UEA Bluebell Apiary vandalised

UEA Bluebell Apiary vandalised. I can't visit every hive every day even in the summer let alone the winter. I have however, been dropping into the UEA apiary on a fairly regular basis just to check that the hives were still upright.

Today one wasn't.

The top brood box was on the ground on it's side. I was able to pick it up and place it back in position on top of the bottom box but I was getting stung so much that I had to retire and go back for my beekeeping suit in order to get the frames back into position. Even so there is still one sticking up proud. I will have to visit the hive again in a day or two with a smoker and sort it out properly.

These bees do not like being messed around with on the best of days and in the best of conditions - today's circumstances were neither.

The good note I can draw from it was that I could see (as you can in the photo) that there were plenty of bees in the hive.

The second hive was left alone. Hopefully the young vandals were also getting stung for their trouble and had decided to retreat from the scene of the crime.

http://patricklaslett.blogspot.com/2008/10/another-bright-sunny-day.html

Fondant

I put fondant on most of the hives that didn't get any before Christmas including those in Old Costessy.

The allotment bees

The allotment bees were all flying again today and have stopped throwing out their dead. I put some more feed on the hive in the top corner. That colony came from Thorpe.

Postwick, Thorpe, UEA and allotment apiaries

My Postwick apiary has not had a visit for some weeks now and as the bees were flying in allotment today I though I would visit both Thorpe and Poswick to see if the bees were flying OK.

Of the three hives at Thorpe the middle hive had far the highest number of flying bees and on inspection I saw that the entrance wasn't restricted or protected from mice . I quickly made an entrance block for it. The left hand hive with the old queen didn't have flying bees until it was distured - then it had plenty.

Out of the ten hives at Postwick one had only dead bees in it. I think it was failing the last time I put a bucket of feed on it as that feed bucket was still completely full today. I think the hive had a failing queen even then. It wasn't on an open mesh base.

The hive nearby with the old queen was flying well. That hive had two brood boxes and a super so I took off the super that was completely empty and smelling a little musty and put the full bucket of feed on instead.

I put the crown board from the failed hive on the hive that had the damaged crown board, even though the brood box I find is smaller and the correct size for a for a WBC hive.

I made a quick check of the UEA orchard hives and both had flying bees.

Allotment bees

The allotment bees were flying today. After several cold weeks the weather has suddenly warmed up and the bees took the opportunity to fly. Every hive on the allotment sites had lives bees in them.

I checked

Tina's hive
Furgle's hive
The UEA Permaculture Student's three hives
and nine hives on my plot

They were all showing sign of life and in the case of some of the hives on my plot death as well.

The bees were carrying dead bees out of the entrance. I removed the mouse guards from two hives (that really have small enough entrances anyway) and watched as dead bee after dead bee was carried out to join many more on the ground in front of the hives.

Neither of those hives have open mesh floors and judging by the effort it takes for a live bee to drag a dead bee out of the hive they both have too large an area for landing on I will have to cut them down next year.

The UEA Students Permaculture Society allotment

The UEA Students Permaculture Society allotment has three hives in the corner of the plot. The original hive there at the start of 2008 had a 2007 swarm in it and that swarm queen is still there in a 'kind of' WBC hive. The other two hives have 2008 daughters of the swarm queen. The feeder buckets were empty on two of the hives - the one with the old queen in and the colony in the new single brood box. The other colony is on a double brood system and still has some sugar in it. I removed the two empty buckets and covered the feeder holes with glass. There were live bees at the entrance of the double brood box hive.

http://patricklaslett.blogspot.com/2008/11/student-allotment-apiary-tinas-hive.html

There were empty buckets to remove on Tina's hive (live bees) and Furgles hive.

Feral bees

The feral bees from the car park had finished their bucket of feed. It's late in the year but I filled it and replaced it. Moving it down closer to the bees certainly seems to have made the difference.

http://patricklaslett.blogspot.com/2008/10/ferral.html

Being able to get close to the bees in order to feed them in the middle of winter is one good argument for taking them through the winter on a single brood box only.