What did you do in the Apiary today?

[bpmurray]

I removed the crop from my 5 colonies, but there was hardly anything. I got around 5lbs of cut comb and about 25lbs of extracted honey. All hives had made serious inroads into their stores - a couple had a third super on, but they had consumed pretty much everything. I have now started feeding all colonies, and I've noticed that the ivy is just about to flower - the flower heads are out and just need to pop open.

What a dreadful year!

 

[pargyle]

I removed the crop from my 5 colonies, but there was hardly anything. I got around 5lbs of cut comb and about 25lbs of extracted honey. All hives had made serious inroads into their stores - a couple had a third super on, but they had consumed pretty much everything. I have now started feeding all colonies, and I've noticed that the ivy is just about to flower - the flower heads are out and just need to pop open.

What a dreadful year!

Ivy ? So soon ? Goodness it's not even mid August yet - I don't see it here until September/October and last year it was nearer the end of October than the beginning ...Not even a sign of buds let alone flowers yet.

 

[Erichalfbee]

One colony dropping a few mites so have vaped it. There is a super on but I suspect it will be theirs for the winter

Not even a sign of buds let alone flowers yet.

Tiny tiny buds here. You can just make out that there are multiple heads.

 

[pargyle]

One colony dropping a few mites so have vaped it. There is a super on but I suspect it will be theirs for the winter


Tiny tiny buds here. You can just make out that there are multiple heads.

I think the wetter regions seem to get the ivy flowering just that bit earlier ... we are in the shadow of the Isle of Wight to the South and Portsdown Hill to the North so it's pretty dry most of the time - it's good in some respects as they tend to be in the mood to pack it away before shutting down for winter. They usually manage to store enough ivy honey to see them through.

 

[chrisb]

second day of bad wind ( outside ) and rain, no wonder some of the bees are a big grumpy

 

[Tremyfro]

A bit of tidying up in the Bee Yard. Wasps about...so set up some wasp traps.
Colonies looking good. The colony which killed my Golden Queen are still in the naughty corner. We gave them a frame with eggs....if they don't have a virgin or a recently mated queen I will be surprised as they were very quiet.
The nuc we took the Golden Queen from have a queen cell...whether it will emerge..who knows...but they had eggs and could have made their own.
There is quite a bit of capped honey in the brood boxes now so winter reserves are beginning to look good. Not much honey to spare for us...so our harvest will be extremely small...unless we get some good weather soon. Looks like the only honey will come from the Flow frames....at least I won't have to clean the extractor afterwards...

 

[Robbo8916]

Spent yesterday and today removing the crop (up to now) from my 5 production colonies took 220lbs so average of 44lbs per colony.This was a mixture of spring and summer honey and has a lovely golden colour.

Placed 1 super of starters on each hive for cut comb from the balsam which is now coming into full flower and is looking healthy.As my hives have gone from 2 to one super the bees are quite crowded now which i'm told is good for comb production.


Inspected all my colonies and all have lots of BIAS and well mated queens. Varroa levels definately on the up now so will treat as soon as the comb supers are off.

Did my queens hatch out for you? Might be needing them back!

I have not had chance to get in and check what is going on in my main colony since I got there to swap the nuc into their 'winter' box and found the main colony had swarmed! AGAIN!

Luckily the queen was clipped and the bees eventually returned to their hive. Since then all it has done is rain constantly and I am becoming more and more worried. The nuc are so wonderful, great queen, great laying pattern, lovely natured bees. The main colony are constantly producing queen cells (both supersedure and swarm cells - AT THE SAME TIME).

I honestly don't know what to do........ This is when having an official mentor would have come in really handy! Gregior has been an absolute wonder when it has come to giving me advice and helping me find, clip and mark my queens. Be expecting another text soon Greg!

For reference, the nuc are on 3 frames of brood in a 6 frame box. The main colony are on 4 frames of brood in a 10 frame box. So why the hell they are so insistent on swarming is a completely mystery to me!

 

[Millet]

Did my queens hatch out for you? Might be needing them back!

I have not had chance to get in and check what is going on in my main colony since I got there to swap the nuc into their 'winter' box and found the main colony had swarmed! AGAIN!

Luckily the queen was clipped and the bees eventually returned to their hive. Since then all it has done is rain constantly and I am becoming more and more worried. The nuc are so wonderful, great queen, great laying pattern, lovely natured bees. The main colony are constantly producing queen cells (both supersedure and swarm cells - AT THE SAME TIME).

I honestly don't know what to do........ This is when having an official mentor would have come in really handy! Gregior has been an absolute wonder when it has come to giving me advice and helping me find, clip and mark my queens. Be expecting another text soon Greg!

For reference, the nuc are on 3 frames of brood in a 6 frame box. The main colony are on 4 frames of brood in a 10 frame box. So why the hell they are so insistent on swarming is a completely mystery to me!

Join the club, several folk are in the same boat,

 

[madasafish]

Just looked at the rain, copied a ML frame feeder in wood, and labelled my miserable honey crop in jars (so far 55 lbs).

It's nice honey especially soft set.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Put new queens in a few colonies - one is OK but just doesn't seem to build up very much, I was going to give her the freezer treatment (need a queen for demonstration purposes when talking to kids) so popped her in a cage then realised another hive at that location has been giving me grief for a while and I suspected she may be Q- although they ignore test frames. Rather than risk a good queen the condemned one is in there to see if they settle down. If she's still alive Sunday I'll put a candy plug in and see. If nothing else they'll have some brood to settle them until I either requeen or unite.
Ordered a pallet of winter feed before the prices go up next month.

 

[chrisb]

Join the club, several folk are in the same boat,

you can say that again... Lol

 

[Millet]

you can say that again... Lol

Join the club several folk are in the same boat,

 

[Robbo8916]

Join the club several folk are in the same boat,

Almost............almost..............

 

[Tremyfro]

I don't want to hear anyone complaining about their honey crop...unless they have less than me! Mind you the bees are eating well and must all be fat as butter.

 

[Robbo8916]

I don't want to hear anyone complaining about their honey crop...unless they have less than me! Mind you the bees are eating well and must all be fat as butter.

Mine is 0lbs if that makes you feel any better?

 

[Obee1]

Checked in my 2 nucs in my garden that I made for raising QC from breeder queen. One has 10 QC from grafts and cut strips of larvae. The other nuc got the remains of the frame of eggs that I had chopped about - they have raised 5 QC.
Then checked the three garden hives. Supers not quite full - but I did harvest some a week or two ago.

Then over to field apiary. Of the 6 hives I have there 2 are queenless-(one possibly swarmed one has a DLQ. ) 2 are filling supers nicely with HB. Two are smaller colonies requeened in July. The field has so much HB in it and many ghost bees seen returning. Below is pic of field apiary with HB

 

[Tremyfro]

Mine is 0lbs if that makes you feel any better?

It doesn't make me feel better...as it would be nice if we both had some honey! I have 8 lbs from the spring. I left it to see if it would set...which it did. I will soften it and reseed for softest honey.
I'm not complaining .....the bees have plenty of stores for themselves this year. Last year I was feeding from mid July!

 

[Teemore]

Friends started beekeeping last year and currently have one colony and a nuc. I extracted some of their honey for them last night. 57lbs of run honey and they have already taken just over 20 pounds of cut comb from the colony so far. Still two supers on the colony. Their bees are in a really good spot for forage.

 

[Erichalfbee]

I had my very best cut comb in my first year
30lbs off one colony in the spring. Supers are still on partly capped partly eaten

 

[nantmoel]

Another successful incubator hatch, put number 33 on her as it fell out of the card holding the numbers. I dropped her in some diluted honey and dropped her into a mating hive where the QC didn't emerge.



Fingers crossed as well has a number of QC's reared from our breeder queen, these are due to emerge Thursday/Friday next week.