What did you do in the Apiary today?

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Checked the bees in my newest apiary and found another 2 that have gone queenless over the winter, that now makes 5 out of 12 that have done the same at that apiary, my other 2 sites losses are 0/10 and 1/20.
This is the first winter the bees have spent on this new site,in theory it looks like the perfect site but there's a BIG mobile phone mast just 30m from the bees, could this be the reason for the queen losses?
When did they last have a laying queen?
 
I've checked all my hives in the last week. A few were a bit light (mostly nucs) but all are alive at the moment - except for the mini nuc colony that I had overlooked at the end of summer. It seemed very vigorous so I made a PIR cosy and topped up their fondant. Unfortunately, they've recently starved. Most of the bees had not decomposed at all so I might have been just a week or two too late with the fondant top up. However, I can't see a queen among the dead bees so perhaps she was already gone.

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It looks like a lot of the bees have been chewed up?
 
17degC sunny so I checked the stores in the top box of all 5. Meant to check just a couple with highest weight drop but once you get started . ..
One needed feeding, capped brood and eggs up under the crownboard.
One is rustling. Lost the queen? or maybe they're fanning what looks like nectar! No clue where they've found this. Weight of hive still dropping tho'. ?

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17degC sunny so I checked the stores in the top box of all 5. Meant to check just a couple with highest weight drop but once you get started . ..
One needed feeding, capped brood and eggs up under the crownboard.
One is rustling. Lost the queen? or maybe they're fanning what looks like nectar! No clue where they've found this. Weight of hive still dropping tho'. ?

View attachment 42208
 
17degC sunny so I checked the stores in the top box of all 5. Meant to check just a couple with highest weight drop but once you get started . ..
One needed feeding, capped brood and eggs up under the crownboard.
One is rustling. Lost the queen? or maybe they're fanning what looks like nectar! No clue where they've found this. Weight of hive still dropping tho'. ?

View attachment 42208
I looked at some of mine during the week and was surprised that many had quite a bit of nectar in the combs.
 
I looked at some of mine during the week and was surprised that many had quite a bit of nectar in the combs.

Someone suggested that having eaten out the middle of that frame the queen hasn't moved up and laid in it suggesting they're queenless. Not doing a full inspection till April probably so time will tell. She's the old lady of the apiary, they tried to supercede her last autumn already.
Snowdrops are over and can't think where they're finding nectar but I'm in a village, they could be dropping into gardens about. Cherry plum flowering tho' as I think of it.
 
Balmy 14degrees this afternoon, had a surprise at the farm with a hive I suspected was dead apparently busy. Might well be robbery of course, I'll see when I inspect it in a few weeks time.
Pollen going in one hive headed by a last summers Northumberland black queen , others all making the most of the sun.
 
Both hives survived pretty well it would seem.
Lots of willow pollen going in both hives, K&A canal just down the lane
Queen excluders back on, bit of fondant in both.
Replaced what seemed to be a pretty manky super with a new one.
Clean the old one up and reuse.
Airing out my two homemade nucs in the polytunnel, been shut up in a dark dampish shed over winter.
Bit the bullet (tasted bitterly expensive) and bought an instavap lite !
Looking good so far.
 

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uick check that all is well with this cold snap forecast. All looking good and my very local willow just flowering of which all hives were taking advantage. Great to see them piling in the pollen.
 
not in the apiary but bee related - BFA meeting at Symonds Yat. the morning session was an interesting spring roundup from the NBU given by the RBI for the South West England area.
The rumoured catastrophic winter losses came up, with only one member declaring high losses with mortalities of around 70% since Christmas - sounded like the usual winter dwindle scenario with not many dead bees in the hive, no heads in cells or dead bees on the comb and plenty of stores remaining
From the SW RBI standpoint, most of the losses seem to be hobbyists with the majority obviously varoosis and one regular factor was late varroa treatment.
one interesting fact from their national statistics is that contrary to what is being bandied around - there was only one case of colony poisoning reported last year and when the SBI got there - it was CBPV and it seems there's been quite a few cases cropping up with hobbyists .
 
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