So far so good

The bees were flying today and I checked all of my hives at Bluebell Road (Honey Stripe's bees were out in abundance) Old Costessy, the Allotment 83, Postwick and Thorpe. Those that were running low on fondant I gave an extra lump. Some of the bees were taking in pollen.

Willow(2)09 vandalised, Old Costessy, Postwick

It was a bright sunny day after days of wind and rain. A check of the apiaries was in order. Willow(2)09 at the Bluebell road UEA Permaculture apiary has had an unwanted visit. The bucket feeder was laying by the hive empty with it's lid off and the brood box had the crown board off. I put the hive back together and seeing the size of the wooden poles left near by I fear for the other two hives. I will now need to visit this site frequently throughout the winter.

The bees in the bigger hives at Old Costessy were taking pollen in. One hive there still had a box feeder on . I took it off and replaced it with a block of fondant.

It was getting too late to see bees flying at Postwick but the hives there seem to be OK and all had fondant.

Honey Stripes

I put a complete block of fondant on top of Honey Stripe's three brood boxes. I may now have to pick another nice day and remove the queen excluder that is between box two and three as I don't want the bees to move up into the top box and leave the queen behind.

I also put a block of fondant onto Willow(1)09's hive. There was still feed in the bucket on that hive because the mesh in the lid had got blocked with crystalised sugar. I transfered that sugar syrup to Willow(2)09's hive that had an empty bucket on.

Warm enough to fly

The bees were out in force today.

I visited the bees at the Bluebell Road, Allotment 83 and Old Costessy apiaries and all the hives had flying bees.

Long Stratton Swarm

One of the hives with a box feeder on was the hive with the Long Sratton swarm in it - at least there were in it. As the sun came out this afternoon after recent days of rain I thought I would remove the empty feeder from the top of the brood box.Whilst unsticking the two the brood box moved and was strangely light. It didn't take much of an inspection to see that the bees have gone taking all stores with them. More likely any stores left behind have been cleaned out by bees from other colonies, whichever way, the result was that the box was empty of both bees and stores.

Bonus week, Tina

It's the end of a bonus week for the bees. The weather in the middle of the week was still and warm. Better than we often get on a summer's day. There wasn't much that I needed to do with the bees as they all have feed now. Although a few will soon have empty box feeders that I will remove and replace with a block of fondant. Some do still need mouse guards putting on.

GW's old brood box (now No6) seems to doing well with it's new queen. On watching the bees coming and going bringing in pollen and making the most of the fine weather I saw at least three drones fly into the entrance. Maybe they will keep a few through the winter or they just haven't thrown them out yet because of the warm Autumn weather.

I have moved Tina for the very last time to the end of the allotment.

Warm weather again

Today has been unusually warm for this time of year and the bees were out and about and bringing in pollen.

Postwick, Thorpe, Old Costessy

It was a very nice sunny day on Friday when I checked the hives a Postwick adding fondant thymol where required. All the hives there have fondant on now.

I gave each hive at Thorpe a sprinkle of ctystals and ablock of fondant.

Saturday it rained.

Today I made sure all the hives at Old Costessy have fondant on them. The strongest hive there is colony I have been describing as 'facing south' although it is now one of three hives facing south. It has two brood boxes and two supers on and a lot of bees in it.

Ringland Apiary, Old Costessy

There are four hives in the Ringland apiary. Laburnham, Midnight, Greengage83 (brood box 3), and a 2009 daughter of Tina and today I gave them all a treatment of thymol and put a mouse guard over the entrance to each hive. I put a block of fondant on both Midnight and Greengage's crown board. The other two hives had a block put on some weeks ago.

In Old Costessy I gave the hive on bricks a block of fondant.

Suffolk bees Autum

The last time I visited the three hives in Suffolk was in June

Today I gave them each a block of fondant, a mouse guard and a sprinkling of Thymol crystals.

Midnight,, Old Costessy, Tina

I moved Midnight to Ringland to join the laburnham swarm (now on double brood box) Greengage83 and one of Tina's 2009 queens.

I have given two more hives thymol and fondant in Old Costessy. One of them was a colony from the permaculture society allotment site. A 2009 queen bred at the Bluebell Road allotments. Grandmother the UEA swarm queen. 2006

The hive facing south had completly filled the brood box (thatI put on a few weeks back) with honey. I took out three frames and gave them to Tina and put in three frames of undrawn foundation back in their place.

Tina continues on albeit with very little yellow marking left on her. I'm goin to move her back to allotment 83 and hopefully keep her through another winter as she is a great queen to breed from.

George's bees

I put fondant on George's bees today. They hadn't made any honey at all.

Unlike the hive facing south at Old Costessy that has not only filled a super with honey but a complete extra brood box as well.

I took another fifteen frames of honey from the hives at Old Costessy and there is still more to collect.

Old Costessy late honey

I have started taking the last crop of honey from the hives in Old Costessy. 12 frames from three hives and several half filled frames moved onto another hive.

It has started to rain.

Old Costessy

I paid a visit to Old Costessy today although there wasn't much to do there as the sun is still shining and the bees that don't have feed on are making honey and best left alone.

There was the colony that was queenless that had one of George's nucs to unite with to check out. The bees had torn a lot of the newspaper away so I put the two lots of bees together in the bottom brood box. I didn't see the queen.

That gave me a spare brood box so I put Norman's allotment queen into that. I now have just one lot of bees left in a nuc box that need to go into a brood box.

There is one small colony at the allotment that seem to be queenless all of sudden. I will need to unite those with another colony soon and that will free up another box.

The bees that were on the outside of their brood box have all moved inside and are taking the feed from the box feeder. I am going to leave them for a while before checking them for a laying queen.

Thorpe and Poswick

I put another bucket of feed on two of the hives in Thorpe.

In Postwick most of the hives have some fondant on. One of the three that hasn't is supposed to be uniting two brood boxes together but as yet the bees in the bottom box don't seem to be interested in the bees with a queen in the box above.

The hive that has a daughter of one of the two stinging hives that I moved from the allotment at the start of the year I have been leaving to make honey this year. On my last visit I moved the queen excluder down between the super and brood box as they were on a brood and a half. Gamgling that the queen is in the super at this time of the year (I did the same with the Bowthorpe queen today - nice brood pattern there with no chalkbrood) .

The queen was in the brood box and the bees were making honey in the super. I took three frames of honey out and put the super back with a brood box of old frames on top. We have had a sustained spell of hot sunny weather in the last few weeks and if this weather continues I will take some more honey before feeding the box and possibly leaving it with two brood boxes of bees and stores.

I have a lot of undrawn brood frames an fear not enough bees to get them all drawn out before the winter.

Midnight. Norman's allotment hive

One of my nucs has taken exception to the thymol crystals treatment and I found a clump of bees under the roof when I was checking the box feeder I put on yesterday. I have moved the the bees from the roof and left the roof off but there was still a clump of bees on the front of the hive even after I had smoked them down. However, some were taking the feed.

Normans allotment hive next to the German queen didn't settle well with their new queen in the summer and swarmed (or did they build up too fast for me and got tight for space?). I took out the swarm queen cell and made a nuc up with it (that nuc is one of the few left in a nuc box and is now in Old Costessy). I then put in a frame from the German queen and raised some queen cells from her. The first German queen Norman's bees raised they didn't like and they started raising more queens cells (as did the bees in the North Walsham swarm box that also had a German queen cell). I took out the queen from Norman's box and put her in a nuc box (I watched that fail to fight off the wasps and then get robbed out. It all happened so fast there wasn't anything I could do about it) and I left Norman's bees to get on with it thinking it was late in the year to be raising queens. Back link

Today was my first inspection to see how they are getting on. They have a laying queen (although I didn't see her) and are a small but seemingly happy colony. I gave them a completely capped frame of honey from Bill's greengage hive, closed them up and put a block of fondant on. I didn't treat them with thymol. Who knows they may just make it through the winter.

I did the opposite with the North Walsham's bees and their German queen cell. I left the queen in but took the queen cells out and put those in a nuc box. The queen survives but the bees tore down one of the queen cells within days of me putting it in the nuc box (I wanted to give a queen cell to the Greengage swarm who had lost theirs). The other cell came to nothing.

I think nuc boxes are only really viable for breeding queens in middle of the season when conditions are optimum.

Midnight's colony seems to be still going strong after their thymol treatment. I'm feeding them at the moment with a bucket feeder and plan to take them out to Ringland soon.

I put mouse guards on the three Bluebell Road hives today they all still have syrup in their buckets.

Autumn feed

Although in the middle of the day it has been hot and sunny for quite a few days now (if not weeks!) the days are getting shorter and the nights colder. Autumn is officially here and winter not so far away. I am still feeding the bees in all of my hives except for a few of the bigger ones in Old Costessy. Those are still making honey.

I am trying to unite small colonies with more bees to boost their numbers and sorting out brood boxes, floors, roofs and entrance blocks as I empty my nuc boxes. I have yet to start fitting mouse guards. Most of the colonies have had some thymol cystals spread along the lugs (not those still making honey) and several hives now have a block of fondant on.

I have brought the box feeders in to play today and I'm on my tenth 25 Kilo bag of sugar.

Box 8, Box 3

I took Box 8 with Greengage in it out to Ringland yesterday.

The flying bees left behind took no time tearing down the newspaper between the two brood boxes to get at a new queen. As I went to check them this afternoon a bee flew out of the entrance carrying a piece of newspaper about an inch and a half long and up and over a large apple tree it flew taking the strip of newspaper with it.

I merged the frames of the two boxes together. Hopefully that is another queen that will now have a colony that will be strong enough to take her through the winter. The box they are in is Box 3. It has a feeder bucket on.

I put another full bucket of feed on Honey Stripes hive and the two Willow09 hives. On my next visit I should open them up and take one of the brood boxes off Honey Stripes hive (she has three) and possibly put an extra brood box on each of the other two.

Postwick

Today has been a warm sunny day and the bees in Postwick are making honey. Those hives that I gave fondant to on my lasted visit had eaten most of what I gave them and needed more.

The 2008 swarm are still drawing out comb to store the honey in. I gave them a bucket of feed.

The queen that bred from one of the two swarm colonies that I took to Postwick in the spring I've moved back to the allotment.

Old Costessy

The bees in Old Costessy I think are working both the balsam (judging by the white pollen on their backs) and the ivy (judging by the smell in the apiary). What kind of honey I am going to get as a result remains to be seen.

I Googled 'ivy honey' and ended up reading this I only know the heritage of some of my bees. I know for example that Tina's mother was an imported Greek Buckfast cross. And my German queen is Carniolan It is also apparent from their yellow colour that some of the swarms I pick up are Italian.

But many are black bees as Honey Stripes mother was. Unfortunately I have seen deformed wings in Honey stripes hive both at the beginning and end of this year. Even so her colony did very well and made a good crop of honey.

Allotment apiary

I have taken the last of the honey from the hives in the allotment today and started getting them ready for the winter.

Greengage83 is a large strong colony that I'm feeding with sugar syrup. The bees have just about filled their brood box with stores. Today I gave them a second brood box to clean up and store sugar in before I take away the bottom box (that I numbered 8). I want to unite a small colony with some of Greengage's bees. I will take Greengage to Postwick or Ringland.

The medium sized colonies that are on four or five frames I'm giving a block fondant to. But before putting the block of fondant onto the crown board I am checking that the queen is laying, taking out any undrawn frames and replacing with older drawn out frames, moving the brood to the center of the box and putting an equal number of empty (but drawn out) frames on either side. Finally I sprinkle some thymol crystals at the end of the lugs of the frames with brood and bees on them.

Holly at Old Costessy

I am beginning to give the hives at Old Costessy a complete 12.5 kilo lump of fondant to see them through the winter.

The last two hives to have a block of fondant will be Holly's hive and the hive facing south as both are still making honey.

I took two 2007 swarm colonies to Postwick in April after removing their queens. Both colonies re-queened in Postwick and have been pretty much left alone for the year apart from having some honey taken from them.

On inspection today neither had a queen to be seen (they are not marked) and both looked healthy with plenty of capped brood. I would have liked to seen the queens as I transferred the frames into a new brood box that is attached to a new floor.

One of the colonies is strong enough for me to take half their bees and give them a new queen. Unfortunately they were on a brood and a half. I have put the queen excluder between the brood box and super hoping that the queen is in the brood box. I should find out on my next visit which box the queen is laying in if I leave it for four more days.

Neither colony were bad to handle today.

GW

GW is doing well in Postwick and the bees left behind have settled down well with their new queen but the colony is not big enough to be split in half again this year.

The German queen's bees are still storing sugar syrup away and for the time being they are still drawing out frames of new foundation. If the weather changes and gets colder they may stop making wax and I will start to put in frames that have already been drawn out. I stole two full frames of stores from them today today and put two new ones in to replace them. I will keep a close eye on their feeder bucket and make sure that they never run out of syrup.

Laburnam has been moved to Ringland.

George's bees, Cherry

George's bees are doing fine after uniting with a new queen after his original queen swarmed. The two queens in the nuc boxes that were produced from the queen cells left behind by the swarming queen were OK too.

I took the top brood box off after putting the frame with the queen on into the bottom box. There is still a super on with frames of un-wired foundation in it but there was no honey in any of the frames today. The bees did draw out the wax and start storing honey in the frames but then they ate it all after the queen swarmed. With stores from two brood boxes combined the colony now has a good stock of honey in the brood box and given some fine weather and an ivy flow they could well move some of it up into a couple of the super frames.

Cherry's colony is doing OK in Old Costessy after the Thymol treatment.

Both of the colonies from the hive that had two queens in are doing fine. I switched the brood with the super on the 'supers' one today hoping that the queen will leave the super and move up into the brood box. Given enough food and fine weather she should.

Thorpe, GW in Postwick, Allotment German queen

Out of the three hives at Thorpe the end hive under the hazel has done the best at making honey. I took practically a full super off that hive today. For swarm that had already had half the bees stolen from it before being moved to Thorpe that is not at all bad. One to watch. All three hives there have a bucket of feed on.

GW is doing fine in Postwick with half her bees and a chunk of fondant above the hole on the crown board. Back on the allotment the other half of her bees have accepted a new queen. I moved her to the bottom brood box and took the top brood box off leaving that for the bees to clean out. I will feed these bees now and hopefully build up their numbers.

I spent the afternoon in postwick giving the smaller hives fondant and taking supers off the bigger hives. I have lost one hive since my last visit. The bees had been killed inside the hive even though the entrance was closed right down the half an inch. It was a gruesome sight inside the hive as the bees all had their heads missing.

The skinny queen and the Bowthorpe swarm queen have decided that is time to lay eggs. A bit late in the day. The bees were taking in pollen of several different colours and must be making honey from more than just ivy. It was a hot day with a warm sutherly breeze and there was definitlely a 'flow' on.

It was shame really to have been taking the honey off as there would be more to take in a few days time if this weather continues. Still the bees can have any more honey they make now. Most of the hives have empty brood frames that need filling with stores for the winter.

I gave the largest hive (last year's swarm) another brood box of un-drawn foundation that I put on top of the two brood boxes there. I haven't started feeding that hive yet.

In the allotment the German queen has just about filled the top brood box with stores and has only a couple of empty frames left. I put another bucket of feed on. I will start taking full frames out soon and either put them in store or give them to some of the smaller colonies. The German bees can then fill yet more empty frames.

I moved one of Tina's daughters from Thorpe to the allotment.

Honey Stripes - Thymol, Old Costessy

I took what honey there was stored in Honey Stripes supers off yesterday. The bees had eaten any that wasn't capped and are not making honey from the ivy yet. There were plenty of queen eggs in the top brood box but also signs of a high mite infestation with several bees with deformed wings So today I treated the three hives at that Apiary with thymol and gave them each a bucket of feed. Honey Stripes hive has had two brood boxes on all season and today I put on a third with frames in that need a clean up and switched the two existing boxes around as there wasn't much food stored in the bottom box. I expect they will soon empty the bucket of feed I gave them today and need another in three or four days time.

I was expecting to do much the same at Old Costessy but I found that there was nectar flowing into the hives there and the bees were making honey. The bees were entering the hives with white pollen on their backs and I think they are working the Himalayan Balsom that is growing along the river banks nearby. Certainly there was plenty of Balsom flowering in the pub garden on the river bank just down the road from apiary a week or so back. In just one season it can grow to an amazing height if it has some support to grow through.

I did take a few frames of honey off from a couple of the stronger hives - but I left most of them on as we could get a warm sunny week this week and if we do the bees could well fill a super completely with honey.

I gave Holly's hive three wet supers (above the crown board) to clean up that I had extracted honey from after taking them from Honey Stripes yesterdy.

The smaller hives at Old Costessy need feeding and I gave them each a fist sized lump fondant to keep them going.

GW moved to Postwick

GW's hive consisted of three brood boxes before I split it up today with GW in the bottom box under the queen excluder.

The top box has had three buckets of sugar syrup stored in frames (frames that had been left spare that needed cleaning up). Those frames of stores are now split up and in several other boxes that have small nucs with 2009 queens.

I put the middle box on a new floor and I will put the top box back on above it (with empty frames) with a sheet of newspaper between the two. Tomorrow I plan to put a small nuc of four frames with a new queen in it in that top box. My intention is to boost the number of bees looking after that queen and once they are united I will feed them up and maybe be able to do a similar split again for another small colony.

The original floor and bottom brood box with the swarm queen is now in Postwick and needs more feeding. This time last year they were still in comb amongst the twigs in the car park shrubbery. Back link

GW's bees are the only 'feral' bees I have collected living outside like that.

THIS TIME LAST YEAR

Feeding and uniting

I put a second bucket of feed on the German queen's hive today.

Those colonies that don't have a queen I'm uniting with a colonies that do have a queen.

I still have few nuc boxes with colonies in but I intend to move them all into regular brood boxes in the next couple of weeks

Feeding

The ivy is beginning to come into bloom here in Norwich and if the weather stays warm during September/October the bees will work hard at making honey out of it's nectar. I have spun out ivy honey in past years and have learned that timing is critical. A speedy extraction is required. The honey will even set on the inside of the extracter it sets so fast and once it is capped by the bees it almost too late to extract. It needs to be taken out of the hive just as the bees are in the process of capping it.

http://www.southamptonbeekeepers.co.uk/index_files/notes/october_supp.pdf
http://www.beesmith.co.uk/news.php?extend.69

There are other nectar sources that my bees are working at the moment including Golden Rod and Himalayan Balsam http://www.nookfarmhoney.co.uk/balsam_flower_honey.php I am holding on for a little while while yet before I take all of my supers off and extract what honey there is there.

I won't take the ivy honey and will leave that for the bees and I will feed them at the same time so that the ivy honey gets mixed with sugar.

GW

Furgle's bees (back link) didn't survive the last month. Maybe they couldn't cope with the wasp invasion although there weren't many dead bees in the brood box so that may not be the reason for their demise. I see that I noted that the queen was small.

GW's bees have made a good job cleaning the brood comb and stored a bucket of feed in them so far. I have isolated the queen in the bottom brood box so that I move her out and take her to Postwick in due course. In the meantime I have put another bucket of feed on. The queen is not good enough to keep on the allotment. The brood has too much chalk brood, the bees don't make honey and now they are not as nice to handle once the hive is opened as they were earlier in the year.

I also put a bucket of feed on the German queen and that got the bees very excited disturbing the balance in the hive next door. Norman's hive that had the queen in a nuc box on top of the hive that the bees decided to rob out. Once the bees start a robbing attack they go crazy.

I am still reducing hive entrances ever smaller.

Entrance blocks

I am limiting the amount of space the bees have defend at the entrance of their hives. I have reduced it on the strong hives as well the weaker ones although not by as much. It is good to see the wasps realizing it isn't worth even trying to sneak into the hives as they are so well defended.

The weather is beginning to change and there is not much summer left for this year now.

Postwick

It was another hot sunny day and I was able to check the smaller colonies of bees in Postwick without a veil or smoke.

Those nuc boxes that I gave an extra frame of brood to before leaving to go on holiday have generally done well with the exception of one that had all but faded out. I was able to transfer one colony from a nuc box to a regular brood and start feeding it. New entrance blocks were needed on several of the hives as there plenty of wasps around.

Last year's swarm is now the strongest hive on the site and again I stole one of it's frames of brood to give to one of the smaller colonies.

The Bowthorpe swarm has made no honey in contrast to the Laburnham swarm that was collected later in the year. The bees seem easy enough to work with and I'm sure if I feed them this autumn that they will make honey next year. But because of this year's performance they won't be bees that I breed from in the future.

I finally found (and marked) the queen that has been hiding from me all year and it's not supprising that she was so hard to find as she is dark, small and skinny. She is the kind of queen that beekeepers 'dispatch' and replace with another. Certainly the bees have taken all year to build up their numbers and fill a brood box and they have made no honey at all this year. I will keep her and feed the bees this autumn and wait for the worker bees to decide on when to replace her.

Honey Stripes, Old Costessy

I took one of the four supers off Honey Stripe's hive. The three left on do have some honey in them and today the bees were putting more in. Although it was a hot sunny day today the bees know that winter is approaching and the first three frames of the top brood box in Honey Stripes hive are now solid with stored honey and no longer contain brood and pollen as they did a month ago.

Willow2 (2009) was laying well and there is now a Willow3(2009) (daughter of Willow2(2009)) also doing well in what was the top brood box of Willow's hive last winter. (Honey Stripes is Willow2(2008)).

When this sunny spell is over and I have taken what honey there is off and the ivy comes into full bloom I need to put another new super and feeder on each of these hives.

Most of the hives at Old Costessy had laying queens although Norman's number three hive must have swarmed recently and was full of drones with more hatching out.

Midnight

A traumatised queen.

I have spent a sunny afternoon checking through the hives and nuc boxes on my allotment giving the bees fondant and a couple of the bigger colonies thymol crystals.

I marked a super looking black queen that I am going to call Midnight. (given that she sticks around!)

After packing up and putting my gear into the shed I walked back down the path to find a very distressed queen with a green wing outside and on top of the nuc box. I put her back inside but she really didn't want to go she was fluttering and running along the edge not knowing what to do. I taped around the lid and halved the entrance hole at the front. I havn't seen anything like this before. But it could explain why I have lost some queens and why some of the nucs have taken off. Maybe the trauma of marking is too much for them when they are so young and I should leave it until they have gone through a winter before I mark them.

Bill's bees, WBC

Bill's bees. At the start of the season I bought two brood boxes of bees from Bill who keeps his bees in a clearing in a small wood out in the countryside near Dereham. Within the first month of having them I took out the queens from each and forced them to make queen cells. What happened to each hive is an object lesson in what can go right and what can go wrong. One hive had no bees in when I got back from my holiday. The other hive (the one I call Bill's Greengage hive) has two (link back) brood boxes of bees and the top brood box has eight out of the twelve frames filled with capped honey and if I hadn't stolen some frames earlier in the year with honey in to give to other hives it would have a complete set of twelve. That queen has not swarmed and just got on with making honey. The other hive swarmed (maybe because it also needed a brood box of new frames) with their first new queen then failed to requeen and finally got robbed out when I was away. That final disaster was possibly my fault for not closing down the entrance before I left.

I have one other hive with a queen from Bill's bees that have also made honey. They have provided my with an object lesson in hive entrance control this year as they have propalised the bottoms of the brood frames to restrict the access to the brood box. Bill's bees make more propalis than my other bees. Interestingly they had a super on above the brood box with no queen excluder but they haven't taken the queen up into it to lay and have only used it to store honey in. That honey now needs to be taken off as I spotted a deformed winged bee on my inspection today and that is a sign of a bad mite infestation so treatment of that brood box is now a high priority.

One hive that doesn't need treatment at the moment is the WBC hive the smells strongly of thymol and although it has honey in the supers I don't think I can extract it because of the thymol. The queen wasn't marked (she is now) which supprised me. These are the best natured bees I have.

On closer inspection the early Ivy that is blooming in the hedge on the way into the allotment didn't have bees on it. It did have wasps and hover flys (looking like large wasps) and ladybirds. I notice that the ladybirds are also fond of my greengages along with the wasps. However, there is a honey flow of some sort coming in (maybe it's the golden rod) and some dark orange pollen being collected too.

I took the fondant of GW's hive and I'm cutting it up and giving a lump each to the nucs.

Ivy honey, North Walsham swarm, Normans allotment bees

I have been away from my bees since the 20th of last month. A long time at this time of the year and I have lost some bees as a result. In the allotment they were under attack from wasps as I was packing to leave and some of the nuc boxes may not have been able to defend themselves. Even the strong GW hive has a collection of dead wasps and bees under the entrance.

They have also been short of supplies and any it seems that only now new honey is being put into the frames. On the way into the allotment site I noticed bees on the first of the ivy flowers to open and as the weather is warm it is likely to be ivy honey that they beginning to store.

I have started to feed. I removed all of GW's supers that were empty yesterday and put on another brood box with frames from some of the failed nuc boxes that need cleaning up. On top of that I put a block of fondant. In the next week I will try to put feeder buckets on all of the hives and transfer the bees in nuc boxes to brood boxes. I intend to split up GW and take her in one brood box to another apiary. Then I will put newspaper between the remaining two brood boxes and replace some of the frames in the top box with a small nuc with a laying queen that is in a bee brief next to the hive. Given that the bees in the bottom box accept her they will all have a good chance of getting through the winter. They will need constant feeding for the next couple of months.

The queen cells from the German queen had successfully produced new queens in Norman's allotment hive and the North Walsham swarm hive. Both of which I have marked. However both hives also had queen cells in them. I took the queen out of Norman's brood box with a couple of frames and put her in a nuc box leaving a frame with two queen cells in the brood box.

The frames I had removed and put into a nuc box with the original queen cell (the reason I put in a frame of eggs from the German queen into Norman's brood box in the first place) also had a laying queen. But I couldn't find her to mark.

The NS hive had a brood box under a super and most of the activity was going on in the super frames two of which have queen cells. I put those frames into a nuc box with a couple of others and after marking the queen put her in the brood box with a queen excluder between that and the super.

I have no way of knowing how old the queen cells are so they could hatch before I find a home for them.

George's bees, Thorpe bees, Greengage swarm

George's bees have united successfully with the new queen and one of the boxes had a new stripy laying queen that is now marked.

All three hives at Thorpe were queen right and the one under the hazel tree had a nearly full super on and an empty feeder bucket.

It was after seven in the evening and I was just checking that the nuc boxes had enough empty frames to keep them going for three weeks when I became aware of the buzzing all around me. The bees were swarming and it looked like they may settle in the greengage tree between Bill's greengage hive and my allotment 83 greengage hive. I looked around to see where they were coming from but I couldn't be sure. Only one of the nuc boxes at the end of the plot seemed a little excited. Maybe the queen had got back from her mating flight but didn't like the old home. They did settle in the greegage tree and it was easy to cut the twig on and pop them into another box. I stole a frame from the top brood box on Bill's Greengage hive that was half filled with fresh honey. Hopefully that will bribe them to stay. I saw the queen decend into the box but didn't try to mark her. (another striped queen)

Thymol

I put thymol crystals on two of my hives today. One was a Cherry's colony (one of the swarms I picked at the start of the season). They had made a fair amount of honey but I spotted a bee with virtually no wings and that is an indication that the mite levels are getting too high. I took off the suppers and have now extracted the capped honey. The thymol may put the queen off laying for a few weeks but the bees will all be much happier without so many mites.

The other was Bill's greengage hive.

Extracting honey

Some of the honey is ready to be taken off the hives. But there is still a lot that is not quite capped enough yet to be taken.

I have also been stealing frames of brood and giving them to small nucs with new queens in them. The brood from the 2008 swarm queen on frames of new foundation put into the second brood box a few weeks ago was just about flawless and without a single cell missing or any chalk brood.

Furgle's queen

Furgle's queen is small and dark and her bees have given up laying eggs in queen cells

Two queens in the same hive?

I have split up the hive at station three in Old Costessy - (this was the hive that I united two brood boxes together at the end of last season). On inspection yesterday there seemed to be a queen below the queen excluder and one above the queen excluder. Judging by the number of dead drones on top of the queen excluder it has been like this for some time. (drones can't get through a queen excluder)

There were three supers on this hive which I thought were filling nicely with honey. As the queen was new this year I havn't been giving a full inspection. The bees seem to have acomodated the situation OK with the bottom queen inhabiting the brood box and her bees using the first super. Then it seems the other queen was laying in the second super and her bees were putting honey in the top super. This is how it appears be but as these are black bees and the hives are under trees I find the queens almost impossible to find. I spent all year looking for one in this hive in 2007/8.

As the bees in the brood box are only on four or five frames I have taken all three supers off and stood them as a stand alone hive. I figure it won't do any harm to let the bees fill up the brood box now. The flying bees are likely to return there even if they are used to going up the the accomdation on the third floor.

Although the hive on bricks has a queen that is laying well now with several frames of brood I can't find her.

The nuc box above had it's second laying queen this year that was hiding in two slabs of comb hanging under a shallow frame and on inspection yesterday it had eggs but one queen cell as well. I was going to try again to find the queen today before deciding what to do with her and the queen cell. The queen cell was quite sneaky and hardly looked like one. It was built into the wax at the join between the bottom of the shallow frame and the 'wild' comb and didn't really stick out at all. I was too late. Today the queen cell was empty. I may as well leave these bees alone now and let them sort them selves out. If they swarm it will be a very small swarm.

All the problems I have had with this hive this year stem from leaving it on a brood and a half last year.

Quite a few of the new queens have bees that seem to want to supercede them. Furgles bees had eggs in queen cups a few days ago and now needs a closer watch.

GW,

There was a lot of activity at the entrance of GW's hive and after the chaos created by pulling it apart the other day I thought I would give it another look. The queen marked green (she should be marked red) was there in the top brood box on the second frame in. I made a quick inspection for queen cells and put the hive back together. There was still some unhatched brood in the big old wooden feeder box and I released quite a few drones that had emerged from brood in the feeder box that is above the queen excluder. I need to put on another super.

I was going to take the queen and the brood out of the Wynmondham swarm and give them one of my queen cells to hatch out. The bees were ahead of me and had already made their own queen cell. I still removed the queen and a couple of frames of brood. But I did leave them with their own queen cell to look after.

Tina's girls, Laburnham

We marked some good looking new laying queens from the queen cells that Tina's bees produced when she was removed from the WBC hive in her town garden and taken to Old Costessy a month or so ago.

I also took one of her queen cells to Postwick that I gave to the the second compost bin swarm to hatch out. That was after I had taken their lively queen out of the brood box with a couple of frames bees and brood. I put those in a nuc box and sat it on top of the brood box. Tina's girls had been laying for some time with plenty of capped brood and that was the case in the brood box here too. But what I found in the nuc box above was not what I was expecting. I found queen cells. One hatched, one torn down and one about to hatch with the antenna of the yet to emerge queen twiching. On closer inspection a virgin queen was on the other frame and she looking like she was ready for a fight. Why the bees had decided to make these queen cells is a mystery. The last time I inspected she was there and seemed OK. I suppose it is possible that I damaged her in some way on closing the box. Anyway I took the frame with the emerging queen out of the nuc box and put it in another box. To give the bees and the new queen some chance of making a nucleous big enough to survive I stole a frame of brood from the Bowthorpe compost bin swarm that had some young bees about to hatch out and plenty young brood for them to look after. It will be five days before these new queens take their maiden flight so lets hope the weather is good for them then.

The Bowthorpe swarm has done quite well and more than half filled the brood box. But they have made no honey in the super. I marked their banded queen. I should have put the brood box down on the floor and moved the super under it it above the queen excluder. Maybe next time.

The Laburnham bees are no longer yellow. The bees that left the original hive with the queen were yellow and the queen is yellow but her bees are much darker and are not as 'laid back' as the yellow bees. Hower, they are making honey and they look like they are good hard working 'mongrel' bees.

Last year's (Hellsden) Postwick swarm (I only took one swarm to Postwick last year) has two brood boxes and five supers on. That is after I put another one on today. I have liked the way these bees has steadily grown from a relativly small swarm to what is now a big hive. They have always had an independant air about them. They ignored the fondant until quite late in the season. It was almost as though it was beneath them to consume something that they hadn't stored for themselfs.

Robbers

I lost a small nuc today. The box had been robbed out by invaders. As the recent good weather has changed and the nectar flow eased the robbing has begun. The colony was too small to defend it's self and all of it's stores have now been removed. I noticed a lot of activity at the box entrance and that gave me cause to look inside. It is a sign that I need to start thinking about feeding all of the colonies both large and small.

GW, Mount Pleasant swarm, North Walsham swarm

At last I found GW in the top brood box and marked her and immediately lost her again as she squeezed through the queen marking cage as my back was turned. I took her hive apart and pulled the twigs and brood frame apart. The brood frames in the two supers had to have the extra brood cut of the bottoms before they would fit into a regular brood box. The hive is now on a new floor with a double brood box, a super and above that a large old box feeder filled with the spare brood comb. Wether or not the bees will look after this brood remains to be seen as does a green winged queen. She should be red of course.

The mount pleasant swarm has good looking striped queen. Now marked green.

The North Walsham swarm has been building up well and the queen is laying plenty of eggs right now. But there is too much chalk brood in the hive for my liking. There was less on the new drawn out frames but then they have have less time for it to develope. The queen is small and black (and now marked green) and I took her and several frames of brood out of that brood box and put them in a nuc box to go to Old Costessy. In a few days time I will also take out any queen cells. I am going to put a queen cell from Luke's german queen in there. The queen cells are building up in Norman's hive where the queen swarmed. I removed Norman's bees queen cells a few days ago and put in a frame of eggs from Luke's Carniolan queen. A first cross could prove to be a disaster but we will see.

Tina, Hive on bricks, Willow's hive

I moved Tina out of her bee brief and back into a regular brood box today. I don't know how much more egg laying she can achieve but there were two good frames of sealed brood with her today.

At last! The hive on bricks has a laying queen and judging by the propolis she is an offspring of Sticky. I thought my attempts to add queen cells had failed.

I opened Willow's hive for an inspection today. The bees seemed much happier and were making honey again. But on the first frame of the brood box there was a queen cell. It was however the only one and it seemed to be on a frame isolated from the main brood colony where there were plenty of eggs. There were queen cups but they didn't have eggs in them. I didn't see the queen but it seems that she has been accepted by the bees now and the swarming impulse has waned.

Mount Pleasant Swarm

The swarm in Mount Pleasant needed a bee brush to get the bees swept into the box. The are now under the second large apple tree. I stole a frame from Bill's Greengage bees to give them something eat and to induce them to stay.

The two swarms I collected last week have settled in and both have a laying queen.

George's bees

There were plenty of queen cells in George's hive to make a up a couple of nuc boxes. Those left over on the frames left in the hive were removed as we intended to unite a new queen with them. The queen marked green was put into a brood box on top of a sheet of newspaper on top of the box already there. Hope fully the bees will get through the newspaper and accept her as their own.

Hive on bricks

At Old Costessy the hive on bricks has again failed to re-queen.

Honey stripes, Willow

I took three supers of honey off Honey Stripe's hive today and put one new one. Stripe's hive is now four supers on top on two brood boxes. I didn't go through the bottom brood box as there was no signs of immediate swarming in the top box. If they continue to make honey for a week or two more I may take the top brood box off and replace with a new one with new frames and foundation and then feed the bees until all the new foundation is all drawn out before putting any supers back on.

The late Willow's hive is a bit of a mystery. Today there were plenty of eggs laid in the brood box and plenty of queen cells in the making. The queen that I have marked green was on the last frame on the far side of the box. I took out more frames with queen cells on. Maybe my taking frames out and putting empty ones back is confusing the bees. Or maybe they just don't like this queen and want a new one. Added to those in the brood box that I took off on my last visit I now have a lot of queen cells to deal with.

Suffolk bees

There are three queen right hives at Suffolk and so far none are making any honey.

Swarming weather

I was just about to remove another bird box with bees living in it (I now have two on my allotment shed wall) when George's call came through. His garden was full of bees and they seem to be settling high up in one of his conifers. They were on his neighbours side of the tree and too high to get at. The best we could do was to set up another hive and hope that they would come down from the tree into it. By the time I left George's garden they hadn't and they had in fact moved further away and just about out of sight.

Misty's bees that didn't re-queen have three queen cells on the frame that I introduced from the Laburnham bees. So I need a home for two queen cells.

The other 2008 swarm queen that I moved to Postwick had also left her hive leaving a hive full of queen cells. Many open, some torn down and a couple still left intact. I removed a frame with an unopened queen cell on it and put it into a nuc box with a frame of bees. That hive was just about swarmed out. Bad management on my part.

I checked several of the boxes in Postwick. The Lakenham swarm looks a bit sad and I couldn't find the queen. The Bowthorp swarm was fine and slowly filling up the brood box of new frames. The Laburnham bees were making honey. The last of the 2008 queens that I can't find I still can't find. She is beginning to lay a little better now and they may well build up into a useful hive for next year.

The swarm I collected last year and took to Postwick I left in a box without a queen excluder. I thought I would leave them that way as an experiment and see how many boxes the queen would go up into to lay eggs in. I took five supers off today and there were eggs and brood in the top box. With so much swarming going on I thought I had better get these bees under control and find the queen if possible. When I had taken three boxes off and removed several frames that were mostly drone brood I was beginning to wonder if this was wise. I had to stop a couple of times to take out bees from inside the veil on my bee keeping smock. These bees were crawling bees and had crawled up inside. But they weren't stinging me. When there is no queen excluder the bees use the central frames for brood and put honey in the outside frames. In the brood box at the bottom there were still frames of undrawn foundation. The bees had moved up from the center of the brood box and ignored some of the outer frames. I had just got past the center frames and there she was, a red marked queen. There wasn't much red left on her but enough to say she was the queen that came with the swarm last year. I put another brood box on and a queen excluder on top of that. I may go back in a day or two and put all the frames with brood on in one super and put that under the queen excluder too as being so far away from the queen the bees could start making queen cells on those frames.

It was late when I got back to the allotment but not dark. As I walked up the path past the large dog rose I heard a humming. There, just above my left shoulder, was a small clump of bees in the rose. I cut the rose twigs into a nuc box with the bees on before gently shaking the bees off and putting some old frames in for them.

It's the weather for it.

Yesterday - two swarms. The UEA Permaculture Allotment Bees

I picked up a small swarm in Long Stratton that was in a garden shrub. I was able to cut the twigs with the bees on of and put them into my box.

For the second time this year I have been called to a garden that I have picked up a swarm from before. The Wymondham swarm was on a buddleia and with aid of some loppers a branch of that was also cut of with the bees on it and put into the box.

Both of these had an old sticky frame of stores put into the box first to help persuade them to stay. I will now be keen to see if it worked as the last swarm I collected and took to Postwick didn't stay in the box I put them in.

On the students plot, from one swarm picked up at the UEA in 2007, there are now four laying queens (three in hives and one in a nuc box) and there are two nuc boxes with bees in. I gave the two nuc boxes a small patch of queen eggs each (from my Greengage hive) to see if they need to make queen cells.

The UEA bees are quite tough and reasonably OK to handle but there are probably too many in the one place now. I had three hives last winter and will probably take the bees in the nuc box to Old Costessy soon.

Willow's hive. Georges bees

At last I have found a queen in Willow's hive. In the top brood box there were plenty of eggs but on one of the middle frames was a queen cell in the early stages of production so I took that frame out. In the bottom brood box was a fully formed queen cell with a hole in it's side. So what was going on in this hive? That is the sign of a queen destroyed by another queen. Once I got about three frames from the far edge of the bottom box I found a queen. An unmarked new queen. So Willow had been superceded. That explains why the bees are now better natured and why there was a break in honey production earlier on. It doesn't explain why I have always found eggs in the brood box. Initially I took the frame with the new queen out of the hive but changed my mind and put her back in the bottom brood box. And I put back the frame with the queen cell in production in the top brood box but I then removed that box and put it on it's own floor a few feet away from the hive. The bees that don't fly back to Willow's old hive can bring up a new queen in that hive. The question now is are the bees going to be happy with their new queen or are they still going to make queen cells.

There is also the brood box next to Willow's old hive that I put queen cells in before that had bees coming and going to it.

George's bees are getting the queen to lay in queen cups. I destroyed most but left one on one frame that I put into a nuc box with another frame of bees. They can proceed with making a queen cell with it if they wish but I want the bees in George's hive to make some honey.

Feral bees found in the bush

The bees that were found living in the car park shrubs are building up in number. They have got well established in the new brood box and only have a few more frame left to draw out. I looked for the queen today but didn't see her. I have treated them with thymol crystals and the newer frames of brood do seem to have less chalk brood than the earlier ones. The swarm from North Walsham also suffers very badly with chalk brood. If I do find the queen I will remove her. I think she should be called GW. Chalk brood Treatment? Bee disorders Chalk brood treatment -- Askotat

Half way point tomorrow

From tomorrow onwards the queen bees will gradually begin to lay less eggs each day as we go past mid point in the year. In Norwich we still have some busy weeks ahead of us (the lime trees have begun to flower and after those the sweet chestnut will come into bloom) but we only have one more month now before we have to start thinking about next winter and feeding our bees sugar syrup for their winter stores.

So far this year queen rearing has been quite good with a fair percentage hatching out and getting mated. If a queen doesn't hatch out I see that as personal failure. But if she hatches out but fails to get back to the box she left then that is just bad luck. It can of course be bad weather but this year we have had good mating days evenly spaced every week or ten days or so apart.

Some of the queens I have seen have been extremely small and again I think that is down to the beekeeper as I'm sure that left to their own devices the bees would have prevented them from surviving. I have two nuc boxes where the bees have a very small patch of brood with a new queen cell in the middle of it. The bees definitely don't think those queens are up to the mark and are taking steps to replace them.

Allotment swarm, Little Lauren

The swarm in the box near the aconites did decide to make some queen cells on the frame with the WBC eggs that I introduced. I removed three queen cells and left them one.

Little Lauren has been laying well and building up nicely so I thought some of her bees could bring up one of the WBC queen cells from the aconite swarm. I moved LL to the middle hive in thorpe where she can stay now.

There were a couple of nuc boxes that I thought hadn't produced a laying queen but it turns out that they are just a little late in getting mated.

Georges bees, Thorpe, Laburnum

Georges bees are doing well but have just laid their first egg in a queen cup. If we are to get honey out of that hive now they will need a regular weekly inspection to make sure that they don't make queen cells and swarm.

The three hives at Thorpe couldn't be more different this year from last. The swarm that I added to hive number three is OK but could really do with feeding. The bees in number two are very low in numbers have no queen and need a nuc adding. Hive number one that did have a laying queen at the start of the year had an open queen cell but no laying queen. The number of bees is still quite high so they need a frame of eggs or a queen cell added.

I took a frame of eggs out of Laburnum's hive and put it in Misty's old hive as that hive didn't re-queen. There are still quite a few bees there so hopefully that frame will have some good queen cells on in weeks time.

My inspection at Postwick was cut short by thunder and lightening and by the time I got back to the city it was raining hard.

Allotment swarm

Furgle spotted a swarm on his way out of the allotment site. Thank's Furgle that swarm is now in Postwick.

Tina, Honey Stripes, Willow

Some of my bees are getting very swarmy now the weather is getting hot again and a swarm was seen over the allotments coming from the direction of my plot. I couldn't find it though.

Tina has was once more been taken to Old Costessy. She did really well in the new brood box she was put in and had completely filled it with brood and made a good start on a second. But today there was a queen cell and that wasn't the first that her bees had tried to make so she was removed. The queen cell is in it's own box and in a weeks time I'm sure there will be several (if not many) more emergency queen cells in the brood box she was removed from.

Honey stripes is laying well and as we have had a considerable amount of rain and the blackberry has started into flower. A hot spell now should see more supers start to fill with honey.

Willow is still impossible to find. I spent some considerable time today going through both brood boxes. She is still laying well but her bees are getting ready to swarm. I removed two rather scraggy queen cells on this visit. I would very much like to remove her -- but no luck. I may just split the two brood boxes on Monday if I still can't find her.

Furgle's bees, Allotment 83, Permaculture Society allotment

Furgle's hive has successfully requeened and one of the two nuc boxes produced a laying queen.

There are three swarms on my allotment. Two (Little Lauren and the North Walsham bees) have laying queens. The allotment swarm near the aconites was still queenless and has now a frame of eggs from the WBC hive to make queen cells with.

Both the Greengage hives have requeened - that's Bill's Greengage and my Greengage 83. I gave Greengage 83 a treatment of thymol.

Out of the three hives on the students Permaculture Society allotment two of the three have new laying queens.

Four swarms at Postwick

All the four swarms that I have taken to Postwick this year have laying queens.

Tina

Tina's bees have moved up into their new brood box well and are working hard drawing out the combs that have new foundation. In the bottom box they are still making queen cups and given some more good sunny weather may well start to get into swarm mode. It will be a good idea to have a nuc box ready for the next time they are inspected.

Both of the queen cells that were left behind when Tina was moved did hatch into new queens and mated successfully. One has gone to Jonty in wiltshire. The other is still on Tina's plot.

Tina, Suffolk bees, Georges bees and Zigga

Tina is doing well and has filled the brood box so we put on another to give her some space. One queen cell in the making removed.

The bees in Suffolk are in a much better state now. On my last visit I wasn't sure that the queen in the hive with drone brood was a new queen and I removed her from the hive and put a frame with some eggs in to replace her. Today that hive had a new queen that had just started to lay. A good looking striped queen that I marked.

The queen that I had removed was also laying and looking good. I marked her too.

The old queen has several frames of capped brood now and will, I hope, start to build up again and need a second brood box on my next visit. These are all originally from Bill's bees.

George's bees are OK but he has been stung so they may need to be changed. I may switch his bees with the Laburnum swarm queen before the season is over.

Zigga in her country retreat had, from a four frame start, completely filled her brood box and was desperately in need of supers. Zigga is another candidate for a second brood box.

Stripes, Willow, Holly

Stripes, Willow and Holly are all doing well and laying eggs.

Sorted through several boxes at old Costessy and marked another 2009 queen.

Gave one new queen in a very small nuc a frame of brood from Holly's hive.

Made up two nuc boxes from Norman's No1 Old Costessy hive and left a frame with a queen cell in the brood box too.

Swarm in Hellsdon

The swarm was on an odd old branch of a tree laying on a bank of newly mown grass. I was seen as a mad bee man by the local lads as I sat with my cardboard box and bees flying all around me. They are little dark bees and I took them to Postwick where I was planning a visit this afternoon anyway.

The swarm from the Costessy compost bin with the flying queen had a queen there today. I didn't try to mark her this time.

The laburnum swarm queen is clearly marked and laying well now. Her bees are very laid back and hardly bother to move when I inspect them. I may take her to the allotment apiary.

The Bowthorpe compost bin (No 2) swarm are moving up into their new brood box slowly.

I checked the hive that has the last of the 2008 queens in it. There were eggs. But as usual with that colony I didn't see the queen. It is still quite weak but is hanging on in there. Maybe if they can get through another winter they will take off next year.

The bees from the 2008 swarm that I moved from the allotment are still being annoying. I checked them today and they have a new queen and are making honey and a lot of brace comb as I had left some frames out of the hive when taking out the queen cells. If I meant to replace them after then it must have slipped my mind. Leaving gaps in the hive is always asking for trouble. Out of the two colonies I moved I have four new queens. Not so good as I was looking for ten.

I'm not sure the swarm from North Walsham are nice bees as I gave them a brood box today. As the head gardener was having a greenhouse base laid in her allotment next door I was under strict instructions not to get the bees worked up and to leave them alone for the day. Giving those bees another box without smoking them as we we packing up set one bee folowing us up and down the allotment path. I'm blaming them anyway. I need to check them for a laying queen.

Lauren is laying

The Rockland swarm has a laying queen that I promised to call Lauren - so Little Lauren she is

Tina, Sticky

Tina is doing fine and is just about bursting out of her WBC brood box. I would like her to put some honey on the new frames we put in on the last inspection so will wait a few days before adding a second brood box.

I made up three nucs after Sticky's removal but unfortunately only one had a laying queen on inspection today so I put a frame of eggs in from Holly's brood box.

The allotment swarm

I checked the allotment swarm that I collected on the 17th for a laying queen this evening. There were no eggs in the hive. I moved a frame of eggs from the nuc box that had a 2009 queen in. That made the bees very excited

Then the queen flew off

It took several visits to the black plastic compost bin that the bees had swarmed into before I got them into a box to take them away. In fact I didn't get them into the box until I found the queen on the outside and picked her up and put her in the box myself. After making up a brood box for them and putting in a couple of frames of honey to entice them to stay I tipped the bees onto the top of the brood box. As I have done several times this year already. Watching the bees sort themselves out I noticed the queen again and though ah! I should mark her but she slipped down between the frames as I found my marking pen. So I thought that was the end of that good idea until up she popped again. She was nipping around pretty fast and I only got just to tip one wing with green as she left the top of the box and flew up into the air.

The one single brood box that survived last winter was getting very excited as I left that apiary. A mated queen returning or a virgin queen leaving?

Misty gone, Rockland swarm

It has been more than a week since I last looked at Misty and and on inspection today she was gone leaving several queen cells behind in her place. I have put one of Misty's queen cells in the hive at the end of the plot and the hive next to the WBC.

I picked up a swarm in Rockland today. Lauren?

The swing sworm left my box and there is only one North Walsham sworn in one of the two boxes now.

A second queen from the hive next to the WBC has come into lay in her nuc box.

Tina

Tina seen and doing well and had a super of unwired foundation put on.

Georges bees are progressing quite nicely and had a super of unwired foundation put on.

There is a queen in the laburnum swarm and I have marked her green. I'm glad these bees they have their own queen as they are quite different to my mostly black bees in that they are very yellow. The queen is quite small and looks very similar the workers. They seem to be waiting for something to happen at the moment and she is not laying a lot of eggs - if any. There are eggs on the frame I introduced - but are they hers? I'm not sure if she is a mated queen or not. I hope she is as marking a virgin queen is probably not a good idea. Link

Two swarms

I picked up two swarms from under the same trampoline in a garden in North Walsham.

Furgle's swarm has left

DN4 Frames

DN4 Frames made up with new foundation are the order of the day. I picked up another small swarm this evening that was hanging under the seat of a swing in Bracon Ash. I have housed it on the allotment to the left of the path towards the end.

The laburnum swarm is doing well but has no laying queen at the moment. I put a frame of eggs in from the Blowthorpe compost bin swarm, that has started laying in the new ND4 frames in the brood box above the old super they were originally put in, to see if they are without a queen and make a queen cell.

I had a quick look into Honey Stripes hive and she is laying well. There were two full supers of honey on the hive so I gave it two more supers. Willow is also still laying well and eluding capture. When opened in the middle of a sunny day Willows bees are not so bad and quite easy to work with but if they are left until the evening or opened in bad weather the protest and sting.

Nuc Boxes, Furgle's swarm

I just can't make them fast enough.

It's beginning to go a little crazy in my apiaries at the moment with bees, swarms and drones going in all directions making honey and mating. At the end of the process hopefully it will all settle down and we should have some sound new laying queens. So far I have only marked half a dozen queen bees green (this year's colour) and half of those have been swarms.

There was a very nice large swarm of bees on the handle of Furgle's rusty old wheelbarrow. My bee from Furgle's hive? A fair bet I would say. Now they are on allotment 83 by the small pear tree in a WBC brood box. If there is a laying queen I think she can be called Rusty.

Luke's bees, Allotment swarm, Lost queen

Late last night I brought back a couple of nucs from Luke in Essex. The one in my allotment has one of his German Carnelian queens. The one in Old Cosstessy is his general stock pre German queens.

With the number of beekeepers and their colonies increasing on the allotment site one would expect the occasional swarm to crop up. Today's was an easy one to collect and is now housed in a brood box near to the small apple tree and the aconites.

I have lost another good queen (or did sometime last week) and had a hive full of queen cells to deal with as a result. This time it was the Thorpe allotment hive. A strong hive of nice bees is now split up and in half a dozen nuc boxes.

Acorn marked and moved

This year's queens. I opened the two nuc boxes and the brood box of the queen I took out on the 15th May. One had a laying queen as I could see there were eggs but I could not find her to mark. I think they should all have been left for a further week before inspection

I took queens out of the two hives under greengage tree in the middle of my allotment a week ago. As I had taken the swarm queen(Acorn) away I put a queen cell in brood box she taken from. There are still plenty of bees there that can look after a queen cell.

Acorn was collected as a swarm in an oak tree some days ago on Swarden Common having first ascertained that she is egg laying I have marked her green and taken her out of the hive on the allotment and transported her to Thorpe where she is now in residence in the grey WBC hive under the hazelnut tree.

Misty is OK in her new hive on the 83 allotment plot

Furgle's hive

Furgle's queen went south to a new home some days ago now and I was overdue for making up nucs with her queen cells. I opened up the hive this evening when no one was around in the allotments and as I did it started to rain.

I made four nucs three in boxes that I've made in the last few days and one in brood box.

Permaculture UEA swarm 2007 queen

I moved the Permaculture UEA 2007 swarm queen (Zigga) out to the country on the 2nd and today went into her hive to make up nucs from her many queen cells. The bees did not like that at all (maybe the fact that it was very windy didn't help) and stung John and some of the other altment holders. I think all of Zigga's bees need to moved out of the allotment site and replaced now.

The swarm from the Laburnham tree is still in it's brood box.

Misty, Swarm in weeping Laburnum

One of Zigga's 2008 offspring (single brood box) went to Banbury today.

I put Misty's queen cells into one nuc, the original brood box, and a new brood box split into three compartments.

The swarm I picked up today was in a in weeping Laburnum at about chest height. It was not easy to shake out and had itself well established amongst the branches that grew out at the top of the trunk of the tree. But given a good first shake into a box and then another into a smaller box two hours later I did manage to pick up nearly all the bees that were there. They are now in Postwick.

Swarden Common swarm, Old Costessy queen cells

I managed to get a swarm out of an oak tree today with the help of the kind people (and their ladder) who lived opposite. If it stays and turns out to have laying queen I should take it to Thorpe and put it in the empty hive there.

I split a brood box into three chambers today and put a queen cell and a frame of brood in each from the hive at Old Costessy that had double brood box and was the youngest of Old Costessy's 2008 queens.

8 hives leave to go up north

8 hives leave to go up north

Tina, Cherry , Holly and South facing hive

Tina is laying very well in her 'Hire a hive' garden WBC hive. There were no more queen cells. Could have a second brood box.

Maria is laying well but hasn't moved onto the deep frames yet

I marked Holly before she was laying. She is now laying very well and I marked her some more.

Old Costesey's South facing hive is full of queen cells. I have made up four nucs so far but could make more.

I'm still not sure what is going on inside the brood box of the hive on bricks but think I should make up nucs with the bees.

Cherry has been put to work in Thorpe to get bees out of the wall.

WBC, Cherry, Feral bees, Honey Stripes, Willow.

I took the queen out of the WBC hive last week and today made up five queen cells in Bee Briefs and left one in the brood box. We will see how they have got on in a month's time.

I inspected the last swarm that I collected and it had a marked queen so I took out all the old frames (except the one the queen was on and the one next to it) and replaced them with brand new frames and foundation. The old frame do seem to hold viruses and once the bees draw out the new foundation they do much better on it. This is the swarm from Attlebough with a queen that I will now call 'Cherry'.

The feral in the bush bees are slowly moving into the new brood box but have not taken the queen up there to lay yet.

Honey stripes on inspection was laying OK today.

I made a concerted effort to find Willow by going through both brood boxes but to no avail. Anyway she is laying very well with no signs of queen cells yet.

Permaculture

I took the queen from the single brood box on the Permaculture students allotment to Postwick.

I took the swarm queen in the nuc box to Postwick yesterday.

Zigga, Misty

I went out to the countryside to pick up swarm this morning. It is now in a brood box on the allotment next door but one to the WBC. If there is a laying queen she will be called 'Cherry'.

Furgle's queen has gone in a nuc to Essex.

I don't want to let Misty go and have sited the nuc that she in on the station near the path in the allotment apiary.

Zigga (the UEA swarm queen of 2007) has now gone into semi retirement . I have taken her to a country village and sited her in Bob's back garden.

I also took Zigga's daughter out of the single brood box to make up a nuc.

UEA Permaculture allotment, George's bees

The yellow queen that was picked up as a swarm in the UEA grounds I am going to call 'Ziggar'. So far this year she has been laying really well. It is almost as though she had just got settled down at the start of this year. But she is no longer young and her bees on inspection today were very skittish and in the middle of the brood box at the bottom of one of the frames was the reason why. Queen cells. Several fat queen cells in production. Fortunately I had decided it was time to move her and had her new home ready (she is going out to a village in country for her retirement). She is marked and on my second go through the box found her on the second frame in. Removing her should stop her bees from swarming which I reckon they were about to do at any time.

George's bees needed their first inspection after being moved a week ago. They were doing really well with a good looking frame of brood and plenty of eggs laid in the last week. The hive needs a regular crown board and some supers.

Old Costessy, Postwick, Willow

I marked my first new green queen today. She is the daughter of the lost queen from the hive on bricks. I'm going to name her 'Maria'. Maria is on shallow frames (that are now in a bit of a state) that I have moved in with some new deep frames. I'm hoping that I will soon find her laying on the new frames..

I inspected the brood box on bricks that I thought also had a laying queen. I could see no eggs and have put a frame of brood in from the double brood box.

I made up a nuc with the bees in the double brood box - she was the last queen to get established in Old Costessy last year. I put in a tray of Apiguard although all the Old Costessy hives were treated earlier in the year.

There are two boxes to move out of Old Costessy now.

In Postwick I still had a hive full of queen cells to sort out. It is the other hive that had to be moved from the allotment. I think both of those hives must have had last year's swarms in.

I made up a nuc from the bees in the hive at the back of the Postwick apiary. This hive, that was under the budlia bushes before I cut them down, was Norman's big angry hive when I bought it last year. I used a frame of eggs from one of Rosemary's greek queen's daughters to produce 'Misty'. I like Misty's bees that are uniformly dark with three thin bands of light honey grey. They are calm and easy to work with.

I took another look into Willow's hive as I would really like to find her and get her out into a nuc box but I think she has been taken down into the bottom brood box as there were very few eggs in the top one. I must remember to do an inspection one sunny lunchtime next week as Willow's bees just do not like their hive being opened if the conditions are not perfect. I took out a couple of old frames of stores and put in two new frames of foundation in their place and put on another super.

Postwick, Old Costessy

I went through one of the two hives I moved from the allotment toady and made up five nucs with the queen cells in it.

I checked the Bowthorpe swarm - and yes there was a laying queen in the box. I gave it some Thymol.

I didn't check and give thymol to the single brood box on my last visit but did today.

In Old Costessy I took out the south facing queen to make up a nuc.

The nuc box on top of the hive on bricks has a laying queen.

The swarm that came from the holly tree has a queen that I marked green.

Russet

I checked over Tina's hive with john and swashed just one queen cup.

The hive at the end of the allotment near the Norfolk Russet apple tree had her queen removed a week ago. That queen was from one of Tina's queen cells. She is now in Islington London. On inspection today there were only two queen cells both on the frame of drone brood.

Furgle's hive has two brood boxes and a super now separated by queen excluders.

I took out the queen from the WBC hive on the allotment today to make up a nuc

Permaculture bees, Bill's bees, Furgle's bees

We have had a good spell of fine weather and I'm concerned that I am giving my bees enough space.

The latest colony to get established last year on the student's Permaculture allotment is in one new brood box. I was going to just put on another super but on opening up found there was no queen excluder so instead I could have put on another brood box. Before doing so I had to take out the frame of drone brood and so may as well give the brood box an inspection. It was full of queen cups with eggs in. Either the bees were feeling tight for space, even though there were still four undrawn super frames, or they don't like their queen. Either way I will take her out of there soon. At least she was still there today. After removing the queen cups and completely capped frame of drone brood I shut it up again.

I put a complete new brood box full of new foundation on one of Bill's hives. That will keep those bees busy for some time and eventually allow me to remove Bill's original brood box.

Furgal's bees have two brood boxes and a super of old stores under the queen excluder and badly needs a full inspection. Unfortunately Furgle has been busy on his plot on a daily basis and although not there today Sunday is not a good day to open up and take to bits a hive when there are children in plots nearby.

Swarms, Postwick and Bluebell Road

I picked up another Bowthorpe swarm today. Again the bees were in a compost bin. This time in the garden next door to the one I took a swarm away from two days ago. A cast I imagine from the same hive.

I took the swarm to Postwick. The bees I took from the allotment to Postwick are still angry with me.

I inspected the other hives in Postwick. The one at the back is slowly coming along well with bees that are nice to work with. But the others are taking their time to get moving and are generally very dissapointing and don't seem to be progressing much. The 2008 Postwick swarm are moving up through their hive that has no queen excluder on.

Stripes was looking OK but not really exciting where as her mum (I am going to call her Willow) was looking extremely good. Honey Stripes seemed to be running out of steam so I changed her hive around. I moved the queen excluder up above the second brood box after taking some of the older frames out and replacing them with brand new deep frames and foundation. I spotted two bees with deformed wings so I gave the top brood box a liberal application of Thymol crystals as deformed bees must mean that the mite levels are getting too high in the hive. There were three supers on the hive but I took one off and gave it to Willow instead.

A new colony for George. Sticky and Tina's girls.

George's hive died out over the winter for no real reason apart from maybe they had got themselves stuck in a corner of the hive without food in one of the cold spells we had at the start of the year. They had half eaten their fondant before dying and there was plenty of stores at the other end of the box and in the super above. It looked like they had eaten themsevles into a corner and only had areas of empty frame around them and had gotten themselves isolated from the stores in the hive. Or maybe it was just because the hive came from the Suffolk countryside and was suffering from insecticide spray. Anyway as part of his 'hire a hive' agreement I took George some new bees today. George has the queen from the hive at the centre of the allotment that have been making so much fuss about loosing her and stinging people. The bees were fine on normal inspections and not too cross.

I took Sticky out of her hive over a week so the hive was due an inspection for queen cells. Out of the frames in two brood boxes I made up three nucs. Perversely the best queen cells were on the frame of drone brood that was due for removal for mite control. I uncapped some of of it and there were one or two mites in what I uncapped. Anyway I put most of it back so I will breed quite a few more drones and some more mites. I will put a frame of drone brood in again when there is another laying queen in the brood box.

I made up two nuc boxes as well. Sticky's bees are nice gentle bees to work with so I hope I do get three new queens from her two brood boxes.

Tina's bees decided to put nearly all of their queen eggs on the one frame so I only made up one extra nuc with her bees.

Judging by the number of bees taking in pollen the hive on bricks and to one of the two nuc boxes I made with queen cells have two new laying queens. One nuc box was empty of bees and on inspection I could see that the queen cell had not hatched out. It was a very small nuc box and maybe too small for the early part of the year.

I must keep checking that the hives don't need supers putting on as a result of this run of fine weather we are having. I did put a super on Norman's bees in the allotment at the end of the day.

2nd swarm collected, stinging bees

I uncapped and washed the grubs out of the two frames of drone brood that I removed from the hives yesterday. I didn't see a lot of mites but there were some.

Yesterday after I had finished working on the hive with queen cells in, the swarm hive near the path and the hive next to the hive with the queen cells the bees were not happy and stung Lucy.

This morning they were still not happy and stung Ceril, Roy and Bernie and so this evening the two without queen cells had to be moved and are now in Postwick. The boxes with the queens in are still there and I will move those soon.

I moved them after I picked up my second swarm of the year and my second swarm from the same garden. It is the garden that Stripes mother came from two years ago. Apparently the bees do have patterns and can often swarm in the same place - although no one seems to know how or why so my expert Paul tells me.

These were in a holly bush and after cutting a couple of branches out with the loppers were easy enough to shake down into a cardboard box. They are yellow bees and have swarmed much earlier in the year than the others two years ago. They were on a Willow tree that gets heavily pruned each year and so far this year has only grown few inches.

I have taken them to Old Costessy where I had left a hive set up should a wandering swarm want to move into one. It's next to the hive on bricks. I will leave them to settle down for a few days before inspecting to see if they have a laying queen.

It was interesting to see that the bees in the hive on bricks and the bees in Sticky's hive were obviously quite aware of my activity when introducing the swarm to the brood box whereas the bees in the south facing hive could not be bothered to even come to the entrance to look. I guess that's the difference between having a laying queen and not having a laying queen.

Queen cells, drone brood, swarms

The week is up for checking the first hive that I removed the queen from a week ago - the hive next to the WBC. Out of that hive I made up two nuc boxes and left a queen cell in the brood box too. I took out a frame of capped drone brood that on inspection with an uncapping fork didn't seem to be full of mites.

I put supers on both of Bills hives and marked the queen in the hive at the end that is next to Norman's hive.

I took the queen out of the hive next the first hive I opened -- the bees didn't like that - and took out a frame of drone brood. Found the queen and put her in a new box but as yet haven't marked as she dropped to the hive floor.

I took the queen out of the swarm hive next to the path near the small apple tree. I was about to take that nuc box of bees to Thorpe when the call came through that there was a swarm to pick up. The swarm had just moved into a compost bin that was covered with a sheet. The sheet was easy to pick up and shake into a box. Bowthorpe Compost bees - the first swarm I have picked up this year. I will leave them for a few days before checking for eggs to see if they have a laying queen.

In the end I didn't take last year's swarm queen to Thorpe.

I am due to open Sticky's hive tomorrow and see how many queen cells are there - but must go to Postwick first and pick up the queenless bees there who would I think welcome a queen cell to look after.

Tina, 83 Bluebell Allotments. Norman's Old Costessy No1

I moved Tina to a new home in John's garden. She now lives in an old WBC hive.

I took the queen out of the hive at the far end of the allotment site (She was one of Tina's daughters) and put her in a new brood box ready to leave in the morning.

I checked the bees from the Thorpe in the hive in the top corner that I left with two queen excluders on (because I couldn't find the queen) on my last visit. There were only eggs in the brood box but I still couldn't find the queen. It's strong hive that's making honey. The bees were easy enough to handle without gloves and they didn't sting.

I checked the hive with the two new brood boxes under the greengage tree. They were drawing out the frames well but were also beginning to ignore the bottom box where the frame of drone brood is.

I have been thinking of the queen cell that I left in Norman's (No1) hive in Old Costesy. I was thinking that I should put it in a nuc box and let that hive produce their own queens. Too late the cell was empty. There was a frame with several queen cells in the making so I made a nuc up with those instead. I may graft a cell onto another frame in a day or so.

Suffolk, Norman's Old Costessy (No. 3 hive)

My last visit to Suffolk was a month ago and my visit and inspection today has told me a little more. It seems that I may have a drone laying queen or the queen that was there today is a new queen that hasn't come fully into lay yet.

The larger colony did have a queen in the hive and it wasn't my old marked queen. So she is either a new queen raised from the few eggs I put in the hive on my last visit a month ago or she replaced my old marked queen last year. As I don't know which of those two she is I have taken her out of the hive with another frame of bees and a frame of stores and set her up in another box. If she can lay eggs then she will have by the time I visit next. If there are still only drone cells on my next visit then I will know that she is not going to make it. As there weren't patches of worker brood I fear the worst but I want to be sure.

Having taken the queen out of the hive I open the other hive that had a small colony with a laying queen on my last visit. It still had a small colony with a laying queen - or eggs at least- as I didn't see the queen. I took out one frame that the queen had just started to lay on where there was a small patch of eggs surrounded by fresh pollen which in turn was surrounded by old stores of honey. The recent warm weather had induced the queen to lay a few eggs. It seemed mean to steal them but I needed a few eggs to go in what was now a queenless hive.

I took a nuc box out to Old Costessy As I wanted to check Norman's number three hive and if there were two frames with queen cells on remove one into a nuc box. There was a frame with a queen cell and a frame with an uncompleted queen cell. I took out the frame with the queen cell plus a couple more frames and put them in a small nuc box. The bees in the original brood box can now finish making the last queen cell. I can now forget about opening that box until the 20th May.

I checked the little heap of dead bees again and in the ful light of day did find a marked red queen amounst them. I'm not sure how she got out of the hive. Did I remove a crown board with her on it?

Postwick yesterday, goodbye Sticky - best of luck!

Yesterday I went through all the hives at Postwick and gave them all Thymol. None of the hives there are building up like the hives elsewhere. It may be the more exposed position and weeks of Northery cool breezes that are affecting things there - but I can't be sure.

Sticky has left Old Costessy and gone to live in Bury St Edmunds today.

Two queens - the one from the allotment next to the WBC and Norman's Old Costessy number one went to Cambridge yesterday.

Thorpe, Permaculture, Old Costessy

I started by looking in the middle hive in Thorpe - just the briefest of looks to see if there were still bees there. There were but there is no point disturbing them further, they will either multiply and survive or dwindle and die out.

Next I checked out the old Thorpe queen. Not so good. She was there and laying eggs but the colony is not strong. I sorted out the brood boxes by reducing two to one and I gave it a liberal sprinkling of Thymol crystals on the lugs before putting back the queen excluder and super.

After seeing that old queen struggling I thought I should check out some of the others. The old UEA swarm 2007 queen on the students permaculture allotment was doing extremely well and had completed drawing out and finished laying in the drone brood I put in last week. I put another super on.

I checked her double brood box daughter and found and marked the queen they had also drawn out and completed laying in the drone brood.

Next I open Tina's hive and took out 'Tina' and marked her yellow again as her mark had worn off. I took her as a nuc to Old Costessy leaving two brood boxes and a super on the hive. That hive also has a frame of drone brood in it.

In Old Costessy the bees were busy at the entrance to hive on bricks and the two nuc boxes above it. I imagine there are virgin queens in all of them now. If the weather forecast is correct they could well get a chance to mate next Monday/Tuesday.

I took out and marked the queen in Norman's number one Old cosstessy hive making up a large nuc in a new brood box. (now in the allotment)

I checked that 'Sticky' was still in her new brood box. She is easy to see now with her new yellow marking and was in place.

I wanted to put a frame of drone brood in Norman's number two Old Costessy hive. In front of the hive was a crown board and when I lifted it a small cluster of dead bees. Inside the hive were queen cells. I checked the cluster to see if there was a dead queen but couldn't see one. I took one of the frames with two queen cells out of the hive brushed off the bees and reduced the queen cells to one then I put it into the hive I had just removed the queen from. I will need to go back with another nuc box to separate the other queen cells soon as I imagine I lost the queen the day they were moved - last friday - a week ago.

I put a frame of drone brood in Norman's number 3 Old Costessy hive

Picked up two new hives from Bill who advised leaving his mesh accross the entrance until tomorrow so that they don't leave the hive and I don't loose another queen - (I was explaining the scene I found at Old Costessy and he said if they leave in the evening they can get chilled and not get back OK)

Lost queen at Costessy, Sticky and allotment queen breeding begins

I was called to my first swarm of the year and helped the beekeeper collect them. The bee briefs have arrived.

I took the first queens out of my hives today.

One was from one of my very best hives of my nicest bees on the allotment.

I had left the hive last year with two brood boxes and fed it up throughout the summer and autumn enough to put on a super above the queen excluder on top of the two brood boxes. I fed them from Christmas onwards with bakers fondant although they didn't need it. A few weeks back I found and marked the queen and put her in the bottom brood box. Nearly two weeks ago I put in a frame of drone foundation. The drone foundation today was drawn out with eggs and brood in it but none capped. Today I took the queen from the bottom brood box and the frame she was on plus one other frame of brood. From the top brood box I took two frames of solid stores. I put those into a brand new brood box on a new open mesh floor. I put a sprinkling of Thymol crystals along the lugs of the four frames with brood and stores in and a new crown board on top. Once strapped down his box is ready to leave my apiary now and will probably be picked up at the weekend.

The original brood box still has the frame of drone foundation and the remainder of the brood in the bottom brood box. It still has the queen excluder on and the super on above that. The top brood box I left until dark then removed and other filled up frames of stores to my bee proof store. Next Wednesday I will open up that brood box again and take out the frame of drone foundation and I expect to find queen cells on several of the frames I've left behind.

My last visit to Old Costessy (apart from when moving hives there) was on the 5th ten days ago. When I mentioned I had lost the queen in the hive on bricks I didn't think I had actually lost her out side the hive. But that is what must have happened as that hive had queen cell in today .

Not only did it have queen cells in the super frames at the top but at least two open queen cells in the brood box below. I put two separate super frames in two nuc boxes with the queen cells and three or four frames of stores. What a mess and the loss of good queen.

I moved Sticky out of her double brood box and marked her yellow -- this time I will check that she is there in a few days time.

Norman's bees - number 4

I have bought another hive of bees from Norman. This double brood box hive is number 4 and I've sited it at 83 Bluebell North allotments. Norman no longer wants to sell hive 5 which he is keeping. It's his only hive left now.

Norman's (No 3) hive to Costessy

I moved another hive to Old Costessy from Norman's back garden. I was able to mark the queen this afternoon and make sure she was in the brood box. The hive was on a brood and a half. It's now on a single brood with two supers.

I have two hives at Postwick on open mesh floors one the swarm I picked up last year which is still a small colony and one the double brood box next to the swarm. I gave them both a dusting of icing sugar today.

More drone brood - Allotment hives

It's a week since the bee inspector went through all of the hives in the allotment and suggested using drone brood for mite removal.

I did put some frames of drone brood in the following day but I really didn't like opening up the hives two days running and left the remaining hives to do today.

The bees in the south facing double brood box hive on the student's permaculture society allotment were not too happy about being confined to the bottom brood box and had started making just one nice big queen cell slap bang in the middle of a frame. I had to destroy it to see if there was an egg laid in it but there wasn't. Generally there were eggs being laid and quite a few drones around. Maybe they don't like the queen anymore. The hives that I have put drone brood into don't need an inspection again for two weeks - but I will give that hive an inspection in one week just to see what the bees are doing then.

The other hive I spent some time on was the Thorpe allotment hive where the bees came from Thorpe (Norman's bees) but mated in the allotments. It's on a brood and a half and I want to mark the queen. I couldn't find her and put on an extra queen excluder on above the brood box and an extra super on the top. Hopefully on my next visit I will find her in the brood box or in the super that is now sandwiched between two queen excluders. They were doing well.

Another hive

I bought another hive from Norman today and took it to Old Costessy

Old Costessy - Sticky. UEA - Stripes

After the bee inspectors visit I have made up thirty frames of DN4 drone brood. I put 4 in some of the hives on the allotment yesterday. But the bees did not appreciate being opened two days in a row so I have left the remainder of the hives so that the bees can settle down again.

It was a perfect beekeeping spring day and the four original hives at Old Costessy haven't been opened for the last seven days. On my last visit I was concerned about Varroa mites and gave each hive a second tray of Apiguard. The trays were half used but as they get in the way I scraped out the now dry contents from the tray (leaving that in the hives) and removed the trays.

I found the South facing queen and marked her. I made sure she was in the bottom brood box and put a frame of drone foundation in. That hive has two brood boxes and one super on.

I found the queen in the hive on bricks in the super (that hive overwintered on a brood and a half) after I had been through the brood box and back again. I marked her but lost her before getting her down into the brood box. I put a frame of drone foundation in that hive too.

I saw sticky and should have marked her even though my marker was red as she too disappeared in the top brood box whilst I procrastinated. I didn't see her all last year. I put a frame of drone brood in the bottom box. If I can't find her next week I will have to put an extra queen excluder between the two brood boxes as I will want to know which box she is in the week after. In two weeks time I plan to move her to replace the colony that was lost over the winter in George's garden hive.

The queen in the fourth hive was laying in the bottom brood as I had marked her and put her there under a queen excluder last week. I put a frame of drone foundation in that brood box.

I put a frame of drone foundation into Stripes brood box and one into stripes mother's bottom brood box. That hive was missing a queen excluder on my last visit so I have put one on. That hive now has two brood boxes, a queen excluder, and one super.

Both hive were making honey.

I won't now need to inspect any of these hives for two weeks - except maybe to make sure the queen is still there and laying in the hive on bricks.

If the weather stays pariculary fine I may put more supers on.

Varroa mites and how to catch them