Old Costessy Apiary

It rained this pm but it is not yet cold.

The last time I visited the four hives at Costessy I topped the feeders on each hive.

On checking the feeders today I found that they were still half full although all had plenty of bees feeding from them.

Without doing a full check it did look as though three of the four hives have most of the brood frames full of stores and it was only the last hive to re-queen that will still need more food after this bucket if the bees are to fill it's two brood boxes full with stores.

Maybe I shouldn't have put a super on that hive but I had taken four supers with me and I put them all on. I like to have one super on all of my hives when they go into the winter. Even if the super isn't used this autumn the bees will clean it and keep it ready to use when they need it next spring.

Each hive had a restricted entrance with an entrance block in and after today they now all have the entrance covered with a mouseguard.

Friday, October 3 2008 topped up feeders
Monday, September 15, 2008 gave the bees more food
Thursday, August 28, 2008 Started feeding unighted two hives

Allotment bees

The weather is still warmer than one would expect for this time of year and the bees are still very active.

Most, but not quite all, of the allotment bees have finished the food I gave them (on the 8th) and I have removed the empty buckets. I will give the swarm hives another inspection maybe tomorrow as I want to be sure that the brood is on frames in the center of the box and not positioned off to one side of the brood box. The hive on Furgle's plot also had an empty bucket on.

George has reported back that his new bees are flying fine.

Suffolk bees

The sunshine continues.

I paid a visit to the bees in Suffolk and fed three of the four hives there and brought the fourth hive back to Norwich and set it up in George's back garden.

Another beautiful, warm, sunny, autumn day. I have left the bees to get on with making honey today.

Tina's hive

I have finally taken all of the honey off Tina's hive and stashed the super frames away ready for next year's swarms and nucs. I left it until this afternoon to move them giving the bees a chance to take some honey back into the hive.

There are now bees in my allotment that are not at all happy to have humans near them. I think the swarm bees that I moved around the other day are not happy at being messed around.

I have made two new roofs today.

Thorpe, Postwick, Bluebell Road, Tina's hive

Another bright sunny day.

I made a quick visit to the bees in Thorpe and took two buckets off the hives. The hive with the old queen didn't have a feeder bucket on.

The middle hive had an empty bucket and I think needs another full bucket of feed before the winter closes in. The hive at the end had a bucket 3/4 full that I took of.

Next I paid a visit to Postwick filled three buckets and put them on the first two brood boxes that are up on the cattle feeder and the third hive in on the row of four.

The bees were busy in all of the hives bringing in bright yellow pollen. From the ivy still I guess.

I then paid a visit to the bees at the UEA Bluebell Road site.

I moved one of the two hives at the Bluebell Road site so that it is now off the floor. The feeder bucket that I put on less than a week ago was empty. I did a quick check to see that eggs were still being laid. This is a double brood box with a super as well and has plenty of stores in it to see it through the winter. I put some thymol crystals in.

The other hive there needs blocks and a new roof. Again the feeder bucket was empty. There were eggs and I gave it thymol. That hive is a brood and a half.

I used the two empty buckets from Bluebell Road and put one on the hive with the old queen on student allotment plot. That has two brood boxes on but the top box is empty. Put in some Thymol crystals.

I opened up the hive on Tina's plot and took off the two supers. The queen is laying in both of the two brood boxes. There were still two new brood frames in the top box that weren't drawn out yet. I put the second feeder bucket from Bluebell Road on. I removed the frames from one of the supers and after brushing the bees off in the dark stored them away in my trunk. The other I will have to deal with in the morning. Put some Thymol crystals in.

My allotment apiary

A warm, sunny, perfect autumn day.

Yesterday I put full feeder buckets on all of the hives at my allotment. And one on the on hive on Furgle's allotment but I didn't have time to open up any of the hives.

The hive on Tina's plot is my only hive that hasn't had any sugar at all so far this year but then it has had all of the wet supers to clean up. However, I will open it up soon and check it for stores.

On my plot there were two hives that needed a little sorting out.

The daughter of the queen that swarmed under the hive in Thorpe that re-queened at the allotment is now finally in a brood box on a hive floor. They have a fair amount of stores but may still need one more bucket once this one is finished.

One of the swarms that I picked this year was housed in haste and made honey comb under the brood frames because they were housed on double supers. That hive has finally been sorted out and that queen is now in a regular brood box on a newly positioned base and under a queen excluder.

http://patricklaslett.blogspot.com/2008/09/allotment-hives-given-thymol.html
http://patricklaslett.blogspot.com/2008/08/day-has-started-with-bright-sunshine.html