What did you do in the Apiary today?

[victor meldrew]

Nothing here either.
An angry sky today



VM

 

[Excession]

Reduced entrances, lots of wasps about no robbing yet...

 

[madasafish]

Tried varroa counts on hives treated yesterday. Worst was 30 odd...

 

[Chris Luck]

Few of these around now..

 

[ma1308]

Re-Queened a very angry hive a few weeks ago checked on them 4 days later to make sure they had not killed her off, all was well. I have left them alone for just over 3 weeks went to check on them today they have eggs, capped brood and seemed a little quieter, only 20 or so attacking me instead of what seemed like hundreds …. I also managed to spot the queen

 

[Erichalfbee]

A few wasps about so reduced all the poly entrances
Wooden hive has an under floor entrance so that was left alone

 

[domino]

Took some honey off, one of my hives if very weak four frames of 12x14 and has a little chalkbroad I'm going to feed it some of that hive alive stuff and see what happens.

 

[Somerford]

busy day

View attachment 8683

Well, a busy day indeed. Collected my two little helpers, and we loaded up the trailer with 95 % of the spare kit to bring home , renovate, sort, repair, sulphur smoke and paint.

Everything went well until I decided to speed things up on the sulphur front.....and thats why you use a sulphur burner as the strips in one stack decided to set the bl**dy stack ablaze. Luckily my sixth sense was working and I only ended up with a scorched super, 2 top bars and a couple of melted 14x*12 frames......

Loads of dead bugs, moths, grubs etc.

And I discovered the motherlode of wax moth colonies.....I had to use a hammer and heel to break apart a brood that had stuck inside a roof, and then it took 5 mins to prise the crown board out.....1000s of cocoons.....all now dead thanks to the sulphur.

Then drove everything back and stacked in newly sorted piles as the heavens opened....

And the reward was a nice Jura whisky and 2 v tired little helpers !

Regards

S

 

[lilybetbee]

Tipped out the hive with a non-laying queen.

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

Put on 2kg + 1.25l ("2:1") for some bad weather, at dusk in the (light) rain. Bees amazingly docile considering; in the past that has been good for an ambush.

 

[Pete D]

Spent the afternoon with the SBI going through my 30 boxes at 5 locations, routine check, asked for volunteers at last association meeting so why not.
Given all clear, lots of healthy colonies............... which I knew really but its good to get another view.
He seemed to apprecaite that I worked with him, opening up ahead and closing up after him.

 

[Monsieur Abeille]

Took supers and a 14x12 off for spinning - take my word for it a 14x12 stuffed with honey is hard work!

The 14x12 mainly had bean honey in I think, dark and fairly thick but quite tasty, so the initial filtering is taking its time. Waiting for that before finishing the harvest. Gave one super back to the bees for finishing as it was unsealed and showing a high water content. Used the tangental large frame attachment on my Giordan for the first time for the 14x12s and it worked well.

I have one colony in an out apiary and they are seriously nasty, but very productive. Think once they've finished gathering for the year I will put on the chain mail and go a queen hunting.

 

[pargyle]

I started an inspection at 7.00am this morning ... bees even more docile than usual and lots of them off foraging. They appear to have stopped building any more comb - the last two empty frames I put in a couple of weeks ago have not been started but the next two frames are now stuffed with honey - one side of each completely capped the other pretty full but not capped.

Still lots of pollen being brought in so I suspect there is still plenty of brood.

Was going to carry on and look through all the frames but it started to rain a little so closed up and left them to it. Pity - it stopped raining within about 10 minutes so I could have, perhaps, just shut the lid and gone back - looked a bit as though it was going to carry on at the time though. Will have to try again tonight or wait until Sunday as forecast not good for next couple of days.

 

[bizzybee]

Treated 4TBHs and 2 warre with HM's varroa recipe this am. Not too hot and slightly windy. Bees - as usual - did not like it.. and are now bearding on entrances and fronts of hives. No doubt they will settle down eventually.

Got three more to do : largest and most populous TBHs which I am leaving until tomorrow when hopefully the other hives will have settled down. I also want to remove more honey before treating.

hi there,
interested in how you remove the honey from a top bar hive as i thought you had combined comb with brood on lower part and honey at the top. Am I wrong? I have only seen tbh's at one site so know v little.
Heather

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

He seemed to apprecaite that I worked with him, opening up ahead and closing up after him.

Should have got some mug to do it for you

 

[beehive1234]

Feeding 2 new colonies with 2:1 syrup. Taken down, readily for winter.
Removed super from strongest hive, because it is too late to draw and fill. They need all the warmth they can get to stack the brood and a half for the winter. Obviously very little for them this year in this area. Or is there another reason why they are not thriving? No signs of disease.
No honey this year.
On the plus side, having lost my 18 year old cat, (in March,) and determined not to have another, found myself running to catch a kitten, sitting in the gravel at the side of the M4. I have called her Princess. Actually, she is quite smart, as well as beautiful.

 

[Dusty Rhodes]

I didn't do anything - but my girls may just be on the balsam!

Quite a few badgers coming in when I came in from work.

Here's hoping! I fancy a couple more full supers.


Dusty.

 

[Tim.S]

Checked my Buckfast hive again to see if the new Q had started laying yet. Took 3 supers off no problem. Qe off no problem. Went through about 3 or 4 frames in the middle of the box no sign of eggs, then wham! The bee's just exploded all over me. Maybe I moved one of the bottom box frames when i took the top ones out. Anyway as you can guess this was when I discover my hood is not done up properly................
Of course no sympathy from her indoors. All I got was - well you wanted to keep bee's!

 

[user 6228]

building the temp sensor strings that will be built into the boxes of the new experimental "tree hive"

 

[alldigging]

Stood and watched ghostly bees coming in this morning .. So that's the balsam here too!