What did you do in the Apiary today?

Found this interesting sculpture on a indentation in one of my hives. Collection of QC's and drone brood.
Came from a hive that I removed the queen to get some emergency queen cells.
The QC's look like they have rounded tips! Could they contain drones? Never heard of them making QC's from unfertilised larvae when there's plenty of fertilised larvae around.
It detached in one piece.
The hive had other more typical QC's on other frames.

Just managed an inspection in between rainshowers. Not the best day for an inspection but needs must.
Although being in a field of OSR the supers were empty although lots of food in the body. No Queen seen out brood and larvae. It was too windy to messing about.

No Queen cells seen which is what I was looking for.

Hopefully some warmer weather and there will be some surplus honey.

On inspection my hive with nice quiet bees had queen cells. Decided I would Pagden this one. Was beginning to think my queen spotting skills had left me, when I saw a lovely jet black queen, no stripes at all. Marked her and popped her in the new box. I know colouring is no reliable indicator but hoping she might be closer to native than my other mongrels.

Just sat and watched the bees

Morning with the bees at the association apiary - looking good generally, marked a few queens, Demarree'd one and conducted a Wally Shaw Snelgrove 2 on another which had QC''s bu the mentor inspecting was convinced there was a queen there even though we couldn't find her. Hope it works as he'd never heard of the maneuvre .
Went and checked a beginner's bees - she'd bought two full colonies from another association member who told her she should feed the bees as soon as they were installed. Obviously this person has a feeding obsession as when we opened up each had a super full of mostly sugar stores, there were clusters of fondant packed cells all over the brood box and a tray of neopolli slid in through the entrance!! and they were only on four frames of brood.
Back home to the Brynmair apiary, checked over the Demarrees in progress to select QC's bound for nucs and find, mark and Demarree another queen on nine frames of brood.
Only downside of the day was one of the beginner's car was broken into when we were at the apiary (we did hear a loud bang and wondered what it was) What really upset me was the scrote walked straight past my vehicle which I'd forgotten to lock (and had a pair of nice bolle sunglasses on the dash) and picked on the Audi!!

Found capped queen cells in both hives and so closed-up to get ready for swarm management. All set and suiting-up when... Hive 1 spewed forth half the family and off they went! I was too slow zipping-up to save them and nor could I find them later. A pretty impressive sight to behold though!

AS in place before the second hive took-off.

I was chuffed that I made it through my first winter without any losses only for spring to peg me back a bit.

Erichalfbee said:

Just sat and watched the bees

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I have done pretty much the same myself today after my apparently bodged up job on swarm control.
Lovely pictures but these little children ignore the Blue Bells with a passion, i will get the cane out next year and give each one three of the best.

Helped a friend inspect their top bar hive.....I forgot how wrong they can go when the comb becomes sqewiff. Grumpy bees so will finish hacking it about another day. I think they had swarmed earlier in the day too. Not a swarm I'd want, they were grumpy in the hive and apparently grumpy at other inspections. If new q is just as bad we will cull.

44Whitehall said:

Found capped queen cells in both hives and so closed-up to get ready for swarm management. All set and suiting-up when... Hive 1 spewed forth half the family and off they went! I was too slow zipping-up to save them and nor could I find them later. A pretty impressive sight to behold though!

AS in place before the second hive took-off.

I was chuffed that I made it through my first winter without any losses only for spring to peg me back a bit.

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Your right, it is a spectacle to behold. Lovely to see one go every now and again, better still if you can catch it afterwards!! Most enjoyable.!!

Tremyfro said:

All my hives were treated with thymol in the autumn and at Xmas were treated for varroa. I still lost colonies. When we tested the dead hives there were lots of nosema...i think they were Ceranae....but my microscope skills are not brilliant. Anyway nosema at any rate. When we tested the slow colony ...same thing though we were alerted initially by some bee poo around the entrance. In some trials I read about...it said the thymol effect was accumulative...so successive drops in numbers over several seasons. I wonder if treating them with thymol spraying in the early autumn would be a good idea? Any thoughts on that?

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I have always added thymol to all sugar feeds- at all seasons#..as it stops mold. No cases of nosema in 6 years as far as I recall.

# I keep a bottle of ready mixed thymol solution and use an eye dropper and bottle for convenience for on site /kitchen mixing.

madasafish said:

I have always added thymol to all sugar feeds- at all seasons#..as it stops mold. No cases of nosema in 6 years as far as I recall.

# I keep a bottle of ready mixed thymol solution and use an eye dropper and bottle for convenience for on site /kitchen mixing.

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I agree...I use the smaller dosage in syrup at all times too to stop the mould. I think if we all tested each of our colonies...we would find nosema in many of them. It's clear to me that the bees have it under control most of the time but in times of colony stress...such as winter time etc...they are more likely to succumb to an explosion in the numbers of nosema.
I was dismayed to find nosema spores in the dead colony...I wish I had kept samples from them all but I didn't know how easy it was to test so that led to inertia on my part. I intend checking the rest of my colonies after we have done the third treatment...to see what if any nosema spores can be seen.

Two swarms from one hive (not checked for a fortnight) captured. Mother hive still had a couple of Queen Cells, but still quite viable I think. Still good amount of honey in the one super.

Other hive, lovely bees, no sign of swarming, good tempered, and have nearly filled out two supers. Most odd though, one Queen Cell found in a super - no other signs of brood at all and QE intact. Cell had remains of a larvae within.

Look under the hive!

Moved a nuc with sealed queen cells and no sign of the queen.
When I lifted the floor heard a soft thud.
Swarm been under the hive attached to the floor
Not many bees left on the floor:


Most had fallen on to the stand:


and the surrounding grass:


Where is the queen in all this mess?
A few minutes later I notice a group of bees fanning and there she was, my clipped queen (bottom right )


Put her back on the floor (bottom right with clipped right wing and retinue) before putting her into a new hive

Dispose of old combs

Something I should have done ages ago was dispose of these old combs.
Why do we hang on to things?

Eyeman said:

Something I should have done ages ago was dispose of these old combs.
Why do we hang on to things?
View attachment 13039

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The price you can but seconds for in a sale its not worth the effort of cleaning them.

Collected first swarm of the season

Box was full to the brim!!

Took them to my apiary and saw another hive still active at 22:00!! They looked like they were fanning the entrance and there was quite a hum from inside!

Not sure what was going on, inspected 5 days ago and no swarm cups but did see drones. Wonder if they are getting ready for tomorrow?



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newbeeinbromley said:

Took them to my apiary and saw another hive still active at 22:00!! They looked like they were fanning the entrance and there was quite a hum from inside!

Not sure what was going on, inspected 5 days ago and no swarm cups but did see drones. Wonder if they are getting ready for tomorrow?

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They are reducing the water in the nectar they collected

Checked my apidea at home which had a virgin I released from a QC in a hive that was superceding. She is now laying
Then over to farm apiary - the hive the virgin came from also has a mated queen. She's the one I couldn't find when a virgin. Spotted her but lost her before queen catcher was retrieved from kit. Hunted through with no luck. Closed up and inspected other colonies. Went back in - spotted her again but she escaped again before queen catcher deployed. I really must start using queens handles - aka wings.
My other farm colonies all doing really well on the OSR. Had to add another super to one and go double brood on another that had filled her bb. Didn't look in the meanies. They swarmed last week and I took down QC to make them hopelessly Q- as I have some queens coming next week. They did ping at my veil as I walked past them. Grrr.

Erichalfbee said:

They are reducing the water in the nectar they collected

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Abd probably struggling to circulate air through that tiny little hole

Quite extreme changes. From 7-9C day temp with cold rain to now16-18C with sun. Also with night temps also from 2-11.. Odd.. So the bees, not little showed desire to swarm. I would try to stop this if I was after honey. But anyway I planned increase, I am splitting these days..

By the way, I got some mobile phone with somewhat decent camera and here are the fresh pics..