Saturday 18th January 2014 ~ Oxalic Acid Application

Oxalic Acid Application

We have felt mixed feelings about whether we should treat them or not but on balance thought it was worth it. We knew we probably had close on 1000 mites using the calculator and some suggestions were to treat in April which sounds daft as there will be nectar coming in then; so we have taken a gamble and hope it pays off.

 

 

The hive at the top of the garden away from the conservatory building site

Woodpecker guard mesh in place

 

 9 degrees and a calm day so hopefully a good time for a quick drizzle of warm Oxalic Acid solution

 Here we come girls

A super full of honey stores still and no bees in this level

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A nice cluster where we expected them having had the Varroa board in for a week

Just checking that I had drizzled on any frames with bees

24th November 2013 ~ Beautiful Beast

November 2013

As we had seen one of these ........

We needed one of these......

 

We can trim loads off the top in due course but as we had read reports of early Green Woodpecker attacks already in Hampshire, despite a very mild autumn, we have fitted this with some degree of urgency.

We have left the bottom just clear of the landing board and hope the bees will soon learn to land and walk up rather than just fly at their front door.

 

Wednesday 9th October 2013 ~ Apivar off and ready for winter

Ready for Winter

Checking the queen excluder for the queen before laying it down; today the queen excluder comes off ready for winter. If we left it on then the colony might starve as they would be unwilling to leave the queen in the brood box as they moved up to the super for food.

 

 Winter stores

 

Good supply of honey

 

Checking for the queen and eggs and larvae ~ we found all those

The queen is just at about 10 o'clock from the centre with a rather fade white dot; we wish we had thought to have the marking kit with us to make finding her in the spring easier

Busy bees at their front door

Varroa board out and a quick check

Last week we counted about 300 and this week less than 50

It has definitely been worth treating as we were only counting about 2 a week in the summer if we put the board in and had wondered if we had many.

 Can you see, little red shiny mites; they are nasty little blighters

So our bees have about 50lbs of honey stored for the winter, they have a good core block of brood and the queen is still laying so they should be strong enough for next season. We have increased the size by almost 50% from the tiny colony we received in April. They have pollen stores and reduced varroa. The queen excluder is off and the crown board is in situ ready for any feeding that is needed. The entrance restrictor is in but as the girls are still bringing in so much pollen we are reluctant to fit the mouse-guard yet as the small holes can cause the pollen to get knocked off. The only other thing is to consider making a woodpecker cage; we haven't seen any green woodpeckers here or spotted ones either but expect they are around so will pick up some wire from the garden centre when we are next there.

Later we went for a walk and here 10 minutes from our garden is a dark honey bee on wild asters; we also saw brighter orangey ones which are not ours but we know there is another hive a little way off to the east.

28th - 29th - 30th September 2013 ~ House Move

How we left the hive last night after a failed attempt had to be aborted
 

Front door all taped up with duck tape; one small strip folded in on itself lengthwise then laid across a longer length like a sticky plaster. This stops the bees getting to stuck to it on the inside. Nylon straps in place and ready to go.
 

In the boot with frames in line with direction of travel so they do not sway about too much
 

House Move!
Job done

We decided to leave them with their front door taped up so they were in for 24 hours. They have a mesh floor and vents in the roof so will be fine.

However when I go to have a look in the morning I find they have dislodged the tape and a few are out flying.

Tape dislodged across entrance

A few bees are out exploring ~ not sure if they moved it, or the weather

A tip we had read about was to display shrubbery across the entrance so the bees 'know' they are somewhere new or their environment has changed.

 

The hive in its new location with Snowdrops & Crocuses planted right in front of them ready for some early spring forage :-)

16th September ~ Apivar and autumn checks

Some very quick checks around now as we are in the process of moving house and preparing our bees for their second move of the year.

Hive inspection and application of veroalife strips
 

Nectar & Honey stores in the brood

Nice amount of sealed brood and nectar

Wednesday 5th - Sunday 9th September 2013 Preparation & Hive inspection

Wednesday 5th September ~ Porters on

 We put the crown board between the two supers tonight and put porter escapes in place ready to remove the empty super on Friday.

Hive Inspection

 Capped Honey and more being worked on

Nice bit of honey with yellow cappings from being walked over with pollen laden feet!

A nice cluster of bees on an outer frame ~ no idea what they were doing except maybe being lazy and keeping each other warm 

!! 

Cluster

Good amount of sealed brood

Honey & Nectar

 

What a lot of bees!

It is amazing how heavy this is. 

Queeny

A playcup and a possible Supercedure Queen Cell

 So, we took off the now empty super and prepared it for winter storage ~ we hope!

Deep frozen overnight and then double wrapped in cling film then back in the box before being sealed into a bin bag. We hope this is enough

Friday 30th August 2013 ~ Hive Inspection

Hive inspection with trainees

Esmé having a little more hive experience

Will in his bee-suit for the first time

Checking out the brood box

 Will actually managing to see eggs on his first try

Bees, bees, bees

Loads of bees and yellow footprints over the tops of the frames.

Today we did quite a reshuffle of super frames

We took the three frames of stores from the top super and put them into the lower frame taking the empty three from the lower super and put into the top.
We then put the crown-board between the supers

The bees were quite calm but very busy with just a couple of pesterers