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How does your beekeeping association collect its subs? Our treasurer is getting bogged under with processing payments. People send cheques without indicating who/what it is for or set up bank standing orders with things like "bee subs" as the reference that make them almost impossible to...

A swarm information and collection Facebook page has been set up to provide members of the public with an easy and straightforward way to get in touch with local beekeepers about swarms in the Leicestershire and Rutland area. Any beekeeper can respond to posts on this page as can any member of...

Bee Health And Disease Day - National Bee Unit The Leicestershire and Rutland Beekeeping Association are hosting Bee Health And Disease Day event on behalf of the National Bee Unit for just £5 per person. This event is open to any bee keeper, regardless of membership of any beekeeping...

Bee Health And Disease Day - National Bee Unit The Leicestershire and Rutland Beekeeping Association are hosting Bee Health And Disease Day event on behalf of the National Bee Unit for just £5 per person. This event is open to any bee keeper, regardless of membership of any beekeeping...

Back in May, during a break in the cold, windy, wet weather, I inspected my bees and in one hive found some unsealed queen cells on the first few frames. I found the queen (not got my notes with me but she is at least 3 years old) on a middle frame and whipped it out and made up a four-frame...

My beekeeping association is looking at the future role of our bi-monthly newsletter. Several associations I have spoken to have abandoned a "formal" newsletter in favour of emails or printed material sent out as and when required with great success. How does your association distribute...

I need to unite a very full, very powerful Q- colony with four supers on it with a 2014 Q+ nuc. What is the best way to do this? There is no way I can clear the supers and have all the bees crammed in to a single brood box so as I see it the best options is to put the queen in a Butler cage...

Does the "move fewer than 3 feet" rule apply vertically? I have to move a nuc downwards.

Do *all* the flying/forager bees go with the queen when she leads a swarm? I was always under the impression that all flying bees go with a prime swarm, leaving behind all the young bees who have not yet begun the forager phase of their life-cycle.. I got an answer phone message last night...

It's a vulgar subject money but... our association needs to raise a fair old pile of it to replace ailing "temporary" buildings that are well past their sell-by date. I'm interested to hear about how have other associations raised cash. Most of the ideas that have been looked at so far...

What lessons did all you other beeks learn from last year's rotten season? I few things I found out the hard way.... 1) Never underestimate the British weather. 2) Never give away/sell nucs made with a laying, mated queen until I am *absolutely* positive that her successor is mated and...

I found one of my colonies dead when I went to give them oxalic acid and it looks like nosema got them. I have been told that scrubbing hive parts in a strongly alkaline solution (e.g. made from caustic soda) is as effective at killing nosema spores as acetic acid. I know of some beekeepers...

I have acquired a small Q- nuc with not very many bees in it - maybe a frame full. It sits about fifteen feet away from the colony most suited to unification. If I simply unite them as they stand, I am concerned that the nuc bees will simply fly back to where their nuc was. But I don't want to...

I am trying to unite a queenless colony in a brood box with a small (four-frame) Buckfast nuc sitting in another brood box above them using the classic sheet-of-newspaper method. All went well with the process but after nearly a week the bees steadfastly refuse to eat their way through the...

I just went round to remove the second Apiguard tray (put on Thur 13th Sept) at the end of treatment to find one of my colonies has completely deserted. There are eggs, brood, sealed brood on several frames (in textbook laying pattern) and some honey. All the frames are in good order. There are...

I have have just been back to collect something I left behind when inspecting three of my colonies this afternoon and noticed a small mound of bees lying on the ground about 3 feet in front of the entrance of the most populace colony. It looks like a small swarm, but lying in the 6-inch long...

Colony 1 has a 2012 queen who should be mated and laying by now. I found no trace of eggs etc. on today's inspection and I understand that the weather has mucked around with the usual way of things this year. However, unlike the other two colonies that are rearing 2012 queens, the workers in...

Interesting (basic) article on the BBC about the relationship between workers and queens. http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/17854061