra one and trying to get them to draw out onto both.

 

[Cazza]

In the middle of a triangle between Stowmarket, Lavenham and Hadleigh.

How lovely, not far from where I was born and raised. Welcome!
Cazza

 

[phillisb]

Today i finally became a beekeeper.I moved my nuc of bees bought yesterday into my hive.The pollen on bees was what i noticed most about the girls today and the photo's made me add this(and some pride!)

 

[victor meldrew]

Raised two flag stones on building blocks in preparation for swapping hive floors and stands !
Flags raised to keep well drained and to allow lawn mower to pass under same

John Wilkinson

 

[witchcraft]

]In the middle of a triangle between Stowmarket, Lavenham and Hadleigh.

How lovely, not far from where I was born and raised. Welcome!
Cazza

Thank you - it is a rather nice art of the country. Nice too to see bees all over my apple blossom and to think that a fair proportion are mine

 

[freethorpe bees]

Welcome to another East Anglian Witchcraft!

I've just come in from doing an inspection. Just the one play cup at the moment, no egg in it. They decided to take an exception to my smoker so I have just sat here with the tweezers and removed 23 stings from it!

Will the sting pheromone still be on it next week? If so is there anything I can do?

 

[victor meldrew]

Welcome to another East Anglian Witchcraft!

I've just come in from doing an inspection. Just the one play cup at the moment, no egg in it. They decided to take an exception to my smoker so I have just sat here with the tweezers and removed 23 stings from it!

Will the sting pheromone still be on it next week? If so is there anything I can do?

Are your smoker bellows constructed from a brown material with a velvet or felt like texture ?
If so that'll be the catalyst
Bees really take exception to this particulat type of bellows ! I have witnessed this phenomena before!
Up side is replacement bellows are cheap enough

John Wilkinson

 

[freethorpe bees]

Yes they are! It hasn't happened before though but I will replace them.

Yesterday I was pin boning a trout with said tweezers, today I'm pin boning my bellows!

 

[Chris Luck]

Total chaos, murder and mayhem....

What appeared to be one large swarm was clearly made up of bees from two different hives that when boxed proceeded to kill each other....chucked the lot on a sheeted walkway in front of an empty hive to sort them selves out, many, (the bulk), have gone in but there are a fair number of dead and still bees outside the hive.

Having a cup of tea now and hoping things sort themselves out and there is at least one Queen left alive. Hopefully one of the Queens did a return and recall to its hive and it is only bees that failed to respond that are mixed in the "swarm".

Chris

 

[Chris B]

Went through 42 colonies today in 3 apiaries.

I've lost 3 swarms.
I split 2 more to prevent swarming.
Full supers on some of the best ones.
The "duffers" from 2 weeks back are now needing supers.
Things are moving along very swiftly now. There's a steady flow of nectar but it doesn't seem to be rape - too dry probably. I watched bees on dandelions in one apiary but in another the dandelions were ignored. Pollen of all colours coming in - brick red, greyish, 2 shades of yellow.

 

[Cazza]

Things are moving along very swiftly now. There's a steady flow of nectar but it doesn't seem to be rape - too dry probably. .

I think you're spot on there. I have a flow but not from the rape which is close by.Very dry here.
Cazza

 

[MuswellMetro]

well made up a nuc as a to start to requeen a hive but may use her as a starter for one of the two colonies i had to get rid off, used an imported NZ queen, not my preferred method but no local queens available till May

No Nuc for the beginners this year, i will have to re combine AS to maintain a reasonable honey supply and use another myself

 

[YorkshireBees]

Checked my hived swarm, they are busy foraging in their new apiary and building comb, didn't spot any eggs yet but still very early. Removed lower QE and gave them a super with what was left of last years stored honey as a present!

Made my plans for inspections tomorrow!

We need rain badly!

 

[Erichalfbee]

Watched one of mine swarm....story elsewhere. Heaven knows what made me go over and look, I inspected Sunday and there was no need.Ha! I wonder if I will ever have enough experience to get this stuff right feeling very inadequate.
Rain? yes we need rain here too. Thundery showers forecast for Saturaday

 

[YorkshireBees]

Watched one of mine swarm....story elsewhere. Heaven knows what made me go over and look, I inspected Sunday and there was no need.Ha! I wonder if I will ever have enough experience to get this stuff right feeling very inadequate.
Rain? yes we need rain here too. Thundery showers forecast for Saturaday

Unlucky with the swarm

I am trying a method of swarm prevention described by a local bee farmer (member of my BKA) which basically involves demareeing them before they start to prepare to swarm. Seems ok so far, I did have one swarm (caught) but it was my fault as they had already built QC's and one was even sealed and I demaree'd them instead of AS!

Still have 5 hives that haven't swarmed so far.

In terms of water I have a black bucket now in my out apiary with a brick in it to hold it down in case of high winds and some compost thrown in for good measure then 2/3 filled with water!
There is a flow on here and loads of OSR but I think it is too dry to produce much nectar. We also have thundery showers forecast for the weekend, fingers crossed.