11 degrees C and flying bees

It might be cool but they are flying, 11 degrees C and 8pm. It has been cool all day at South Kirkby but this colony is very active. Shame it is the feisty colony as well.

all the other colonies were quiet at the front and nothing flying in

I popped over to my Leeds apiary, that is near to a small ditch. It is maybe 5ft-6ft below the apiary. Today due to the very heavy rain fall last night it was nearly level with the apiary floor. It wont I hope get any higher as firstly their is a pump house near by that should not let it and secondly if it reaches the same height as the apiary floor there are miles of fields around that it would also flood, so getting any higher would be quiet difficult if it did , the hives would be ok.

This is a shot from about 8 days ago. You can see the ditch at the back. This is the nearest colony. The ditch is a lot fuller now. I must try and get a shot of the ditch full up.

Wakefield, England, has been cool all day around 13/14 degrees maybe. no rain but generally dull.

It makes you sweat

It didn't work out well to start with

About three weeks ago, I found one swarm cell in this colony, so I performed an artificial swarm. The problem was I could not find the queen, which isn't great It was on 4 boxes to start with.

So I took the swarm cell and some brood and stores and left it on the original site (which is where the floor is in the picture) in 1 box and the other 3 boxes I moved to the left of the original position and turned it round 180 degrees and was confident the queen was in these three boxes

On the original site I also added another brood box because I "assumed" lots and lots off flying bees would go back there. A week later I went back to check on my success story to find that in the box on the original site there was hardly any bees never mind 2 boxes worth and all the flying bees had found there way back to the original queen that I didnt find in the box I moved.

Out of annoyance all I could think to do was merge all the boxes back together to make this monster you see below.  Doesn't it look so serene. It didn't stay that way.

National Hive made up of 5 brood boxes

Any how as I was going through I was very happy to see that there was an awful lot of bees in these 5 boxes. As you can see below. Note the flying bees in the background. There was lot of flying bees about

Apis Millifera in a National Brood box

This is a close up shot of one of the frames out of the box. I have a small metal grab that I can pinch them whilst in the box and lift them out. It is so so. I don't use it much but it is great for when I want to take pictures.

Single National hive frame and brood

I shortened the stack of 5 to 4. The bottom box on the right had the least in with about 3 frames not being used at this end. The second and third boxes were full of bees and the top box once I merged it with the fifth box that I took away had quite a lot of honey in it but still had spare frames in. Over all, a very strong colony with lots of potential. Although I will say a bit feisty and they do tend to follow which is not a good trait in bees at all. 

Open National hive - 5 boxes now down to 4

In the end it worked out well. The queen cell I had seen 3 weeks earlier I now believe to be a supercedure cell. Temporarily splitting the colony did not appear to harm it in any way. There was no more supercedure queen cells or swarm cells on this inspection. However if they only had one supercedure cell as appeared before then in this box of bees that could prove extremely hard to spot.


By the way I have other strong colonies in the apiary. The shot below is one after an inspection as they have a tendancy to pour out of the hive

Apis Millifera - The Western Honey Bee

I will say it is all good fun.

Weather at South Kirkby today was cool at around 15 degrees Celsius. It rained in the morning on and off but in the afternoon during this inspection it was bright, clear and reasonably warm. It took a couple of hours to to do some quick and detailed inspections across 7 boxes of bees at various strengths.

Once I had finished, I took my veil off and it indeed does make you sweat

First post in twelve months

First post in 12 months. How time flies.

This is the allotment as of yesterday

beetroot in the foreground going to seed, parsnip at the back, going to seed, an apple tree just to the left

the allotment

at the back of the parsnips are some golden gourmet shallots (down the left of the shot), garlic and some leeks left over from last winter. In the background is a gooseberry bush, well two actually.

This is bottom of the allotment (where the shot was taken of the flowering parsnips, two chairs weighted down and ground that needs clearing. At the back are hawthorn trees, I layered the ones directly behind the chairs in winter as that was just bare soil.

This is common mullen (I am told) Verbascum thapsus. It started growing and I thought it looked nice, so I left it. It apparently can make flower spits 6ft tall in its second year, bring it on.

Verbascum Thapsis

After a very cold and wet April start of May, this was the grape vine in the greenhouse, wilting with the heat!!!

the vine

This is the Victoria plum tree. Last year it was in a pot and produced about 20plus great tasting plums. This winter  it went in the ground and I am hoping for lots more plums

At the base of the plum tree from left to right is strawberries (yellow flower in the middle if a poppy), poached eggs plants and then chives

This is a colony at the bottom of my garden. A rather strange tale in that I picked up the swarm a few weeks ago, I then thought they all died but later were resurrected and now a thriving small colony. I might post a full account later on.

This was yesterday morning, me and Duncan were moving some bees (well this is one of four colonies we moved)

the bees in a box

Weather yesterday in Wakefield, England was very hot and sunny (20 degrees C plus)

My first Swarm of the season... Awesome doesn't even come close!!!

Got a call yesterday afternoon (22nd April 2011) from Duncan at my association asking me to pick up a swarm near where I live, I was advised it was in a tree but the house occupier had a ladder. So having prepared the car and required kit a few days previously off I went.

This is what I found. It looks high up, because it was. Well 20ft maybe 25ft.

The plan was to put the ladder to the left of the swarm, climb up and lop the branch the were on and holding the branch with swarm attached bring those girls down to earth. That was the plan. 

Due to excitement, I did not take many pictures. but below is a close up

 

Well what actually happened was this.... the ladder went up. so far so good. I went up with branch loppers. this plan is coming together. I cleared the branches that were in the way to make room for me and lopped the branch off the bees were on. this is the point where the plan failed and if I might say so, with style and finesse. That branch with those bees on is how can I put this, bloody heavy. I stayed on the ladders, that's good. the branch when I could not hold it due to the weight, hit the floor. Bees how ever have wings and flew. They were every where. They did look great but that was not the plan.

I came down and watched with the house holder who commented they looked like that when the flew in before. Did they now.

Now is the part for patience. I waited may be half an house and they settled on an old picket fence underneath the tree. Some good luck. At this point I brushed them in to a national brood box and strapped it up. The opening was left open and I came away (leaving the box)

I went back at dusk that evening knowing that all stray bees would have gone in the box with the queen, I stuffed the hole with some sponge and took the bees to my apiary, once the hive was sited, the sponge was removed and I now need to go and check on them.

With this swarm, the cut out and the two colonies from over Winter I am now at 4 colonies and it is only 24th April (mindst you one colony has a failing/failed queen so really I have 3 healthy colonies I hope)

bees on the hive entrance 22nd April 2011

A shot of Apis Melifera "Yorkshire" IE Mongrel going in to my hive at my apiary. This is the strongest of the two that went in to Winter. the other one I believe the queen has failed due to a distinct lack of brood. A shame but that is the natural circle of life and what I am now left with is survivors or the best of the rest.

Bait hive

I have made a bait hive up using the information on McCartney Taylor's website here

Whats a bait hive? basically a box that you put some where out of the way in the hope of catching a swarm of bees in Spring and Summer or Autumn.

This bait hive box will hold 6 national frames ... just

The bait hive, note the hanger on the back with a whole in it to hang on a nail in a tree if required.

This is one end of the box with an entrance whole drilled in approx 28mm wide

inside shot of the box showing the inside hole. In hindsight I should have made the box deeper and had the entrance hole beneath the frame bottoms, in hindsight I have read in a couple of places bees prefer this.

Inside shot again. The length is just slightly longer than a national frame, then I nailed 2 pieces of wood on the inside for the frames to hang on. If a swarm does colonise this box with the frames inside then the will put brace comb between the frames and underneath the wood that the frames hang on but there is worse things in life. this box was made up on the cheap with salvaged wood.

Box with 6 national frames inside, note the end one. it doesnt fit correctly. Bad measurements?. I am annoyed as I measured 6 frames and then added the depth of the side wood on and cut, I think where I went wrong was that the frames I have added inside are not the same one's I measured for and frames from different suppliers/manufacturers can be slightly wider/narrower.

1 frame removed to show old comb that I am using as a lure.

the entrance whole is the right size for birds to get in so I have pinned some wire horizontal and vertically to deter them

The design for this bait box was inspired by Taylor McCartneys website, Cheers Taylor.





Wakefield today is damp and cold.

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