What did you do in the Apiary today?

[Outlander]

I had my first hive delivered today. Thank you Paul of Yorkshire beeh*v*s.

 

[george]

9 deg and alls well . Just had a peek at the front entrances and several early risers are in and out in the sunshine .
I have 5 hives to move tonight , new tenant in rented house near our bee shed has 'Allergies ' so is paranoid about having them so close . High rent sees our bees ,and raises us the risk of losing the whole site . Time to fold I think .
G

 

[Polyanwood]

I painted the 2 supers that I made last night.

 

[MJBee]

Did a quick check on two suspect Q- hives that were given a test frame 4 days ago - neither had produced queen cells - queen seen in one, nothing in the other - leave for another week while scratching head.

Although nice and warm it was very sultry and the bees were evil I now have arms like popeye - Multiple stings through my suit.

Note to self - serves you right, you should know better. do NOT open hive(s) when there is a risk of thunder

 

[Foxylad]

Made a donation to the forum, two nucs ready to sell.

 

[blackcavebees]

Finished my "pallet hive" project (made floor & brood box from pallet wood and off cuts to try and cut down costs till I get some return from this expensive hobby)

Now sitting on top of shed, facing south with lid on and partially covered hoping for a passing scout bee ...

 

[eleanor20]

Inspected one hive, and got first sting of the year! Everything good inside though.
Watched second hive for a while and decided not to inspect today due to masses of bees flying around entrance. They looked like they were orienting but the hive has been there at least 3 weeks now..... would these all be young bees that have not yet been able to fly due to the rubbish weather?

 

[Poggle]

Note to self - serves you right, you should know better. do NOT open hive(s) when there is a risk of thunder

Down the allotment last year I said to someone I reckoned there would be thunder, when he asked why, I said coz my bees are being as shitty as hell with me, his answer was "Yer taking the P again Jock!!" and walked back to his shed shaking his head, half an hour later the first flash of lightning and boom of thunder was heard and seen over the Purbecks He just looked at me when I walked past him in the rain

 

[MuswellMetro]

AND that Yellow thing was in the sky this morning so put on my clean bee suit and did a tour

two new hive on the roof apiary first....q+ but a bit light on stores and then on to next site

virgin still not laying, considered combining if ican find the queen,
marked a new laying queen
reduce an AS to one QCell
reduced to one queen cell the requeen black nuc that rejectedntheir yellow new queen
virgin seen in next but no eggs
Left the aggressive hive with a superceded queen, just checked its supers,
checked aggressive hive's requeening nuc and move 3ft nearer,

on to next site

found and culled a drone laying queen...requeen next saturday in a NUC and ditch the drone brood
swarm one doing well now on 7 frames
swarm two no sign of queen yet
boistrous hive...oops swarmed about two weeks ago on 5 frames of bees (why)
check a few others all ok
helped a friend and rather told him off for adding a super too early but really should not have...they are his bees not mine, but he did the same last year and lost his bees

got home...did i have lunch!! no i forgot

by this time it was cloudy and over cast....no yellow thing in the sky....wonder if it will be there tomorrow

 

[London-Scottish]

^MM

how early was too early for them to be adding super? Didn't realise you risk loosing Bees by adding them too early. I may be guilty of doing the same this evening.

LS

 

[Chris Luck]

They looked like they were orienting but the hive has been there at least 3 weeks now..... would these all be young bees that have not yet been able to fly due to the rubbish weather?

Young bees are regularly coming out for the first time and orientating. In the case of a newly hived swarm even when there are no new bees in the hive for the first few weeks fresh bees will come out to forage to replace and re-enforce the existing foragers.

Chris

 

[MuswellMetro]

^MM

how early was too early for them to be adding super? Didn't realise you risk loosing Bees by adding them too early. I may be guilty of doing the same this evening.

LS

last year, he thought he had 9 frames of bees....so he read...9 frames put on a super BUT what be had was a five frame of bees...3 brood frames plus two store and four frames of bees "looking at "drawing"....less than 10% drawn....he added a super and the wax bees went up.....he took 15lbs of honey off but the brood was still only six frames of bees......they did not last the winter in cluster in a big 14x12 brood box...too small and no where to store syrupy as they drew the super rather than the 14x12 frames

and depsite me telling him in spring he did exactly the same this year, he is an educated well read man but like a religiously zealot he believe the word rather than thinks what the print really says...yes bees on ten frames but how many bees on each frame 5 ,10 1000, 5000.....he also uses matchstick under crown because bbka news say you should....but otherwise he is a good friend

 

[London-Scottish]

Thanks MM

Hmm, so I'm sure I have 7frames brood, 1side of frame as store & 2.5 frame to draw.
(I had put a shallow frame in brood last week with the intention of varroa control for drone brood but after seeing it draw out nicely this week I had thought it good to use in the super to attract them upwards) so have since replaced this in the brood for another super frame as sacrificial drone. And of course thought it appropriate to place super on as I'm sure they will need some time to edge up north and also because they have it all to draw out.

Jury?

 

[susbees]

Spent several hours on mentee's apiary sorting out five relatively disastrous WBC best I could and pulling a large feisty prime out of a never-pruned (til now!) 30 foot hawthorn (from the top naturally).

I have never seen a properly fanning swarm shoot back out of a bait box and straight back up a tree. It was as if they had been sucked out. Perhaps leaving them there a few hours longer might have prevented this who knows...

...finally after a similar performance after dumping most straight into a hive, baited the swarm bucket with a manky comb (no brood as no spare available ANYWHERE ) and they came down a treat. QE under, no idea why she was so headstrong.

Maybe tomorrow we'll get the next supers off (fingers crossed they aren't solid yet...).

 

[nosmoking]

Finished my "pallet hive" project (made floor & brood box from pallet wood and off cuts to try and cut down costs till I get some return from this expensive hobby)

Now sitting on top of shed, facing south with lid on and partially covered hoping for a passing scout bee ...

Maybee doing the same soon but I won't bee sitting on top of my shed though, lol.

Yesterday I strimmed and motor mowered around hives and the bees were not interested in me what-so-ever. Forage is obviously more important.

 

[psafloyd]

Went through a couple of colonies. One had a queen, but fear it swarmed and went after being caught once. Was a swarm last year in any case. No queen or signs of one now but has hatched QC so could be a virgin.

Another that did have a small queen in it also has no sign of one or laying. Maybe she was off mating as it was a gorgeous day today or maybe she has been done away with. This was a split from an AS of the previous one.

Checked a swarm I collected several weeks ago and put into a BB last week. Expanding fast and seems it may have been a cast with a virgin as queen laying now and I marked her – the first I have done.

Looked in another colony (an AS of my main/strongest colony) and she is clearly well mated, banging them out and filling the brood box. This could get quite big just in time for the bramble flow and have started drawing out a super of Manleys I put in last weekend. They're a bit defensive, but so is my main one and highly temperamental when the weather is changing. As I saw all I needed, I closed up and took a sting on the thumb for my pains. Ouch.

Going to move my swarm tonight to another allotment site not very far away as the steward has requested. Let's hope they are happy there and they don't get fractious.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

This morning pottered around the new apiary site to be (still levelling out and tidying up the allocated corner ) Built a new modified pattern hive stand (slightly wider leg spacings so more stable) Then inspected the home hives - both low on stores, one badly so I put a few pints of 1:1 on. Loads of BIAS but both colonies as tetchy as a tetchy thing on a bad day

 

[victor meldrew]

Went round to look at a swarm of bees inhabiting the soffit of a bungalow .
Lady assured me they were honeybees , 'after all, a beekeeper had kept bees for 30 odd years next door to her (Fact)
Yep white tailed bumble bees .
She'd had a fair few swarms over the past years but was confused by the small size of bee and was convinced they were too small for bumbles
VM

 

[Martin G]

Collected a nice little swarm from a tree, got them safely into a box and dropped it off at the apiary. Nipped home to get a hive, stand etc only for it to start raining. The forecast is for days of rain so thought it best not to delay hiving them.

Worked under a giant umbrella, hived them ok with just a few left outside. Forgot to take anything to feed them with so intend to nip back tomorrow if we have a break in the weather and pop some feed on.

Glad I took the decision to hive them when it was just raining because within the hour it was more like a torrential downpour.

Martin

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Collected a nice little swarm from a tree, got them safely into a box and dropped it off at the apiary. Nipped home to get a hive, stand etc only for it to start raining. The forecast is for days of rain so thought it best not to delay hiving them.

Worked under a giant umbrella, hived them ok with just a few left outside. Forgot to take anything to feed them with so intend to nip back tomorrow if we have a break in the weather and pop some feed on.

Glad I took the decision to hive them when it was just raining because within the hour it was more like a torrential downpour.

Martin

Wouldn't it be better not to feed for a day or two so they use up all the honey with whatever nasties it may be carrying to make wax?