What did you do in the Apiary today?

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Managed to get round my colonies, 10c but they are all in sunny sheltered sites, thank goodness. Had been fretting as 10-11 days since last inspection but knew queens were clipped so this took the edge off.

10 main colonies were all fine, between 6 and 15 frames brood, lots of drones, a few play cups but no queen cells. Some supers surprisingly good, others much slower than last year. If weather window had been better I would have set up Demarees but wanted to be quick. Forecast was hail after 3pm.

2 smaller colonies were superseding their queens. In one, I’d taken down one supersedure cell and put in a frame of eggs 6 days ago - too few drones end of April to have good mating. They’d made one cell from this donated frame and another from one of their own.
Queen still there. What to do...unsealed cell from donated frame looked slightly better, but really like the genetics of this colony, so kept their own sealed cell despite uncertainty re timings. Can always give a better queen later if doesn’t work out.

Overwintered Nuc with extension, was also I think superseding with 2 sealed cells. No eggs, no sign of queen, but stores were v low so think she may have gone off lay rather than swarmed and was on the side / bottom of the box. Fed them & reduced cells to one.

Overall pleased main colonies are biding their time, given the grotty weather which looks poor, though warmer nights, for the week ahead. Thinking we need to move to a warmer, drier part of the country. Perhaps I’m taking beekeeping a bit too seriously 😒
 
5 degress C and Heavy Rain, nothing to do, no bees flying, and not good for drone flying either.

I was going to paint more hives today, and sort out and put out bait hives around the area.

So here is a 360 degree photo from 120m above my Apiary ! In this photo more OSR around that I thought!

A Drones View ! (early morning yesterday, much better day when bees were flying!)

Top of the photo is due South.

D4083DDA-91C3-49DD-A2ED-B723E2A0C88B.JPG
 
Checked my hive yesterday. Sunny, light breeze, girls very calm. Saw the queen busy laying and now upto 8&half frames of BIAS. One empty play cup so last weeks concern about possible swarm cells was unfounded.
Some stores around the edges of brood frames but the super has only 3 frames of stores, same as last week. So I’m thinking the poor weather has meant they’re pretty much consuming everything they’re bringing in at the moment?
Quite a few drones bumbling around and one frame looks like bubble wrap with drone cells.
Nothing happening with my bait hive, no scouts seen.BBF97397-54C2-4C0F-8A89-BC68F380AE5B.jpeg
 
5 degress C and Heavy Rain, nothing to do, no bees flying, and not good for drone flying either.

I was going to paint more hives today, and sort out and put out bait hives around the area.

So here is a 360 degree photo from 120m above my Apiary ! In this photo more OSR around that I thought!

A Drones View ! (early morning yesterday, much better day when bees were flying!)

Top of the photo is due South.

View attachment 25897
Fabulous photo
 
Took advantage of 15min break in the rain to install 2 AMM Q’s received this morning, into 2 queenless nucs prepared yesterday. Tabs intact for a few days now. Wanted to get those in as quickly as possible.
 
It's been persistent drizzle and wind all day so I wasn't expecting to see much when I walked past on my way back from walking the dog but it's much milder (14°) and the bees are busy on regardless.
 
Hope you checked for any emergency QCs they'd started
If I know I have a queen coming I will have frames transferred in an upper BB with no queen 7-10 days before she arrives. By which time they have no means of making any cells and are left in a Q- nuc 12-24h b4 introduction. I don't want to curse myself but haven't lost a queen that way
 
If I know I have a queen coming I will have frames transferred in an upper BB with no queen 7-10 days before she arrives. By which time they have no means of making any cells and are left in a Q- nuc 12-24h b4 introduction. I don't want to curse myself but haven't lost a queen that way
If I'm making up a nuc with a new queen, I make sure I have the queen in my top pocket as I make up the nuc and put her straight in, bunch of grass stuffed into the entrance and leave for a couple of days before checking she's out - not lost one using that method.
 
Rained all day, popped to our mentor who has a shop picked up a queen marker pen ( wishful thinking if we have a queen and we've never marked a queen before!!) and a feeder for our nuc of needed for the June gap. Few bees out for a drink but other than that rubbish rain
 
If I know I have a queen coming I will have frames transferred in an upper BB with no queen 7-10 days before she arrives. By which time they have no means of making any cells and are left in a Q- nuc 12-24h b4 introduction. I don't want to curse myself but haven't lost a queen that way
All well and good if you know in advance…
I was told yesterday at 16:00 the Q’s we’re posted and will be delivered today. Given the weather today, the sensible thing was to make up the nucs yesterday.
Plan to leave the tabs intact for a week, remove any QC’s they started and then remove the tabs.
 
How long would you wait?
I seldom wait more than 24 hours. I was distracted/swayed by a load of chatter a while back and left the tabs on for longer on a batch of queens, that year I went from a 100% success rate since using my method (not a method 'invented' by me BTW just one I've been using after extensive research) to a 50% failure rate over a season.
 
Could this be out be queen?
 

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