Basic Assessment &Junior Assessment

Little Miss Webmuppet and I have our assessments on Monday. We had a practice run with our mentor the other day and he is happy that we should be ok.

I don't know about the Junior Assessment, but for the Basic Assessment just do a normal inspection. Helps if you talk as you do it. (This slows you down, which helps with any nerves and it lets the examiner know what you are thinking.)

Listen to the examiner (s)he will probably be trying to give you helpful advice.

Make sure that you know what different diseases look like, what your bees feed on, how long they take to get from egg to emerging, how you can treat varroa, what you might look for in a new apiary and that you can put a super frame together. (In other words, read the curriculum and check that you know the answers - the curriculum is on the BBKA site as are some helpful answers to questions.)

Make sure you can light a smoker using matches. (I took along a blow torch, which I was not allowed to use.)

Ensure that your bee suit has been laundered and that your gloves are new (or spotlessly clean). The examiner does not want you to spread disease to his/her bees.

I am a BBKA Basic assessor and can reassure you that Basic candidates can light a smoker in any way they want. Maybe in Wales things are different.

I'm not so worried (in that I passed) but at least I wasn't handed two sticks, or a flint and a steel.

The nerves got to me, in that I used the bellows so much that the first blast nearly incinerated the bees. (Yes, I know that I should have checked the temperature first.)

Keeping it alight is the problem, most new beekeepers forget to give it the occasional puff

Enjoy it, Mrs Webmuppet!


I had to do it last Sunday, having ducked it for a couple of years.
[I got to the age where I swore I'd never take another exam!]

The examiner was great. It helped a lot when he started by saying,
"Let's pretend I'm somebody interested in beekeeping, who knows nothing about it.
Just show me everything and tell me what everything is".
Made it easy to do the inspection - just talking to a visitor!

As for the questions, it was more like a discussion: if you've been following the Forum for a while, you will have picked up a lot of info by osmosis. Mind you, I was very careful to hedge my bets, by saying things like, "Some people say matchsticks are important for ventilation, but in this apiary.......". Or, "I use 14 x 12 but I know there are pros and cons.....".

On the whole, I enjoyed spending time with the examiner and he was open to questions and offering advice.

Great fun.

All the very best to you both.

Dusty

jd101k2000 said:

...

Make sure you can light a smoker using matches. (I took along a blow torch, which I was not allowed to use.)

…

Click to expand...

Well that would seem to be a strange quirk of your examiner's.
However, as Dusty suggests, an assessment is not the time for raising controversies!

I remember using my blowtorch (a little - "cook's" - one to light the specially-bought pellets (they don't go out easily) when I did my Basic. Aroused no comment (and I passed!)

We know our assessor ........it's all his fault we got involved in beekeeping, he invited us to meet his bees last year and then invited us on a bee safari where we met our mentor.....the rest as they say is history!

The only bit I'm concerned about is building the frame......I can assemble the wooden bits and get the pins hammered in, it's the foundation that gets me every time, it never stays in the grooves. Our mentor told me to keep the foundation in the fridge and it should go in a bit easier. Normally Mr Webmuppet does the DIY side of things (the sight of me armed with a hammer scares him especially as I'm chronically left handed).

Fortunately I'm used to saying what I see when I do the inspection as LMW and I work as a team, one inspects and one writes the notes.

This time next year you'll be able to make up frames with your eyes shut.
You'll be fine......does anybody who has actually looked after bees for a whole season fail?

Mrs Webmuppet said:

. Normally Mr Webmuppet does the DIY side of things (the sight of me armed with a hammer scares him especially as I'm chronically left handed).

Click to expand...

I think the least you can expect is that the assessor or the BKA provide you with a left-handed hammer.

Grounds for an appeal if they don't and it goes wrong horribly.

Dusty

masterBK said:

I am a BBKA Basic assessor and can reassure you that Basic candidates can light a smoker in any way they want. Maybe in Wales things are different.

Click to expand...

We were told we would fail if we didn't hold the smoker between our knees, and we're nowhere near Wisborough Green. During the assessment I told the assessor I couldn't keep hold of it that way and also be able to move, so put the smoker where I wanted it to be. I didn't fail!

Erichalfbee said:

This time next year you'll be able to make up frames with your eyes shut.
You'll be fine......does anybody who has actually looked after bees for a whole season fail?

Click to expand...

Yes, my mate did, mind you he was in his eighties when he started, but was a fit outdoors man. We started together, went on beginners theory and practical course, had bees for 18 months before taking basic. He was awful bless him, but loved his bees. Held his hand for another year, then He decided to give up. Bought his gear off him. He died last year. Miss him.

What a shame. Still at least he had a go and had you to help him.
I had six years' of exams while training then 35 years of regular CPD I vowed I'd never take another exam ever ever again

Frame assembly is part of WGBKA's course for new beekeepers and supplies the association apiary with a good supply of frames ready for the coming season, although we did run out of super frames this year.

We passed! We had our notifications yesterday that we had passed.

Congratulations to you both!

Well done now on to modules and master beekeeper

Congoratulations