Old Costessy hives, UEA Stripes

Old Costessy hives.

I opened all four hives today. Marked the (young) queen in the double brood box. She was in the bottom box so I have put the queen excluder down to the top of that.

I didn't see the other two 2008 queens that I would like to mark. They are in the one hive that faces South and the hive on bricks. Both seem to be laying well and both hives have plenty of stores but there was signs of a Varroa spread virus as there were one or two bees with deformed wings. This is an indication of high mite infestation so it was good to see the Apiguard trays (that I put in the hives on my last visit) were empty. I put three more trays in - one in each hive.

I took a quick look into 'Sticky's' hive just enough to see that she was laying. She is beginning to lay in the top brood box so I gave that box a liberal sprinkling of thymol crystals.

I have made other visit to Golden Stripes hive and pulled it to bits and put it back together again. In the process I have given the hive a clean floor and put the brood box to the bottom. The middle brood box is still in the middle but now on top of the brood box with the queen in with the queen excluder between the the two. The third brood box I have taken off altogether.

Stripes mother is a swarm queen (circa 2007) who's bees are not the easiest to handle. The swarm was originally picked up in Hellesdon and taken to Old Costessy before being moved to the UEA site. On a full inspection today I was pleasantly surprised to see that she was laying extremely well and had covered over half the frame in the brood box and started on the super frames (they are on a brood and a half) and only just started laying drone brood.