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Having a bit of fun, all of my own doing. I only have 1 hive now after developing a reaction to stings (sting free for 4 years :winner1st:). This colony came in as a swarm 2-3 years ago, very placid so I thought why not... On inspection roughly 5 weeks ago, I knew they were building up, there...

This has apparently taken residence here since Saturday, very residential, in a square surrounded by houses. I guess they are already building comb and are settling in. Any advice on how best to re-house them? Would they run into a closely placed hive with the aid of some smoke and a bed sheet?

As a relative newbie still, I thought I would share my experience last week. I have treated only with January Oxalic trickle in my 2-3 years, but came out at Spring minus 2 queens. So that is the end of Oxalic for me. The last few months I have monitored natural mite drop and as it was so low...

It looks like I may be on the slippery slope regarding stings. I have been beekeeping for about 2 years. During year one the few stings I had were brief and of no concern. Roughly 12 months ago I was stung through the veil from a hive that was queenless and unpleasant, the stinger was in for...

The weather has been hellish up here lately, not great for 2-3 weeks and hellish for last 4 days. Today I went to my out apiary to be greeted by a hive with lots of dead bees in front of the hive. Upon opening there were 2 to 3 inches of dead and dying bees on the floor. The entrance was almost...

Heard this week about a swarm, spread over a brick garden wall. It was destroyed by someone with a fire extinguisher. Apparently he thought they were wasps. Gutted about this.

I have a hive that is bombing, currently on 7 frames of brood, wall to wall with bees in the BB and super (just added another). She is a third year queen, was slow to build up last year. I was worried this year could be worse so had them on Candipolline Gold and side insulation early on and...

Trying to save 2 hives that are both well populated (mostly pensioners I guess) they were found half full of drone brood, not that many hatched out Drones though. The brood pattern in hive A was pretty uniform and had a very small amount of random capped worker brood, but no eggs so my guess is...

Zero activity - been cold for a while here and feared the worst - only have myself to blame and learned a big lesson. This was a swarm I caught in my first year 2013, and was amazingly well behaved and very productive. Same last season brought in a bucket full of honey. I had noticed, the size...

Firstly to put you in the picture...Been farting around with an aggressive hive for a few months now, first they balled the Buckfast that I tried to re queen with, didn't leave them queenless for long enough is my guess? With what few eggs Q left, they hatched a queen - but that didn't get...

My most productive hive this year was a swarm I had caught last year. Eggs and brood were at very low levels this spring and early summer, quite a concern, so dummied down. Things eventually got going really well and despite the colony never getting massive, they still filled supers faster than...

I hived a caught swarm sometime in July and waited and waited for eggs and brood, but nothing, so duly checked through and no sign of HM. Added a frame of eggs from the hive next door and they proceeded to make queen cells, the one I left was charged, lovely and fat and was duly sealed on the...

Did an A/s last Tuesday, big lesson learned today, there was a mixture of brood and stores. Had a quick peek today mainly to check for any extra Q cells - the whole hive was operating in slow motion, quite a bit of brood had been uncapped no doubt searching for fodder. About 100 dead bees and...

Had a scenario over 3 weeks ago where I had 2 sealed QCells and 1 nearly capped, my mentor had a peek with me and said Supercedure was happening as the grubs and brood was all over 8 days old. I may have squished the queen on my last inspection, so probably an emergency job. Anyway we tore down...

Just leaving one of my hives to get on with emergence of new queen - it was emergency queen in this instance, maybe I squished her. Either way they were coming along nicely, and were originally a swarm I caught last year. My mentor has over 40 years under his belt and and told me that a queen...

Managed to catch a queen wasp today, was very lucky as she was in my shed yesterday - I opened the door and she flew out. Thought I had missed my chance but went in today and there she was. Turns out she is on her last legs, not flying just slowly walking around. Decided not to squish her. Took...

This is a swarm I caught last year, and they are ready for off again. The problem is I have never been able to spot the queen have had 2 other beeks look with me in the past and she is proving very elusive. I did see her for the first time last Sunday, looked down to grab my "crown of thorns"...

I hardly dare ask this after the ribbing bee novice has been given. Hope someone can see my predicament and offer help, I am still in year 1 and have thought through this but still don't know the answer. I have a hive on brood and a half, they were absolutely rammed with stores of syrup by end...

Evening all, I need to feed a hive in a hurry, this is the hive that reluctantly gave the wasps their last supper when autumn feeding. It's now the lightest of my 4 hives, perhaps not dangerously low, but taking no chances. I haven't got fondant, so have soaked a bag of sugar and I have it...