Don't Warré Steve

(Title dedication: Julie of Happy hour at the top bar hive).
As I hinted in my last post they has been some change in my warré circumstances.

My own warré remains consistent.  They are still just within one box but show good activity even with the ailing weather. So what has changed?... August Cottage has some lodgers!

BACKGROUND
Steve is a natural beekeeper based in York who I met as we were both starting out last year. Him with a warré, me with a kTBH. Unfortunately
his hived swarm was robbed out quite quickly and didn't make it. This year, through the biobees forum, Steve was the lucky recipient of bees from Barbara, who is an extremely experienced kTBH keeper who has been treatment free for varroa for more than 5 years. Newly (and beautifully) built warré in hand Steve collected his bees. All went well until 6 weeks later the bees swarmed again. A classic case of false floor syndrome perhaps. So the swarm's swarm was hastily housed in the spare box and one Steve had to hand.

Fast forward to today and Steve is in the throws of a house move with no where to put the hives.  This is where I ride in on my white charger to save the day. Since there is plenty of room where I keep my bees I am keeping an eye on his hives until after Christmas.  By that time Steve is hoping to have orgainsed an  allotment in which to site the hives.

The reswarming has left the both colonies a little on the small side going into the back end of the year. On a positive note the hives are certainly well built. The wood is two inches thick with generous windows so you can keep an eye on things.  Not sure I would want to lift them when full of honey but I'm sure the bees will appreciate it during a Yorkshire winter.

Change of weather, Change of fortune

I have been keeping an eye on the hives of late but not messing about with them too much. The weather is flowing inevitability towards autumn and with the shortening of the days comes the slowing down of the hives.

I can no longer inspect (open inspection) the hives after work in the evening. It is just a little too cold for my conscience to allow. That only leaves me with weekends to open them up, and the weather in Yorkshire is.... unreliable.

Formally Phoebee
This hive swarmed whilst I was on holiday and I have been waiting for signs of a laying queen. Whenever I have tried to inspect this usually placid colony has been extremely reactionary. A change in temperament like this was not a good sign but I hoped for the best. The activity in this hive however has continued to drop off. I managed to fully inspect the hive this weekend and things really don't look good. There was the crack of propolys on opening, a further sign of the march towards winter. Once open the bees gave me no trouble and appeared listless. There were bands on honey at the top of 22 combs and I removed any empty to reduce the hive to a more manageable size for them.

I have never been a whiz at queen spotting but this hive's queen (and her daughters) are particularly hard to spot. Their markings have all been VERY similar to the workers and are all quite skinny.  Still I looked hard and found not a monarch.

The brood pattern was spotty and very bumpy suggesting drones.  Whether this is a drone laying queen or a laying worker at this stage I think it is unimportant.

You get an idea of how they feel from this comb really. Queen cup anyone? I fear I may have to shake these bees out in front of another hive one evening so they can find a new queenright home. It is just too late in the year for a brood transfer.

Boudica's bees
It might not be summer anymore but someone forgot to tell these girls. On sunday it was grey and overcast with a little mist in the air. Boudica's hive was as busy Heathrow on a bank holiday.

Opening up I notice there were still a few squatters in residence. I am afraid I had to well and truly block their route of entry this time as I will be putting the insulation board in later this week.

is that one pulling out a pin?

On opening the hive I noticed the propolys was still very soft and sticky. The colony is obviously having no trouble maintaining a good temperature. The bees were still festooning in places suggesting comb building is still underway. There is still a solid brood pattern and fresh eggs.

I removed the remainder of the comb from the brewery bees. You can see in the picture below how they chewed down the comb to expose the larvae. This reduced the hive to 18 bars. Not all of the bars are fully built out so they should have plenty of space for the rest of autumn but not too much to keep warm in winter.

All in all I am really pleased with this colony.  After the shaky start we had we are getting on well and the bees are doing well.

I ended up with quite a bit of empty comb from both hives. Any good empty comb I placed behind the follower boards to help out next year. I only removed the comb that was very old, wonky or had high drone cell content.

My wife has a fancy to make lip balm but we shall see! Next update on Warré hives in a few days...yes... I said hive's'!

By eck it's bin awhile

I think I need to start this blog entry with an apology.  I have been remiss in my duties as a blogger. I started a new job in July leaving me less opportunities for online time. I am sorry for not keeping you all up to date on my poor long suffering bees and the meanderings of my mind. To try and make up for it (and because this blog post is quite light pictures) here is a photo of a bee taken at The Eden Project in cornwall.

The combine of the queenless brewery bees and boudica's hive seemed to go well. There was certainly no bad behaviour externally that suggested the colony was undergoing internal struggles. I left them alone for a full two weeks before sticking my nose in for check up. They were no more defensive than usual and I noticed all the comb from the brewery bees was empty. All the stores were gone, presumably moved. More surprising though was all the drone brood was gone too. Looking at the comb which contained the brood I noticed it had been chewed in. This may have been bees harvesting the wax to use else where but there were small white blobs on some cell edges (not varroa btw). On one of the combs that contained younger brood when I put them in, there were a few larvae with the cell chewed down around them (so they stuck out) with workers nipping at them!  Admittedly I am not that experienced but I have never seen anything like this. The colony has appears to have decided that the drone brood was just unacceptable. Why bother to wait and have to evict the drones when you can eat them and get a bit of protein into the bargin. I didn't disturb the brood nest at all and removed the crosscombed bars from the brewery bees hive.

I hope to do a proper inspection this weekend and update on all the hives so stay turned.

Hop Queen the Drone layer

Well Kyle's first supervised inspection took place on friday. He inspected the brewery bees headed up by the Hop Queen. This was a swarm that arrived on the day we visited the Great Yorshire Brewery.

It was clear during Kyle's inspection that there was much more drone brood than any recently arrived swarm has any right to have. As such I went in and checked myself without my "helper" :)



Solid drone brood and a beautiful pollen pattern



As you can see there is 100% drone brood. The drone brood is also housed within worker cells so it isn't something the colony has chosen, it is something forced upon them by their situation. There are a few reason how I know this a drone laying queen rather than a laying worker:

1 - There is a roughly normal brood pattern. Laid as closely together as the drone sized brood allows. With a laying worker it would be a lot more scattered about the place.

2 - The eggs are one to a cell and laid in the bottom. Laying workers will lay mulitple eggs and lack the full length abdomen required to reach the bottom of the cell so the eggs are on the sides.

3 - Oh!.... and we saw a queen in there on friday. If I am honest this is the main way I know, but it is worth considering the other points too :) But then you'd know that if you'd read my last blog :p



Some cross comb. Lots of drone brood and a hopeful queen cup.



It is a real shame that this queen will come to nothing as the way in which the bees have laid down their pollen stores, in a circle around the brood rather than just arching the top, is a trait of the british black bee suggesting these bees might have had some genetic link. The cross-comb shown in the picture above is minimal and only covers two bars so I can easily remove it and attach it to a seperate bar and let them join up the gap. What you may notice on that cross-comb is a hopeful little queen cup.

So the bees clearly recognise the problem. In fact the roar from the hive was alot like the one I heard in a hive I had that went queenless a while back. So what are my options:

1 - "let nature take its course". In time these bees will simply die off leaving empty comb which can be donated to another hive. 

This seems a little unfair to the bees and waste of a potential workforce (bad manager!).

2 - Donate some brood. Given some eggs and young brood the bees could raise a new queen albeit not 'their' own genetically.

There are a few problems with this idea. Firstly and Majorly they won't have a queen for another month. With it already being August this does not give them enough time to build up for winter. There is also a danger they would swarm again and further weaken themselves. A lesser problem is that I was only intending to keep this colony for genetic diversity within my queens (and therefore mating drones). This would give me another queen with the same/similar genetics before I have decided which queens I want to propergate from. It would also slightly weaken the donor hive at a time when they need all the bees they can get.

3 - Buy a queen. Queens can be easily purchased on the internet to arrive the following morning in an inroduction cage. They cost between £30-40, which in bee keeping terms isn't a lot. After a brief introduction period the queen is released and can begin laying right away.

Hmmmm I think the purchasing and import of genetically pure races of bee is shady at best. I truely believe local bee populations should be able to stabilise genetically which will allow them to properly react to selection pressures provided by their environment, diseases, pests, and (hopefully) to a lesser extent the beekeeper.

4 - Combine with a queen right colony. This would involve removing The Hop Queen (drone layer) and transferring the comb into another hive that is queenright. The bees need to be 'introduced' or they will fight. A traditional method is using a newspaper combination. A sheet of newspaper is put between the two colonies with a few slits cut in it. By the time the bees have chewed through the paper the scents in the hive have equalised and everyone lives happily ever after. This works well with conventional vertical hives but is a little tricker with a horizontal hive. It can be done though with either a modified follower board (hole in the middle with some newspaper covering it) or simply by masking taping a sheet of newspaper in place between the bars. Since the fighting is triggered by scent I have heard of people spraying the bees with air fresher *eeek!* and walking away. My current preferred method is to dust the bees with icing sugar (powdered sugar), as well as a few combs worth of bees at the end of the hive you're adding it to. This works well in a horizontal hive as sugar dusting is easy, does a improntu mite treatment, and by the time the bees have finished licking the sugar from each other they are all friends (or at the very least work colleagues). You should remember though to buy sugar free of caking agents, or grind your own. This way of combining will also allow you to put the combs within the relevant part of the hive rather than only at one end.

This will ultimately not result in me having another colony but it can potentially strengthen another colony on the approach to winter. However, this comb contains a lot of drone cells which the colony would have to look after and feed.

5 - Make them queenless and then shake them in front of another hive. This would involve removing the queen and leaving them without her for a few days. Theoretically, I can wait till the evening and empty the bees from the comb anyway from the current hive. Without the hive to return to (because I will have moved it) the bees will return to any queenright hive in the area strengthening their workforce. Again theoretically, that volume of flying bees entering a hive in the evening should mean there is no fighting. I could then feed the drone brood to the chickens.... they are in support of this plan.

This has the benefit being able to temperarily bolster any of my hives. The comb could then still be donated to another top bar hive for them to use for stores.

I am currenly torn between options 4 and 5 and would be interested in hearing peoples opinions so please comment.

In other news on checking Boudica hive to see if it would be able to provide a brood donation look who is back!

I had (I thought) removed these critters from Boudica's hive roof but as it happens they have managed to find another way in and rebuilt their nest. This is one of the babies all grown up. All six of the babies were present so either they hadn't left home or they were dropping off some washing for mum.  

Fairwell Phoebee

I have today (fri 1st aug) returned from a week away. I have inspected the hives and…..

Big beautiful boudica is being elusive but the hive is growing well. We saw brood in all stages and nectar is obviously coming in. Since their dramatic arrival as a swarm they have built 14 combs, 9 brood comb, and 5 honey combs. The brood pattern is solid and their temper is much better. Their tenant Mrs Fieldmouse was however looking a little lonely. Her children all grown up had now left home which unfortunately meant eviction for her.

Mata hari’s sneaky bees have been steady growers and there appears to be a bigger cloud outside the entrance everytime I visit. The viewing window tells me though that they still haven’t moved down in their warré. They must be reaching critical mass. Will they swarm? Will they grow down? Every day seems to tip the odds a little more in favour of the former.

Kyle did his first supervised inspection on the brewery bees. He did well,  though I had to take over when there was some cross comb. They have 7 combs, 5 of which are complete. We saw the Hop Queen herself but since the colony is a new swarm and are still so small there was a surprisingly large amount of drone brood, any would be a lot at this stage. There also appeared as though there may have been a couple of queen cells. It is possible this an old queen or at least poorly mated queen and she is running out of fertilised eggs. Hopefully the bees will manage to supercede her successfully.

The bees of the poppy hive, like their Warré neighbours, are showing no signs of moving down either.  As such I have made a cowardly decision and supered the previously nadired box *blushes shamefully*. There is still time for them to build up that box and hopefully by spring the bottom box will be empty where they have moved up with the stores.

And finally the headline story :(
I checked my large top bar hive before I went away on holiday. There was minimal young brood, pollen and nectar being placed in comb previously packed with brood, and of course queen cups. Eh oh, the dreaded swarming preparation. I have to admit I was surprised, the combine I had performed provided them with quite a lot of empty comb they could use but other than a few bees hanging out down there they hadn’t used it to store a thing. I was short on time and I fear a little late in the day. I moved a little of that unused comb (brood type) down into the brood nest hoping to give the queen some laying room.  I made sure I had some swarm traps primed and ready and went on holiday.
I returned to a hive containing some capped brood a LOT of stored nectar,  a number of capped queen cells, and empty swarm traps. Having never checked them I don’t know which queen cells are occupied so have decided to let nature take it’s course.  Queen Phoebee was my first queen. She arrived on the 27th July last year as a very small cast swarm. Her leaving marks the 1st anniversary of me as a bee keeper. I wish her well and hope she finds a good home. Fairwell Phoebee, you were a good queen and taught me much.

A Mice Surprise!

I have a fear that this blog may turn into a pun exchange with happy hour at the top bar hive.

I went inspect Boudica and her meanie bees last night. I lifted the lid to find a field mouse giving me a indignant look. She was not at all impressed with me invading her nest.

Mrs Field Mouse had built her nest at one end and there were a number of babies snuggled up inside. Initially I was a little startled and unsure about what to do. Standing there staring at those mouse pups I thought weeeeell can't hurt! Since they weren't on top of the bars that were in use I decided to leave the be. I proceeded with my inspection with the mouse observers. Oddly, the bees were the calmest they have ever been. These bees are normally fairly reactive and will take to the air. This time they remained on the comb and got on with their work.

Once these babies are up and around I will move the nest out and seal their entrance route.

Meanwhile in Mata Hari's Warré the bees still haven't moved down but there is some serious activity in the comb guides in the second box.

Only time will tell if they are going to move down or swarm out. No prizes for guessing which I am rooting for.

Cover me I am not going in

It is true that I have been itching to get into those hives. It is also true that I am curious as to the progress of all five colonies. It is not true that they need me poking around in their business. Each time I have both the opportunity and inclination to perform a hive inspection I am trying to ask myself the question "What am I trying to achieve?". If the answer is "I don't know", or "I just fancy a look" then I am going to fight the urge to open'er up!

As we enter the run up to the end of July the laying rate of the Queen will begin to drop off, the nectar flow will slow or stabilise, and risk of swarming will reduce. Since I feel as though there is less need to be searching for queen cells I decided to assess the colonies externally. There are different types of hive inspection and indeed observing the hive entrance can tell you a lot. The book linked to here within the Biobees forum library outlines season by season the observations that can made and their meanings. This also meant that instead of carrying a hive tool, water mister, and box of spare topbars I could take my camera!

The Brewery Bees:
The newly arrived swarm have now been on the roof of my shed for a week. I am awaiting one of two new natural beekeepers to collect them as their first colony. The Hop Queen may be an early queen from this year or one of last year's queens. The shear size of the swarm suggested a prime swarm and the fact that there was pollen being taken in within 3 days certainly suggests a laying queen is present. Being on the top of my shed I pass them every morning on the way to the car and several times in the evening. They are active from at least 7:15am through to at least 9:00pm. That is a long work day.

orange pollen going in

Grey pollen possibly bramble

By tapping the top bars with my knife handle I can also guess they have 5 bars worth of comb so far, which isn't bad going for a week. Since they are new to this bait hive even a prolific colony will be fine in there for at least about two-three weeks so no need to actually go in. If fact I wouldn't inspect these until they are in their final destination hive. All the bars can be transferred in one go keeping the cluster intact for minimal disturbance.

Phoebee's Girls:This remains the busiest hive by far. Following the combine of the queenless section of the hive with the queenright side the entrance activity has only increased. There are no large numbers of dead bees outside the hive and despite the HUGE number of bees they haven't become defensive. This suggests the combination has gone ahead with little in the way of resistance. Again by tapping the hive there is significant activity along the full length on the hive suggesting they are making use of the empty comb the queenless colony had.

Phoebee's Hive extremely busy at all entrances. A cloud of bees coming and going.

Following the start of a little rain everyone coming home.

Obviously with this many bees and at a time of year when wax building is reduced there is a danger the comb will be back-filled and the colony will swarm. HOWEVER, they don't need to build any wax the colony combine has just "donated" them at least 10 full combs to be getting along with. Lots of space, no need to swarm (fingers crossed).

Warré hive (the sneaky bees):Since the new roof, box underneath and the holes being plugged this colony has steadily built in strength. There appear to be a few more bees flying each day. Looking through the viewing window I can see bees investigating the second boxes topbars. There is a danger that the colony will see this second set as a false floor and swarm. I have a few bait hives out and can look to see if there is any scout bee activity. This obviously tells me if any bees in the area are thinking of swarming rather than specifically my bees but it is useful none the less. 

Hopefully the slow and steady growth Mata Hari is leading will allow the comb building to stay ahead of the laying.

Poppy hive:This hive is not nearly as busy as they were when they first turned up. This may very well be a result of a post-swarm 'lag' when the bees from the original swarm are dying off and the new bees are not quite flying yet. They will also have brood to look after rather than only foraging to do. It will take a while following a swarm for bee numbers to reach an equilibrium. This hive is definitely busier in the morning than the afternoon and I remember they propolysed the bait hive heavily suggesting they may be caucasian race. I doubt they have made any roads down into the bottom box nadirred a few weeks back, but the fact that it was nadirred instead of superred means they shouldn't be losing any heat.

'hey dude! you're going the wrong way'

With the fact that they are a recent swarm, the space I know is in there and the drop off in activity further swarming is currently unlikely.

Boudica and the Iceni (meany bees):Much more chilled out and not at all defensive at the entrance. It may be that the defensiveness I have seen is all just a hangover from the terrible installation I performed. Add to this the colouring I have noticed on Boudica herself suggests that these may also be a caucasians bee strain. They are well known for taking a long time to calm down after a challenge. This makes sense as if I am collecting another beekeepers swarms they are likely to have all the same or closely related bees.

much calmer at the entrance

During the last inspection I provided a few extra bars and noted they are not expanding fast. This colony had wax starter strips instead of comb guide on their first bars so they have built across a lot of bars but have wide shallow comb. They therefore have lots of space to still expand down. They are covering at least 11 bars with a few spare for building. Recent swarm with space available and little time to build stores so swarming again unlikely.

So I have managed to do an inspection of each hive without removing a single bar. How stupid am I going to look if they all swarm now :)

Forage Alimighty

I haven’t inspected now for a week and a half and truth be told I am itching to see how things are going.

How has the recombine gone for the previous double hive? Has the extra comb meant that all those bees finally have someone to put stores ahead of that prolific queen of theirs’?

How are Mata Hari and the sneaky bees getting on now they don’t have a leaky roof and a hive that resembles a colander?

Have the poppy hive managed to grow down from their colossal cross-comb catastrophe into the box below? I have heard that post june there is lot less comb building done. I am still concerned I have given them too much the achieve.

As for Boudica and the meanie bees (as Kyle calls them) I am a little less curious.  They have made it clear that they want space. Space that is roughly the same size and shape as me! In honesty they are more nervous  than mean.  Even the way they move about on the comb appears more frantic than the other colonies. The brood nest is expanding in a single direction in the hive with some stores placed at the other end. I have found (supprisingly) that they seem to prefer me inspecting from the brood end. As soon as I remove the follower board from the stores end they get very interested in my face as a possible dartboard. .. It may be that the one of the other colonies is performing some robbing. Which would explain the defensiveness.

On a walk past last night despite the weather (which has been typically English) all hives had bees out flying. Hardy Yorkshire bees and no mistake. The blackberry and elderflower flow is obviously finished. The bees loss being our gain as the berries start to form. I am already collecting empty bottles from friends for wine making. The main nectar at the moment seems to be Himalyan balsam, lime trees, poppies are still going strong (from the oilseed rape fields), as well as a glut of rosebay willow herb. The gardeners of the village are doing us proud with micklemass daisies and still plenty of lavender to go around.

The Sins of the Son visited upon the Father

As you may or may not know this weekend another swarm arrived.
As you may or may not know my parents were visiting and witnessed the spectical.
As you almost certainly do not know my father was intrigued by the event. So much so he 'borrowed' one of my bait hives to put on his shed roof to see if anything happened. He placed the bait hive on monday, come wednesday and he has bees! This year is clearly a very good year.
I am told there is lots of entrance activity and pollen going in so this could well be a prime swarm. He has asked if I can find someone who would like them in the area. Anyone in East London/Essex want some bees :)

Look who's come to visit

I was heading into the vegetable garden and what should I see but a swarm taking up residence in the bait hive on my roof. I still haven't witnessed a swarm in the air, or clustered on a branch but this was still very cool. To see so many bees clustered to the front of the box and in the air one minute. Then the next minute they'll all in the box.  They really didn't look like they should fit.

 My parents were visiting this weekend and I took my dad to Cropton Brewery (also called the Great Yorkshire Brewery). As such these shall be the brewery bees presided over by The Hop Queen.

A Glass at half its total capacity

It's half a glass, whether half full or half empty it doesn't matter because the bottle is never far away. My two Queen system has not been realised. I have had made the decision to recombine the colonies so I failed...right!

Glass half empty:
The first proper beekeeper-like manipulation I attempted, ie a split, ultimately resulted in a queenless colony. The split threw several swarms weakening the split. I have now recombined the colonies as I think it is too late to raise a queen and get the colony back to strength.

Glass half full:
The queen right side of the split have been going gang busters. They have reached more than 18 bars of solid brood and are wall-to-wall bees. The queenless side have had no brood to look after so have laid down honey stores which the queenright side are lacking.  Between them there will be more than 30 bars of full comb. Together they will be a very strong hive. The extra comb shoould give the queenright bees a chance to put some stores down. I suspect at the moment their comb building can't stay ahead of the vigorous queen. I also now have other colonies caught as swarms so have still increased my numbers. One of the colonies I was able to sell on BN frames for a small amount to buy more equipment.

Half a glass either way:
I have some very healthy and vigorous colonies. I have two top bar hives, a national and a warré. I have increased my bee numbers and learnt some lessons. The bees will do what the bees will do. I can always try again next year with the two queens but if the colony remains this vigorous there may not be room.
I still cannot say with assurity that I know what I am doing. I'm am the point where to any theoretical situation I have the theoretical answer. I can provide information and advice. What I cannot do is handle 50,000  bees making decisions in ways I don't understand, doing things I can't see,  to achieve something I daren't guess at. It's a shame you can't start with one bee and work your way up, like with juggling. In fact juggling is what it feels like. I understand how many balls there are, how gravity works, and where my hands are. At some point there is a switch when it all comes together and you are juggling. But for me it still feels like it's raining tennis balls.

Hive Update: Just the facts Ma'am

I will admit I have something of a rambling vernacular (I think it is as a result of a childhood accident with an illistrated encyclopedia). I have told plenty of stories of different hives so far and thought I would try and give an all encompassing update! So in no particular order.

Atol Hive (kenyan top bar hive with middle periscope entrance):
This was my first top bar hive and made from scrap wood in my shed. I moved my first colony out of this in May when I performed a split. It now contains Queen Boudicca and the Icena. This was a swarm I caught and transferred with perhaps a little trouble. Each of the family have got to name one of the Queens in the Apiary, and this one was Amber's turn. However, if I am honest whilst I was trying to install them I thought up quite a few names for them myself! They are currently on 10 full bars and I have been inserting bars at the edges. They continue to be a little..... touchy, so I haven't managed to inspect the full brood nest.

Beeford (A Warré style hive):
This was a mess of a few dilapidated boxes left in the apiary that some bees decided to move in to. They are referred to as Mata Hari and the sneaky bees. Thanks to the action of my father they now have some nice new boxes and roof. At the weekend I looked at possibly removing the top bars from the single box they were inhabiting and moving them across to one of the newer boxes but there was too much cross-comb. I have left them in their current box and installed a quilt, roof, and box underneath to grow down in to. I have tried to plug many of the gaps with wax.

 

The roof contains a piece of insulation followed by the standard Warré quilt. The hive gets sun first thing and then is well shaded the rest of the day. Dad kindly installed viewing windows with a piece of foam to insert and help with insulation. I would like it very much if these bees could grow down sufficiently for me to add another box and remove the old top box before winter but I think this might be too much for them. I may have to clad the sides for them to overwinter.

C3BEE0 (Long Kenyan TBH with end and middle entrance and an ecofloor):
This contains the split from my original colony that was housed in Atol. This was supposed to form a two queen system this year but things have not been going as planned. They do aft gang agley. The queenright side of the split is flying with 18 bars of brood at the moment and going strong. Pheobee seems quite the layer. The are a few combs of drone brood with I have moved to the outside of the brood nest hoping they will fill it honey. I replaced them with empty bars hoping they'll build worker brood comb. The queenless side of the split have continued to remain hopelessly queenless. The exact sequence of events can only be guessed at but it is clear that the hive has swarmed a few times and left the hive without a queen. I inserted a full frame of eggs from the queenright side last week and they seemed happier. They didn't start any queen cells though. When I checked the comb at the weekend there were many queen cups but the brood was obviously too far along to raise any queens. I was intending to put another bar of Phoebee's brood in there yesterday but by the time I found the right mix of eggs and young brood the hive was getting very tetchy. There appeared to be some damp in the hive. It looks as though this might have been a roof leak I need to sort out. As a result some wood lice had entered and I think it was stressing the bees. I moved the middle follower boards over so Phobee's end of the hive have both middle entrance now in case it is an internal damp issue. I will keep an eye.

Mock national (national style 10 frame brood box)
This hive contained the Queen my daughter named 'mmm-mmm-bee'. This was a lovely little colony and obviously a cast from the hive split. They were extremely calm and gentle but I am afraid I only have so much space. This colony has now gone to a gentleman in Leeds and we wish them well together.

Poppy Hive (12 frame national brood with insulated roof and ecofloor)
This is the newest hive and the newest colony. This colony turned up in a six frame national nuc that really wasn't ready for bees. As such there was a absolute mess of cross-comb. Rather than try to deal with it on frames I decided to put them in a bigger box, remove any collapsed comb, and put another big box underneath. Now there are two 12 frame national brood boxes. The top containing the mess plus extra combs, the bottom with new frame and comb guides. Now I wouldn't normally do this to a poor colony as it quite a lot to expect them to grow down into the box below this late in the year. This colony though has an impressive number of bees. The six frame nuc they were in was a deep and it was wall-to-wall bees. If any new colony could do it, it's this one. The queen doesn't yet have a name but I may name her for the hive. The hive is called the poppy hive because this is paint colour I had :) The hive has also been started in the middle of the poppy flow. They are currently next to a big clump of brambles flowering, and we have the lime trees coming in at the moment too so come on girls you can do it!

"So.. Have you built that Warré yet?" :)

I really should stop procrastinating but I never seem to be able to get around to it.

As you may or may not know I have been saying I will build a warré for a while.
As you may or may not know I had a failed attempt at a warré inhabited by some less than picky bees.
But now to those of you who say 'Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today' I say 'Ha!'. Enter stage right, my father. A man who was until recently was perfectly happy in his ignorance of bees, and who kindly (if nervously) helped me perform a split in May. A man who recognises my propensity to procrastinate and the plight of these poorly housed insects. A man who now HAS built a Warré.

Dad... Thank you... and the bees thank you too.
By the way, can you give me hand moving them in at the weekend. Pleeeeeeease :D

The absentee monarch

Well after one month of hoping the queenless side of my split would settle on a regent I have finally intervened.  On the inspection today there was no sign of a queen, no sign of brood, no sign of eggs, and possible signs of a dreaded laying worker *gasp*.

The queen-right side of the split however has now reached 16 bars of brood and I can barely see for bees. I found an entire comb with eggs front and back. So this was kindly donated to the queenless hive to give them one more chance of raising a queen. I will try and keep eye this time. Last time I think I left too many queen cells as I am pretty sure there has been two to three swarms from this split.

In other news a little cast swarm I caught (probably from the above) is doing well. My new assistant beekeeper Kyle helped inspect today.

He very much likes having his very own beesuit. We even managed to find the queen together (something for which i do not have a good pedigree). Mmm..mmm...mmm-bee, as my daughter named her, is a skinny girl but working hard. You can see all the eggs in the comb above her.

Oh and some more bees turned up in the nuc I have just managed to empty. Well the joke is on you bees! I still don't have a sixth colony because I already have someone lined up to have you Ha!

A Poultry Matter

Yes, I know this a bee blog but thought I would tell you about our newest animals. My daughter Skyla said all she wanted for her 5th birthday watch some chicks she could watch grow into chickens *sigh*. I have been managing to hold out against my wife wanting chickens for seven years, now my daughter had joined the fray I knew I didn't have a chance. So it was at the beginning of May we visited a breeder and got 3X Rhode Island Reds and an Auracana, all just one week old. Skyla was very pleased.

We watched them grow, and grow they did. To have some idea of the a chickens growth rate they start of the size of... well... an egg. The "standard birds" you buy in the supermarket are then just 40-50 days old. That is quite some growing. Which takes quite some eating, and results in quite some.. well.. you knowing what eating results in. We were hoping at least two of the birds would end up being girls (pullets) and things were looking good. Two of the Rhode Island Reds had developed combs where as one and the Auracana did not. This was good news because although you obviously don't have favourites, the Auracana (or Fairy Blue) was the favourite we didn't have. Fairy blue was so calm and friendly. But then came the day that Fairy Blue crowed at us *sigh*. So it was that we find ourselves this weekend driving three cockerels back to the breeder.

Bye bye birdies

This time we collected three chicks who are a Rhode Island Red/Sussex hybrid. These should make much better layers and unlike pure breeds will continue to lay during the winter months.

Hello new girls

So, we now have a Rhode Island Red of 7 weeks (renamed Sandy), and three Rhode Island Red X Sussex called Starlight, Moondark, and Planet. I do love how my daughter names things. All I need to do now is finish the coop!

A bit more paint and a roof wouldn't go amiss.

Oh and just so you can have a little bit of bees. Here is my foster son Kyle loving having a bee suit all of his own.

Honestly, he is happy :)

The Accidental Warré

So you know for some time I have been meaning to get around to building a Warré hive. Well as it turns the bees have grown a little impatient.

Before I had bees and was playing around with the different hive designs, I made a Warré... sort of. The Warré was built from old fencing boards which were more than a little warped. Part of the beauty of the Warré hive is the build simplicity. Warré recommends using butt joints rather than any more difficult means of forming a box. However, if you have wavy and/or bowed wood you end up with severe gaping at the edges, and a box that rocks on a flat surface. At least mine did. I completed the build as a dry run and dumped the boxes in the apiary just in case I wanted to salvage them at a later date. Well as it turns out bees aren't quite as picky about my wood-working skills as I am. On a quick trip to the apiary last night to check if the swarms I had housed were still there I noticed bees going in and out of a knot hole in one of the Warré boxes. This is right next where I put the national box swarm. In fact the national is standing on one of the Warré boxes to raise it off of the ground.

I am going to have to build them a proper Warré Hive (with windows of course) so they can over-winter *sigh* just need to finish the chicken coop first. These bees shall henceforth be known as Mata Hari and the sneaky bees.

It just goes to show all these rules we have for how to site bait hives to catch swarms are based on probability. I am obviously sitting at the outer edge of the bell curve for swarms. If there are enough swarms about and they need somewhere to go, they'll go in practically anywhere. It is odd that I lived in this village for years and I swear I never saw a honey bee. Then I caught a swarm at the end of last year and now I am at the point where my wife is saying "...do you really need any more bees?". This is colony five! Any more turn up in the bait hives I have out will be gifted to new beekeepers in the making. To coin a phrase from mylatinnotebook "... I do not want a sixth hive... I do not want a sixth hive...".

UPDATE: Bees in another bait hive... This does NOT count as a sixth hive...ish. They will go to a new beekeeper at my association.

Worst Beekeeper Ever!

Laying in bed last night reflecting on the evening and feeling more than a little sore from the events my wife mumbled sleepily to me ".. you shouldn't do beekeeping in a hurry...*snore*". I had to admit she was right (please don't tell her), if you don't have time to dedicate to complete a task, however it pans out, leave it for another day.

Remember the swarm trap that was occupied on Sunday?

I thought there weren't many bees in there. "Probably a small cast swarm...", "probably a queen cell I missed in my own hive....", was what I told my wife. Well.... I was wrong. There were a LOT of bees in that box, and they reeeeeaaalllly didn't like me!

Here was my evening (numbered list of mistakes below):
I decided I had a little spare time so thought I would collect the bait hive 1. This is the location I had a full bait hive stolen from in May so I didn't want to leave it there too long. It is a little remote and only accessible along a farm track on foot or by bike. So I cycled out to the bait hive in my bee suit 2. It felt good cycling out there as this is where I collected my first swarm last year when I "became" a beekeeper. I had moved another full bait hive the night before with no trouble at all. They were quiet as lambs and although I had lit my smoker just in case I didn't need it so felt a little silly. So this evening I didn't bring a smoker with me 3. I thought I could maybe put the bait hive on my bike seat and wheel the bike to the apiary location but that wasn't going to work. So just like last year I corked up the entrance 4. and carried them the 3/4 of mile to the apiary. Remember I am wearing the beesuit, though not done up it was still rather warm 2. This should have been my first clue as to just how many bees were in there because it was very heavy. By the time I reached the apiary I was hot, sweating, and aching 2. I left the bait hive at the hive site to settle whilst I jogged back to the bait hive site and collected my bike, to cycle back to the apiary 2. 2. 2.

Buoyed on by the ease of the previous evening's transfer I decided to move the bees into their new hive 3. 5. BAD IDEA! From the second I took out the first bar 6. things were not good. The size of the colony meant they were comb building on all 9 bars of the bait hive having only been in there 1 1/2 days. So removing the end bar disrupted the cluster and must have rolled some bees against one another.... they did not like this. They boiled out of the bait hive making a noise like water hitting a hot skillet. All I had with me was a water mister spray with some peppermint oil in it. I was quickly covered in bees who were ready, willing, and able to show there displeasure for the treatment they had received that evening. I misted the air liberally in order to discourage the flying bees and hopefully mask the alert pheromones with the peppermint oil. They were having none of it. A group had rallied together on my arm and were tunneling up my gauntlet stinging as they went. A few had managed to master velcro and had gained access to the zip at my neck and found a sweet spot at my throat for stinging. Having got all the bars roughly in place I beat a hasty retreat to regroup. I grabbed my bike and cycled home shedding angry bees into the wind on the way, there I grabbed my smoker 3. and got it lit before heading back to the fray.  I managed to get the majority of bees into the hive without much more fuss, the evening was cooling and having already moved the bars the cluster was intact and in the hive. There were still a few hundred bees on the bait hive walls which I was not going to try and brush or bang out. I put the bait hive on its side in front of the hive. The bees still in the bait hive will have to overnight there and move into the new hive in the morning when there sisters show them the way. I returned home aching of muscle, skin, and pride and soaked in sweat and shame. I fell into bed with a greeting of "...what took you so long?" from my wife. Having described my evening she imparted her sleepy wisdom only to leave me awake and thinking of all my mistakes... oh, and I forgot to put the bins out!

1. Never try and "fit something in". Have the time or don't do it.
2. Take your bee suit in a bag. It may be easier to wear it rather than carry it but on an evening where it is 17oC with high humidity you will sweat, and bees do not like it.
3. Never assume just because one lot of bees is calm one evening, another will be the next. Every colony is different. Over-prepare, it is better to feel a little silly than a lot sore.
4. Although this bait hive does have vent holes drilled in the side it would have been better considering the heat and humidity if I had placed mesh over the entrance instead.
5. These bees should have been left to settle in the new location for a day or so before attempting to move them into the hive. Placing the bait hive so the entrance is in front of the new hive entrance means that when you perform the transfer any bees oriented to that location will return to find the new entrance in the same location. By putting some grass in the bait hive's entrance it also prompts the bees to reorient.
6. There were no spacers at the end of the bait hive so all bars were for comb building. This isn't usually a big deal as it takes a colony a while before they have built across 9 bars. It is better though to leave a spacer bar at each end (~5-10mm) so you have access to each end without having to remove a comb building bar and disturbing the bees.