What did you do in the Apiary today?

[madasafish]

So did you use a push in cage, a travelling cage or just popped her in on her ownsome smelling of Airwick?

On a frame of brood (she had been in a nuc).. so sprayed hive, sprayed frame.. in she went..

 

[Goran]

Qcells on bars.. 4th breeding colony I think I messed some.. Fondant on top, honey syrup in feeder.. 4kg of pollen rich honey today for feeding.. Pollen frames in..

Next turn should be better.

 

[snelgrove]

Removed supers from some hives on the edge of Rape. Dark and very runny, not typical rape honey, North East coastal site, unsure what else could be mixed in to make such a difference when theres about 60 acres of Rape on doorstep. Any ideas ?

 

[Tom Jay]

A sad first for me: taking out a queen. I couldn't bring myself to squash her. In the freezer. Especially sad for me as she was my excellent queen of last season, 30lb taken off them in a part of the world where lots of colonies produced no surplus at all in 2015. She's been laying but hardly at all. Meanwhile the small colony is in good fettle and has brought in loads of store. She looked in poor shape, moving on the comb with difficulty.

Tomorrow I will give them one of the three frames with a queen cell from the remainder of my swarmed colony of last week. There were in fact seven queen cells there and I have cut out four, and I have another weak colony so I will look tomorrow to see if that queen is also the problem, and do likewise. I reckon it will be good to use all three of these enormous queen cells - I have of course kept the best looking ones with most activity around them - as their mother and grandmother are both prolific layers.

 

[Millet]

Removed supers from some hives on the edge of Rape. Dark and very runny, not typical rape honey, North East coastal site, unsure what else could be mixed in to make such a difference when theres about 60 acres of Rape on doorstep. Any ideas ?

I hope mine is the same when i eventually get there, a broken arm is bad enough, now my car has give up the ghost and the weather is carp up Alnwick way,so i am stuck in Hartlepool till Tuesday.

 

[JWF]

Went through the queenless part of an artificial swarm done 6 days ago only to find some neatly placed eggs on about half a frame on the outside of the BB. I know the original queen was transferred, as she's laying well in her new home.

The QC i'd selected is still capped, and it would be too soon for her to be laying anyway - so i'm left with two options (I think!) - there was a hatched queen, plus the original queen in the hive when I did the AS, or there's a laying worker.

It's too soon for laying workers after only 6 days queenless, and surely if there was a queen mature enough to be laying already, they would have swarmed from the original hive at least two weeks ago?

Or, this thought just popped into my head - what if one of my virgin queens from another hive has been out for a mating flight but ended up returning to the wrong hive? That seems possible, as I'm expecting three queens to come into lay very soon.

Why don't bees do as they're told lol!!!

Took another look today - the little blighters had drawn about 20 QCs on the two outside frames, but no eggs or brood in the centre. All the QCs were puny looking things so i culled them all, and will unite with another colony if they are indeed now hopelessly queenless - or if a queen does come into lay they may get a stay of execution. Maybe!

Still confused about where the eggs came from - in the absence of any other eggs I no longer think it likely they got a mated queen in there by accident.

 

[Barbarian]

I have used the " Watering Can " method of introducing a new Q. I would use it again. Useful with an out-apiary.

You open up the Q- hive. Use the can to give the bees and frames a soaking then run in the new Q. Simple.

 

[Chriszog]

Not exactly the Apiary but extracted my first ever honey today, only one super but 9 frames of capped honey, the taste is awesome (I may be biased) and everything went to plan, even the Kitchen was clean before SWMBO got home from shopping, 26lb of golden nectar!!

 

[B+.]

extracted my first ever honey today, only one super but 9 frames of capped honey, the taste is awesome (I may be biased) and everything went to plan, even the Kitchen was clean before SWMBO got home from shopping, 26lb of golden nectar!!

Any more of this nonsense and they'll come to expect it!

Well done! Save some for the association show!

 

[Finman]

.
I should move my biggest hives to raspberry forests. But it is stormy and cold. I must split my hives, that I can move and lift the hives to sedan carry. Biggest hive has 6 boxes. Most have 4 boxes.

.That is those must works... Not very pleasant to do. That sciatica thing.

 

[B+.]

I noticed blackberries in flower on the edge of a birchmoor at one of my apiaries yesterday. It hardly seems five minutes since the osr came into flower

I checked one of my cell builders and was happy to see 38 cells under construction.

 

[Gilberdyke John]

.
I should move my biggest hives to raspberry forests. But it is stormy and cold. I must split my hives, that I can move and lift the hives to sedan carry. Biggest hive has 6 boxes. Most have 4 boxes.

.That is those must works... Not very pleasant to do. That sciatica thing.

Time to invest some pension money into bee trailers and a four wheel drive vehicle?

 

[Obee1]

.
I should move my biggest hives to raspberry forests. But it is stormy and cold. I must split my hives, that I can move and lift the hives to sedan carry. Biggest hive has 6 boxes. Most have 4 boxes.

.That is those must works... Not very pleasant to do. That sciatica thing.

What is your sedan carry - does it enable you to carry the hive on your own? Assume it would have wheels?

 

[Tom Jay]

I have used the " Watering Can " method of introducing a new Q. I would use it again. Useful with an out-apiary.

You open up the Q- hive. Use the can to give the bees and frames a soaking then run in the new Q. Simple.

I've not heard of this, Barbarian. What's the logic? Workers too busy dealing with the damp to notice she's a foreigner? Or washing out of the colony scent?

 

[birdsandbees]

Moved four full Nuc colonies into hives, made up a bunch of Super frames in the hope that I'll get them filled before the end of the summer

Another plus being that I've now got four empty Nucs to use as bait hives.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Busy day - association apiary this morning nice and early to close up a nuc going to two of our beginners, then the usual inspection and mark another of this year's queens. Then to Carreg apiary to take off the supers for tomorrow's extraction and four inspections (not the best of weather with thundery showers!!) I went prepared for two Demarree's and I had one brood box up there on top of a stack of supers and QX's which had a few frames of drawn foundation with a bit of stores in - intention was to use in the Demarree, well........ luckily I had the veil done up and everything when I went to the stack, as I took off the roof I thought 'dash it - can't have stacked them too securely last time' as there seemed that a few bees had found their way through to the four drawn frames - I lifted the crown board to be met with a massive cloud of bees and free comb hanging off the board!! a swarm has moved in. So now another colony in Carreg presently perched on a few empty syrup drums next to the super stack and one batch of Demarree frames used up. The most urgent Demarree conducted on queen 20, inspections done without too much drama - the last hive was really tetchy and, as I closed up the heavens opened and I got soaked.
Quick call to Garn Cottage to pick up some supers there (rain had stopped by that time) then back home to put clearer boards on home hives then tea and medals

 

[Finman]

Time to invest some pension money into bee trailers and a four wheel drive vehicle?

This has worked well 40 years.

Four wheel? I do not put hives in such places, where I need four wheel.

But now I go to move them, at least some. 7 km to drive. Half asphalt road and half sand road.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Didn't realise they had Reliant Robins out in Finland

 

[Erichalfbee]

Tab out of a queen cage
Inspection and super on a colony.....in between showers

 

[JWF]

Extracted two supers giving around 30lb of a nice fresh honey with a nice aftertaste. As I seem to be accumulating honey i think i'd better get some labels sorted and start selling some!