What did you do in the Apiary today?

[madasafish]

Shook out a hive of DLW into the grass prior to a frame of brood and eggs.

 

[lilybetbee]

Went to move a nuc box that was 'resting' in M-i-L's garden to a hive in a new out apiary.
Absolutely full to the seams, with numerous capped and charged QC, so a bit too late in hiving.
Left the hive and 4 frames with 2 QC at the new site and brought back the Queen and 2 frames in the nuc box. May reunite, it depends how things go.
Need to explain to OH why I seem to have another lot of bees and why they found their way to our garden!

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Just taking a break from extracting (small percentage of crop, but the hives are getting too tall to manage) I can't believe they are paking so much in - backfilling down the frame so there isn't even a beespace! Bit of weighing and checking and a conservative estimate of yield is 30lb per super! 5 down 4 to go!

 

[pargyle]

I think pargyle means North South so face your entrance East for warm, South for cold

Yep ... Spot on Erica ... the bees seem to like to build comb in a North to South direction from the Compass - presumably they like the comb aligned with the earth's magnetic field ?

I've no real views on frames being warm way or cold way - I've got both and it doesn't seem to make a lot of difference as far as I can see ?

 

[theeggman]

Another one of THOSE days

Inspections this am.

1: not inspected for 2 weeks as we left a single QC last time. Should have emerged by now. Removed dummy board and then first frame, check the inside face for Q no sign, turn over to see outside face, there's a great looking Q and off she flies over the hedge.

2: Inspected 2 weeks ago, left for 2 weeks as there was a single supersedure cell right in the middle of one frame. As the Q was last year's we left them to sort it out. Swarmed yesterday, caught and removed from a bramble hedge and put into BB beside hive 3 to unite today. QCs everywhere in hive 2, Supersedure cell still not emerged and contents dead. Left 1 open QC.

3: Small colony with a recent Q laying like a train. As we are going through looking for the Q there she is being attacked by what looked like a scrub Q which promptly vanished when we disturbed it. Attacked Q didn't survive so now we have a colony with a probable duff Q running around that is no bigger than a standard worker.

The swarm from Yesterday, that we thought would have the Red Q from No.2 has no obvious Q so there's probably a virgin in there somewhere. Red Q must have gone when we weren't around.

The upside is that we put clearer boards on 3 hives and will remove 7 supers tomorrow.

To think we started keeping bees as a relaxing pastime in our dotage!!

Tim.

 

[BeeJayBee]

I think pargyle means North South so face your entrance East for warm, South for cold

Yep ... Spot on Erica ... the bees seem to like to build comb in a North to South direction from the Compass - presumably they like the comb aligned with the earth's magnetic field ?

I've no real views on frames being warm way or cold way - I've got both and it doesn't seem to make a lot of difference as far as I can see ?

Yes, the frames run north -> south, doesn't matter where the entrance can't run Langstroths any other way than 'cold', so it means the entrance is to the south but I don't think it would make any difference if it was to the west.

I don't think 'cold' or 'warm' applies any more either, not with open mesh floors.

 

[richardbees]

Had a look in the top of my hives today and it's obvious the exceptional honey flow we've just experienced here is over.

I agree with beejoyful.......general use of omf also means 'entrance blocks' with different openings and 'mouse guards' are no longer needed.

 

[Bosleeu]

Checked almost all my hives. Discovered two newly mated queens are laying very well, three newly introduced queens are doing the same.

Larger colonies all stacked with heavy supers, but only on average about 20% capped. Crossing my fingers for a little bit of sweet chestnut left out there to help with that.......

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

I agree with beejoyful.......general use of omf also means 'entrance blocks' with different openings and 'mouse guards' are no longer needed.

Why no mouse guards - are they scared of OMF?

 

[stephenpug]

I have a hive that is stuffing the brood box with honey despite two supers on bloody bees
I also have one that had a cast swarm today so I had a look in and found 9 swarm cells which I ripped out leaving just two again bloody bees
And it is called a relaxing hobby pmsl

 

[meidel]

so they didn't like that queen, found her on the ground outside the hive a few days ago, gave her to a queenless box. Today when I checked the box whence she came there were 4 queen cells, 2 sealed! Why??? Oh well, so cut out 3 and left them with one. And set up a rhombus escape to remove the supers on 2 colonies.

Queenright in all 6 other colonies checked, one being given away on Sunday is doing really well - feel quite proud of the little nuc with 4 frames of brood, 2 of stores and full of bees generally.

Saw bees foraging on a privet hedge on my walk with dog this evening, wondered whose bees they were...

 

[richardbees]

Jenkins

Why no mouse guards - are they scared of OMF?

?:

My entrances are now permanently 8mm deep about 150mm wide, so are mouse-proof and also helpful for the guard bees to defend against intruders.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

I do the same - but under floor entrances - wasps hate them.

Today I did a tour of the three apiaries helped by Labrax (another forumite) - confirmed both my introduced queens accepted and laying - also three queens mated and now laying - happy days. Bees still shovelling in the honey - at this rate even I may be getting a bit short of kit. Bottled up 50 jars of honey extracted Thursday for a desperate retailer who texted me this afternoon.

 

[user 6228]

Very short of kit, put together 3 EPS supers, 3 PIR brood boxes 3 PIR floors

 

[Tonyatcwfarm]

Stood for a long time wondering WTF is going on here surrounded by angry bees wondering wTF is he doing here
Monday 30th lack of eggs in brood and half colony(1super)had me concerned but no q cells seen
Monday 7th one frame in bb had 7/8 q cells mid frame sealed,4 q cells in bb half all sealed.left 2 cells in whole bb and demareed half
Intended to add extra super today,took a quick look at frame with q cells only to see one hatched cell one intact
Cell timeline seem erratic to me but I'll leave for a week before adding a test frame,have a few nucs and mated queens I can combine with
Just when I thought I had it all boxed off

 

[Lindylou]

Inspected 3 of our hives. The last one (we always inspect it last as bees really really like to glue everything up) was full to bursting of angry bees. It is usually a very calm colony so we have no idea why they are so angry. Did a quick inspection - we both got stung several times though. Perhaps the recent spell of bad weather?

 

[madasafish]

Warm and dry here: 23C at 10am.. Association Apiary had lots of queen bees: watched practise marking when holding queen

 

[Tim.S]

Had to do a honey extraction today as totally out of kit. Only mid season and 240 pounds of honey off 4 hives and more to come.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Hived a 6 frame nuc which is waiting for the queen to mate and start laying as there was hardly any space left free - found out these are going to be very sticky bees if the colony makes good - full length entrance on this nuc which they had totally propolised leaving a half inch entrance hole - and that's in a week!
Picked up ten new galvanised hive roof covers from my contact took stock of kit seeing there's quite a few weeks left to the season - looks like more time in the workshop soon!

 

[Erichalfbee]

Clearing 2 supers
Took tab out of queen introduction cage to find that bees had proposed all the holes apart from the few on one short side. Inmates still alive inside so I made a couple of holes in the fondant plug.