What did you do in the Apiary today?

[Jimmys Mum]

Try a nail gun

Mmmm. They look a bit scary! Tennis elbow or a nail being fired accidentally through my foot.....?

 

[REDWOOD]

Bin The hammer and buy a cordless drill and screw your hives together

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Try a nail gun

I find a raquet works better than a nail gun for tennis

 

[YorkshireBees]

Nailgun for frame assembly and drill and screw together hive boxes!

That's my preferred method.

Off to clear the final supers for this year.

 

[Headnavigator]

Have run out of thymol crystals before completing my varroa treatment; have never had any trouble buying them before, but nowhere seems to sell them now - any ideas pls?

Doh, Google let me down, have now found them in Payn*s list, so no prob.

 

[Monsieur Abeille]

Was worried a week ago that one colony was broodless, and consequently put in a test frame. Much relief today as an inspection showed not only no queen cells, but also plenty of capped brood on frames that I had previously thought of as empty (bearing in mind that I didn't shake bees of any of the frames, and cannot see eggs anyway). Conclusion therefore that either she'd gone off lay during varroa treatment and I'd just missed some larvae, or I'd just failed to see any brood that was there hiding beneath bees.

 

[itma]

…
I also made up 6 new floors and 2 brood boxes, only to find that my tennis elbow has flared up again. I never had this before I kept bees and started making up my own kit. Apparently I am holding the hammer all wrong and it's all about the right wrist action! Whoever thought hammering could be so technical!

The wooden boxes that I made up in the past were principally screwed together, as also advised above.

However, the real answer is to go poly and not have to do any such assembly!
Paynes usually deliver next day, and with the only assembly being the slotting in of the rails*, the things can be in use mere minutes after delivery.


* If Paynes have remembered to include the rails! They've left them out of my orders more than once, so there's some sort of glitch in their system somewhere.

 

[Hivemaker.]

Have run out of thymol crystals before completing my varroa treatment; have never had any trouble buying them before, but nowhere seems to sell them now - any ideas pls?

Have bought them from C Wynne Jones for the last few seasons, just had another 3kg delivered on Thursday.

 

[Jimmys Mum]

Transferred some lovely bees from a 6 frame poly-nuc into a dummied down 14x12 national (8 frames plus kingspan packers and top insulation).

I'm chuffed to bits. This nuc has a queen which I raised from my first attempt at grafting this summer. She's a beauty and is building up really well. They were chocker block with 4 full frames of BIAS and 2 full of store and the ivy here is in full flow so I'm hoping for some further expansion for a good start next spring.

 

[kazmcc]

A quick visit to Dusty's house to see the honey extraction in operation. Arran was very interested and happy to help, then we inspected the bees while Dusty finished off extracting.

I didn't get to see it done with the school bees as I was too poorly, so I found it very interesting! We had a great time, and I got to take home the first jar of the year

The kids have tucked into it already.

 

[Swarm]

Great picture Kaz Look at the concentration.

 

[Dusty Rhodes]

A quick visit to Dusty's house to see the honey extraction in operation. Arran was very interested and happy to help, then we inspected the bees while Dusty finished off extracting.

.

So what did I do in the apiary today?

Absolutely nothing!

I let Kaz and Arran do the hard work whilst I stayed indoors gloating over my hoard of golden honey!

Dusty

 

[kazmcc]

Thank you Swarm. I am really enjoying sharing this with Arran.

Dusty, any time! We had a great time on our own out there and I finally managed to light and keep the smoker going for the whole inspection! It's a miracle, I swear!

A bit annoyed with myself for not putting the feeders on gloveless, but boy you can feel the heat from them through those thin gloves!! Maybe one day I will be brave enough

 

[Dusty Rhodes]

A bit annoyed with myself for not putting the feeders on gloveless,

What a strange idea - putting gloves on feeders!


I do worry about you sometimes, Kaz.

Dusty

 

[REDWOOD]

Put a clearing board on the last hive and they are still bringing in the HB, the sky was a mass of white dots but just in time as on walking back I noticed a few Ivy flowers had bloomed. Made a gallon of mead, hope I can keep a bottle this time for the association show before the girls drink it all !!

 

[Headnavigator]

Have bought them from C Wynne Jones for the last few seasons, just had another 3kg delivered on Thursday.

Thanks HM, blimey 3kg!

 

[Mrs Shoot]

Thanks HM, blimey 3kg!

Rumours are he has one or two hives

All hives busy bringing lots if yellow pollen.

Checked hive 1, no eggs, larve only a tiny bit of capped brood left, the possible remains of a QC (difficult to tell as so torn down only a small bit left), and polished cells last week, so added a test frame as suspected a virgin or mated but not yet laying queen in attendance. The old test frame has done the trick again, no drawn QC's but eggs and tiny larve on two frames.

Hive 2 unit has worked well.

Hive 3, saw a queen emerge 2 weeks ago, so added a test frame to see if this will bring her on if she is still in there.

The nuc with queen that took weeks and weeks to get mated, started laying last week after a test frame added to nuc. Lovely capped worker brood. These will be united with hive 3 if no queen in there or hived in a dummy down hive with kingspan next week.

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

Retired the Red Queen Unseen from Buckybeast to a nuc, replacing her with my Hivemaker Queen-in-waiting.

All v smooth, apart from the thunderstorm that sprang up at the deepest part of today's second stage (uniting the HM colony with Buckybeast, after 24h Q-). The nuc keeps the Queen-in-waiting's flying bees so should be good to overwinter; that colony was overdue for hiving anyway. Good luck my beauties.

I now have the three production colonies headed by green queens, the Red Queen Unseen heading a drone colony (or she can swarm, be superseded or make honey: I an NOT squishing her), and a possible late increase colony, to take into autumn. Roll on 2015!

Also mixed the first 2:1 I might need (not yet with this ivy flow) in the apiary compost heap, which is clocking 70C with lawn thatch on it...

Thanks, Pete

 

[REDWOOD]

Last supers off, apiguard on, jarred more honey.

 

[Hachi]

Feeders on and full. Second varroa treatment today and all without my smoker, thought I'd put it in the truck but alas its still in the utility room so worked my two sites smokeless. Only one hive was tetchy and took it out on the hive tool hee hee.