Recent content by VeronicaDribblethwaite

Had an email through Notts BKA yesterday saying that someone had had two colonies stolen which were in a double-housed hive and also an empty hive taken from Hucknall, Nottingham sometime during the evening/night Tue 09/12/2014. Don't know where they were being kept or any other information but...

Feeding Fondant Hi Jimy Dee, It's my first Autumn/Winter keeping bees and I have two colonies in P**nes polyhives. I was a bit concerned as to whether mine had enough stores and decided the 'belt and braces' approach by adding some fondant (perhaps earlier than what may be regarded as normal)...

Just put a reply on a similar post asking advice about a possible queen-less colony. In short, I waited over three weeks from hatching to a point when I was about to insert a frame of brood from my other hive. However on this inspection there were a few recently laid eggs on one frame, but on...

With more than a single hive I’d be tempted to wait a little longer. I did an artificial swarm last month and it was just over three weeks before I saw any eggs from the new queen. Queen cell in the ‘new’ hive had hatched but when doing weekly inspections I’d not seen the new queen or evidence...

Are you sure that the deaths are not down to one hive robbing from the other? I recently had a daily increase in the number of dead bees at the front of my ‘weaker’ hive from just a few to a couple of dozen or so. I found that it was due to the stronger colony trying to rob from the weaker one...