I've had a couple of busy days again, nipping round all my apiaries to put clearer boards on hives so that I could remove some honey supers. I took supers off from two sites today, and put the clearer boards on at a third. I will be taking the supers off from the third site … Continue reading Another Busy Few Days
More Grafting
As well as checking all my out apiaries today, I did the first grafts since my incubator packed up and killed all my queen cells. I brought a frame of young brood home, wrapped in a damp tea towel to keep it from drying out, and chose day old larvae to graft into cell cups. … Continue reading More Grafting
Mixed news in the garden apiary
Another hot and sunny day today here in Dorset, what better weather to be messing about in a bee suit moving heavy hives around - said with tongue firmly in cheek. I inspected the 11 colonies in my garden apiary this morning, with mixed results. Some of the new virgin queen introduced to nucs have … Continue reading Mixed news in the garden apiary
The Queen is dead!
Not what you want to find while carrying out hive inspections - a dead queen, and one of this years too! Luckily I raise my own queens, so am able to replace her easily enough, but it is always sad to find a dead queen. I spent the morning marking new virgin queens, and then … Continue reading The Queen is dead!
Expanding
I had a very busy day today, expanding my home apiary, making splits and introducing new queens. I also had a friend drop round with three virgin queens for me to put into my queen bank as the next three or four days are forecast for rain and thunder storms. I built a new stand … Continue reading Expanding
Walk away split
Today, I went over to one of my apiaries at Lytchett Minster and made a walk away split from one of the very strong hives there, in order to prevent it from swarming. I was able to take away 4 brood frames and a frame of stores, still leaving the original hive in a strong … Continue reading Walk away split
Splits and Queens
I went over to my Lytchett Matravers Apiary this morning to split a double brood National hive to make two hives. This is quite straightforwards; Put a new stand and floor to one side, over a metre away from the existing hive remove the roof and crown board from the existing hive, place the roof … Continue reading Splits and Queens
New Queens
I re-queened two of my hives today, as the bees in those hives were becoming more and more 'protective' of the garden, head butting and following right up to the back door. I re-queened them with Carniolan bees - the Carniolan bee is calm and non-aggressive, used to obtain honey and other bee products in populated areas, … Continue reading New Queens
New hive
I noticed over the last few days that the last over-wintered poly nuc left has had bees bearding outside, this means they are having problems with the hive temperature getting too high, probably due to overcrowding. Overcrowding is one of the main reasons why bees swarm, so I knew that I had to move them … Continue reading New hive
New out-apiary
I set up a new out-apiary at Lytchett Minster today, I think I melted into my suit it was so warm. The bees were so placid it was amazing, despite having been closed up for almost a day, transported in a car and then moved from nucs into hives - they seem to have a … Continue reading New out-apiary
