What did you do in the Apiary today?

[Oscarmonster]

Monsieur Abeille I hope you have plenty of bees, I would be very dissapointed if you had insufficient bees

 

[MuswellMetro]

Did a similar transfer as "Mike a" suggests he was going to do

I looked after the hive in winter as a Beginner who became ill was in trouble with brace comb because he had not pushed the hoffman frames close enough together when placing a 5 frame nuc in the hive . He appeared to have spaced the five frame wide space in the full brood box, You could not inspect the box as it was braced into a six frame solid block about 9 frames wide with wild comb between every pair of frames

He gave me a new 14x12 brood box to use for a bailey transfer and I re-arrange in March the lower box frames better and dummied it out with polystryrene block about 8" wide covered in duck tape, but still not inspectable

Today we found the queen up in the top box, eggs larva ,solid brood of good patern....Queen excluder on sharpish and then went into the bottom box, discarding brace and wild or store comb and dummied down to four cleaned frames with brood/eggs/larva/capped....I will inspect in 7 days for queen cells in the lower box and in three weeks and remove the lower box and melt down the wax

other than that, i planted Dog Rose around the new apiary fence...still no sign of OSR coming in, it may be over, .oh and this morning I did an AS for a friend on his national hive..pagden swarm control.....doing so much , i am loosing a few hours from my memory ( or getting old)

then fed a few swarm nucs...and hives that i knew had little or no liquid stores...just a jar of warm syrup to tide them over

 

[derekm]

watch the missus take 3o bees and kill them for her bees microscopy class...

for the greater good... ( a quotation from "Hot Fuzz"

 

[Dusty Rhodes]

I did the final preparations for picking up my first nuc tomorrow.

It's been a long wait. But since June last year, I've:

Been on an intro course.
Attended lots of apiary evenings at my local BKA.
Read Hooper three times, Cramp twice and the BKA Journal.
Sought the advice of Forum on what equipment is necessary
http://www.beekeepingforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=14039.
Been on the Forum every day.
Got the best equipment I can afford.

So - I'm all ready!
How very good it is, for once, to be totally prepared!
On top of things. Knowing what to expect.

Yep. It's all plain sailing from now on.
Spend my declining years gentle snoozing to the sound of my bees.

Roll on tomorrow.

Dusty.

 

[Erichalfbee]

So - I'm all ready!
How very good it is, for once, to be totally prepared!
On top of things. Knowing what to expect.

Yep. It's all plain sailing from now on.
Spend my declining years gentle snoozing to the sound of my bees.

Congrats

 

[oliver90owner]

So - I'm all ready

Practised getting the smoker alight and staying alight? And all the other things that you can't have thought of?

Enjoy.

RAB

 

[Ziggymole]

Dusty.[/QUOTE]

So - I'm all ready!
How very good it is, for once, to be totally prepared!
On top of things. Knowing what to expect.

Yep. It's all plain sailing from now on.
Spend my declining years gentle snoozing to the sound of my bees.



Good luck Dusty, next year you can smile at my post when I'm in the same position as you are now. I envy you, and yet!!!! - there is still that doubt that I'll ever get there.

 

[VEG]

you will do fine

 

[hiveabee]

I fed my nuc and hive with syrup in between showers (rain not the bathroom type). Constructed a national brood box, floor and roof, need to find some tin to finish the roof.I may use some roofing felt instead, because I have a bit left from a shed maintenance project last weekend.

 

[Luminos]

I did the final preparations for picking up my first nuc tomorrow.

It's been a long wait. But since June last year, I've:

Been on an intro course.
Attended lots of apiary evenings at my local BKA.
Read Hooper three times, Cramp twice and the BKA Journal.
Sought the advice of Forum on what equipment is necessary
http://www.beekeepingforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=14039.
Been on the Forum every day.
Got the best equipment I can afford.

So - I'm all ready!
How very good it is, for once, to be totally prepared!
On top of things. Knowing what to expect.

Yep. It's all plain sailing from now on.
Spend my declining years gentle snoozing to the sound of my bees.

Roll on tomorrow.

Dusty.

Got your abseiling gear on, Dusty?

 

[MJBee]

Quote Dusty: Yep. It's all plain sailing from now on.
Spend my declining years gentle snoozing to the sound of my bees.Unquote.

Like a lamb to the slaughter - just you wait

Seriously - enjoy your bees they will no doubt lead you a merry dance.

Nearer to home strimmed the grass (jungle) that has shot up round my home hives. One colony took serious exception to this and boiled out in defence, good job that this was expected and I was well protected. I'll leave them to settle down then go and rake up the hay and probably get assaulted again ho hum

 

[johnmcc]

It's funny what they take exception to. I regularly use a motor mower right up to and between the hives and they ignore it. I thought it would cause mayhem. I've only worn the suit to mow there once and that was the day after I did an AS when they were cross with everything. Today I've just stood and watched the hives for a while in the bright sunshine. Excellent.

 

[circe]

Gave a frame each to two hives of old ivy honey - only about 5lbs of stores in nat brood and half + super. Veryt different to last year - April/May is usually very good for spring honey here, but they are only just maintaining themselves at the moment with loads of brood to hatch out.

 

[Silly Bee]

An inspection of my hives. Last time was a quick looksee a fortnight ago.

Are we over the worse of this ruddy weather yet?

 

[alanf]

Nearer to home strimmed the grass (jungle) that has shot up round my home hives. One colony took serious exception to this and boiled out in defence, good job that this was expected and I was well protected. I'll leave them to settle down then go and rake up the hay and probably get assaulted again ho hum

Yep. Mowed a patch that was long overdue with an electric rotary. Hive either side. First was the 'good' hive, mower within 20 cm. No reaction at all. Second was the 'naughty' hive. A couple of metres off and they boil out and a couple of hundred settle on the mower itself. Same reaction as last year - veil on and garden gloves which give enough time to back off.

Project this year is to get a couple of queens raised from the 'good' hive.

 

[Monsieur Abeille]

With the help of the good folk who came round to the open apiary, built a high rise des res. Its a demaree type AS - from the bottom new BB with queen, QE, super with stores, empty super, QE, old BB without queen.

The question is, will it work! (note the anti-earthquake high tek broken pantile supporting the structure. They could learn a lot from this over by the San Andreas fault).

 

[Alabamaeee]

Nice photo MA,

Is that a BeeHiveSplies 14X12, and if so what is your impression of them?

 

[TOBY-3652]

Checked honey flow on hives. Largest hive has got nearly 2 supers full others not far behind.. Aim 2 extract tuesday or wednesday

 

[Erichalfbee]

One hive has a supersedure cell.
An AS done 15 days ago has drawn out all frames,has brood on six frames, lots of nectar stored AND 3 swarm cells. I took out one QC on its frame of capped brood and made a nuc out of it. Removed the other two and replaced two frames of stores with foundation (where are they getting nectar from? They must be collecting enough between showers). Gave them a super even though forecast is bad for 2 weeks. Couldn't think of anything else to do. Perhaps I should have done another AS?
Have ordered a replacement Queen and will remove the swarmy one.

 

[wondervet]

Things happening at last. Eggs in queen cups in 2 hives today. Still only just about holding their own in terms of stores tho. Hospital hive with post-starvation paralysis virus looking like they might make it. BIAS on 2 frames after 2 weeks in poly nuc.