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)

Colony Cut out - 30th April 2011

A late post just to document a cut out I did in South Leeds on the the 30th April 2011. My bee keeping association took a call from a roofer stating work had stopped due to a bee colony in a roof. All the roof slates had been removed and the new sheeting had been installed apart from this one corner where the slates had come off but the felting was still in place. I think it had took them a couple of days to ring us and the colony was very docile, may be from the very cold nights (they were still hitting freezing). This is the space that was left once all the comb was removed. It was a good sized colony.

 This is the box the colony went in. I had national frames with rubber bands round them and slotted the comb in. This is the box trussed up ready to be lowered down the scaffold I was working from. I only just managed to get the comb in.

 Just in case you dont know what scaffold is. This is where the bees were taken from. I was working in the top left hand corner of the house. The cut out took around 90 minutes and then I went back later on giving any flying bees time to go in to the box.

and the bees are now doing fine. I did not know if I had killed the queen or even got her, but the colony went to my apiary and left to get on with living in piece and quiet

Weather on the 30th April 2011 was wet and damp and freezing during the night time. Today on the 23rd April 2011...heat wave (twenties) with short rain showers

 

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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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Queen Banking and making the cages

I have been reading a forum and it referred to some instructions on building a queen bank for a bee hive. So I thought I would have a go. Sadly there are only pictures so a lot of guess work was involved in regards to measurements. A queen bank by the way, is a concept of keeping queens but with out the need for a colony for each queen.

The description is here


I started by making the frame where the queen banking cages would sit.

This is the complete unit sat next to a national frame. It has three shelves and there is a little trim on each shelf to stop the queen banking cages (these are hives runners), on the images in the above link I think there is a little wooden lip nailed on instead but it is not clear to me.

This next shot shows the ends. I had to add a little piece of wood to attach the runners as in hind site I had not made the three shelves wide enough. Otherwise two cages would not fit in back to back

These are the first cages I made with 1inch x 1 1/2 inches pieces of 8mm ply, They look great but I am not sure if they are large enough for the queen, as in the link it is references that the cages need to be large/deep enough to stop worker bees poking through and pulling the queens apart. It is also relevant to mention that I made the little lids out of ply on these cages and that was very awkward for attaching two nails in to form hinges as thy ply kept splitting... most annoying which on mark II, I used really wood for the hinged lids.

These are mark II, they do not look much different but the dimensions are 1inch by 2inch with a wooden lid hinged, slightly taller

This is a close up of the lid. when closed it is flat with the top. These cages were constructed using an air nailer but when attaching the lids, I drilled the holes on either side and nailed in two frame nails which made good hinges, When attaching the mesh I used a stapler but did not staple it to the lid other wise movement was restricted. this is my assumption here as any way I could not see how it would work.

You see here the 4 example queen cages I made up. Two 1 1/2 inch high cages and two 2 inch high cages. What I have so far took about 2-3hours to knock together, I am not sure how many cages it will hold but I feel a lot wouldn't be far off. Making more cages is very easy. The mesh I used is very fine and I acquired it from a local farmer / garden supply shop at about £3 per square meter

It is also worth mentioning that I think the frames in the link are Langstroth and I use National sizes. National brood frames are 14inches x 8 1/2 inches and Langstroth brood frames are 17 5/8 inches x 9 1/2 inches (per below). So my cages might still not be large enough at 2 inch high. I don't know.

The weather in Wakefield today is cold and dry.

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More bees

I have been to see my Bees at my out Apiary today. Here are a couple of shots that in my opinion look beautiful.


This is a picture of a super frame with brood in it. Supers with frames inside are usually put on top of brood boxes and usually only have honey in them, however due to an interesting turn of events earlier on in the year, this hive has the brood in the super.


You can see sealed brood in the middle of the super. Sealed brood being larvae that will come out as bees. The bees on this frame will be nurse bees that are looking after the young eggs and larvae by keeping them warm

 This is where the above frame came from, you can just make out the honey comb in the frames on each side of the gap

Weather in Wakefield, England today was cool but sunny and bright.

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My cast swarm

About 6 weeks ago I picked up a small swarm of bees from a place in Leeds. A  small swarm is called a cast. It is very late in the year for swarms of any size and this one was about the size of 2 or 3 tennis balls, so not big. I would like to try and get it through winter but I think it will be hard due to the size. I do know that it needs more food to get it through winter, so I added a frame of honey yesterday and our lass took some pictures



When I housed the swarm I put them in a National brood box that I had been using as a bait hive. It had some loose pieces of comb in that were tied in to a frame (this is my first year as a beekeeper so I dont have spare frames of comb drawn in by a colony)  The bees so far have expanded on the original comb.

The next frame along, they have drawn their own fresh comb,the trouble here though is that the foundation I put in has slipped down (this means I did not fit it correctly, so a lesson there for me) In turn the bees have also glued it to the next frame along, so in this shot there are actually two frames not just one. I will sort this problem next year if this colony makes if through the Winter/Spring

This is the frame of honey I am adding to the cast. This frame is from a hive I have elsewhere, it is mainly made up of sugar syrup honey as I have been feeding my other colonies. It has already been in the hive once, but I whipped it out again so our lass could take a piccy

 This is me putting everything away, As the colony is small I have kept it at home. So far they have not been a bit of bother because the colony is so small

Weather in Wakefield, England yesterday was wet, rainy and damp, Today it has not stopped raining all morning

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Lime Mint murder

Trimmed the Lime mint back this morning, as it was getting way out of control and starting to fall over. There isnt much left but it will soon be back in fifth gear growing quickly. It was standing at about 18inch before the trim and you couldnt see the bucket it was planted in. How times change

These are some Calendula growing in a tub, Last year had 1 plant I think in this tub and these are self sown plants. They are good for attacking greenfly eating insects, so they get to stay

Weather report - Sunny all day ,Wakefield, England and in Leeds and South Elmsall.

Of note checked my bee hive and could not find a queen still and I dont think there are any baby bees either. However spoke to a chap at the association and I am picking him up tomorrow to have a look at the hive, cast an experts eye over the issue.

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starting the process of making my own bee hive!!! WIppeeee

Steady day today, been making the first part of a bee hive, a national brood box. It is 8 pieces of wood or 4 pieces of wood times two, if that makes sense. Two of each piece. I modified the plans that this guy posted on photobucket. top man.. click here

There are 4 struts that needed a router and that took the longest to do. I had to organised a router and table, but once set up, it did the job very quickly

The larger side pieces are made of plywood and I cut them on a table saw which did the job quite well indeed.

If I had done some close up shots, there is room for improvement but not much and I have tried a frame inside the box and it fits very snug.

I want to make some more boxes next and then move on to a floor and bottom

Once the brood box was made, it was time for dinner, followed by rhubarb and prunes with lots of sugar. Very nice indeed.

The poached egg plant seeds I planted are doing well and this is planted at the base of a plum tree. I want to plant its brothers and sisters round a bee hive.

Weather report - Sunny all day and but very windy this morning in to the afternoon, Wakefield, England

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The bees are looking healthy

Had a quick peak at the bees this afternoon, there wasnt much activity at the entrance so I just took the top off. No fears.... lots of bees as you can see

I still dont know if I am queenless yet though. I will do a full inspection next Sunday I hope. weather allowing


My peas are growing very nicely but no flowers yet. These are a mange tout variety called "bijou"

The mint in tubs are growing very well to. This is a lime mint

I have I think 6 varieties on mint in tubs like this including catmint "nepeta racemose". grapefruit mint, apple mint, pineapple mint and eau de cologne mint


Weather report - sunny morning but very wet afternoon and evening, lots of rain, Wakefield, England

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