What did you do in the Apiary today?

[kazmcc]

Kaz and Arran and I went through my hives today........

........and I have to have to offer an apology to ericA!

On another thread, earlier today, the acknowledged Queen of the Forum had said she was anticipating one last inspection before basically leaving her bees alone, apart from feeding, for the winter. I expressed surprise, thinking this was a bit early.

I should have known better!

We found clear signs of the colonies starting to slow down for the autumn, and I've decided to bring forward my scheduling by a fortnight.

I must learn to listen and learn instead of shooting off my mouth.

Sorry ericA,



Dusty

Maybe next week I won't let Arran pick sugar for breakfast

They are starting to fill the empty cells with stores, and patches of brood are noticeably smaller in hive 2, although there are still a fair few drones present.

Hive 1 are a sticky bunch. No drones at all left in that hive. I didn't get to see much else as Arran instructed me that he was inspecting that hive with Dusty, and I was on cleaning brace comb duty.

 

[B+.]

Sprayed a dozen roofs, floors and feeders....and I am all green too!

 

[Cazza]

Spent a lovely hour with the bees this afternoon. Counted varroa, reduced a hive to a single, bb, marked a queen in a hive I had nearly written off and was on last chance queen saloon but she is now mated and laying well, watched drones returning and bees battling the wasps. It's all go, now off to relax with some gentle weeding.
Cazza

 

[nantmoel]

Went through two hive in an out apiary, one which have been hell bent on killing themselves, they have removed two queens, a Buckfast from Pete and then one they raised from her eggs. The queen has emerged (Monday/Tuesday) and she had ripped down (I assume) they other queen cells, they was no sign of her and I had a good look, time will tell, so I gave them another frame of brood that had bias just to give them a boost of bees really. The other hive which has another Buckfast queen again another one from Pete are doing well, she is massive and laying really well. They are both brining heather, the tell tale 'smell' of it when inspecting. Its a shame really that because of the weather they have not been able to take full advantage of it. I must say its been a funny old year, our first back into bee keeping in over 20 years.

 

[Mrs Shoot]

Checked all hives and fed. Three hives had no eggs or larve but some capped brood. All had queens and loads of highly polished cells. Bees were their normal selves. Another one also had a small amount of capped brood, highly polished cells and eggs on one frame, no larve, queen present. Are these just taking a brood break? All have stores.
Found three large hornets in my wasp trap, along with some wasps.
The elastic on one of my trouser legs decided to break. Two girls took advantage and scaled up my boot, on the inside on my trouser leg one stung me on my calf, the other got me on the knee. Will be taking a needle, thread and new piece of elastic to them later.

 

[pargyle]

The elastic on one of my trouser legs decided to break. Two girls took advantage and scaled up my boot, on the inside on my trouser leg one stung me on my calf, the other got me on the knee. Will be taking a needle, thread and new piece of elastic to them later.

Try boots over trousers not trousers over boots ...much safer.

 

[Mrs Shoot]

Try boots over trousers not trousers over boots ...much safer.

Good idea, will do that in the future.

 

[Swarm]

Try boots over trousers not trousers over boots ...much safer.

Until you drop a frame and end up with a boot full of bees.

 

[alldigging]

Finally some nice weather. Spotted a queen in one hive and found good evidence of one in another.

 

[pargyle]

Until you drop a frame and end up with a boot full of bees.

Try Muck boots ... or one of their look alikes .. I have a pair very similar to these but they were even cheaper .. the neoprene tops are stretchy and grip nicely around your trousers ... not a lot of chance of a bee getting down the top of these wellies.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/BISON-NEOPRENE-WELLINGTON-MUCK-BOOT-/291309336443?var=&hash=item43d363b77b

Had mine a year .. wear them daily .. no problems and very comfortable to boot

 

[Swarm]

Riggers and trousers over, sorry.

 

[bontbee]

Jeans and sandals - or crocs... (OK, most of the time, not all!)

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Clearer boards on the last of the supers at the association apiary - even though they're mucking around with the balsam, they've taken some stores back and brood nests are starting to contract. Shook out one weak colony - another virgin gone AWOL on her mating flight by the looks of it.

 

[bontbee]

United three lots of two colonies.

One Q- with a small Q+ colony;

The second unite was a colony which had a very chalky queen, (dispatched to the freezer to try ericA's find-the-other-Q-via-the-deceased's-pheromone technique - if the pheremones last until next year, that is) with a colony in which the Q had a lovely pattern;

The third unite was a Q+ nuc with a colony that has been apparently Q- since 21st July, (yes, I could/should have done something before now, but I was curious to see what transpired, this being the first of my "disappearing" Qs this year). Today, even having been Q- for so long, (and I have hunted repeatedly for her), they were the sweetest bees you could wish for. And I took two supers off the little darlings with no protestation at all. United these with syrup spray and newspaper: despite all the disruptions, so far, so good.​

Oh, and two colonies (that were swarms of similar size taken in the same week, both - as sure as I can be - castes) that developed very similarly until early August, are now decidedly different. One with plenty of stores, 6 frames of brood and Q still happily laying. The other starving and no eggs or larvae. Sprayed them with syrup to revive them, then stuck a gallon of 2:1 on them. By the time I'd finished they were up and about. With hindsight, perhaps I should have let evolution take care of it, as I usually do. Feeling a bit woolly at the mo', tho'...

 

[Hivemaker.]

Try Muck boots ...

Try slippers, the leather moccasin type, much more comfortable in warm weather.

 

[Mrs Shoot]

Try Muck boots ... or one of their look alikes .. I have a pair very similar to these but they were even cheaper .. the neoprene tops are stretchy and grip nicely around your trousers ... not a lot of chance of a bee getting down the top of these wellies.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/BISON-NEOPRENE-WELLINGTON-MUCK-BOOT-/291309336443?var=&hash=item43d363b77b

Had mine a year .. wear them daily .. no problems and very comfortable to boot

I wear a cheap version of Uggs. They have a lovely fluffy lining, and fit snugly to my legs (chunky calfs), like wearing slippers out lol. The elastic normally fits to the boots lovely in their normal elastic state. But I could also tuck in there would be no gap between boot and leg.

 

[victor meldrew]

?Beautiful day today . My bees are working like crazy ! There is still balsam by the ship load , rosebay willow herb . Ivy hasn't come on stream yet the numbers of wasps trying to gain entrance are thankfully much reduced , backed up by the temper of the bees being civil


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Falesh]

We did our second honey harvest. This year we got about 80kg, which is pretty nice for two hives! The bees were good, in the end the only sting we had was because we didn't see a bee stuck to a frame during uncapping and I poked it with my thumb.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qT-67JQmf4c

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

What a difference a week makes!

Decided to spend a few minutes at the home apiary consolidating supers on two hives in readiness for clearing them for extraction next week - there was the possibility of removing at least one empty on each last week, and not a lot in others but the plan was to take the lot off last week (but being busy and seeing the good forecast I thought I'd delay a bit). They've been busy - quite a bit of honey in all supers so it looks like leaving them all on until next week then taking them all off bar one which will be nadired - bees going flat out at the moment - just hope there's not too much heather in it (they're flying nearly two miles to the nearest heather!) to extract.
I had two extremely agressive colonies this year but decided not to requeen as a) They are very good honey producers and b) I couldn't understand how they'd change their temperament so much in just a week.
Now, both colonies are fine, not back to how they were yet - but then that's to be expected this time of year. I think that that could be the story all over the country and some were just a bit too hasty in requeening (accepted there's no choice in some circumstances) Moved the last of the new queens from a nuc to a full size brood box.

 

[Swarm]

Try slippers, the leather moccasin type, much more comfortable in warm weather.

I was waiting for that