Frame Change Continues...

Yesterday's inspection was just to see how the bees are getting on with the new frames, and to see whether I could swap out any more old frames.  The picture was pretty much the same in both hives - comb drawn out on two new frames, but only on one side (the side facing the brood).  There were more bees though - not as many as I'd like, but at least the colonies are building up a little.

Importantly, there was a lot more capped brood, so hopefully that will mean a significant increase in workers soon.  Also, I noticed that Florence's bees had started to make "queen cups".  These are the precursor to queen cells - really, the base of the cell into which the queen will lay an egg that will then grow into a new queen.  If I find an egg in a queen cup, it means the colony are thinking about swarming.  Fortunately, both the cups I found were empty.  Neither colony is big enough to be able to swarm just yet, but I'll need to keep an eye on them for the next few weeks.

Florence's hive seems to have more bees than Miriam's, and just appears to be generally "busier".  So, I decide to swap out an old brood frame for a new one.  The problem - this frame has a lot of capped brood on it.  In a normal year, I would burn the frame with the brood - this seems harsh, but it ensures that any brood diseases are killed, and also kills a fair few varroa, too.  Unfortunately, the cold April has prevented the colonies building up as fast as they normally would.  So, I decided to move the old frame, full of brood, into Miriam's hive.  I must stress I wouldn't normally do this - I am generally fastidious about avoiding cross-contamination between the hives.  But at the moment, with the colony sizes as they are, I've decided to accept the risk, and not waste the brood.

As it was a sunny afternoon, there was a nice amount of activity around the hive entrances:

Frame Change - In Progress

I didn't actually include any pictures in my last post, so here's a look inside Miriam's hive from when I (briefly) opened up last Thursday:

You can see that the frame at the top of the picture (which I added on Thursday) and the five at the bottom (added last Sunday) are new.  The other five are a darker colour, mostly from propolis (this is sticky stuff that bees use to fill small gaps, such as the cracks between boxes in the hive).

You can also see that the bees have shown no interest in the new frames, yet.  I hope, now that the weather is warmer, and with plenty of blossom around, that they will soon start to draw out comb on the new frames.

Actual Stuff About My Bees!

So, yesterday's post was probably not particularly exciting if you wanted to hear about what the bees are doing.  But it does provide an insight into one thing I've discovered about beekeeping - quite a lot of it is done without going anywhere near the bees.  In my first year, I had to build the two hives - I actually spent far more time doing carpentry than looking at bees.  Unfortunately, I am a lousy carpenter, and lost could of the number of times I whacked a finger instead of a nail.  It did teach me one useful lesson, however - being stung by a bee is actually less painful than bashing your finger with a hammer.  Useful beekeeping fact...

OK - on with the hives - this was on Sunday, after rain (and rugby) stopped play on Saturday.  I checked Florence's hive first.  They were busy, and there seemed to be plenty of brood, but still on only 4 frames.  At this time of year, I should be doing their annual comb change - which means taking out all the frames of old comb, and replacing them with 11 new frames.  These each come with a flat sheet of wax, imprinted with the familiar hexagonal pattern of honeycomb, which the bees will then build out until it is comb across the whole frame.

Unfortunately, a full comb change means losing all the brood, and I don't think either hive has enough bees to cope with the loss.  So, I'm going to do it incrementally.  With Florence's hive, I locate 4 frames with no brood and the least amount of honey stored in them.  I take these out, and replace them with 4 fresh frames.  Hopefully the bees will spend the next week or so building fresh comb on the new frames, and Florence will then begin laying in them.  Once she's started laying in the new comb, I can safely swap out the rest of the frames.

Florence's bees started getting a bit feisty towards the end, so I closed up her hive and opened Miriam's.  There are only 4 frames of brood in Miriam's hive, but the colony seems a bit larger.  I think I can get away with swapping 5 frames in her hive, so I take out 5 old broodless frames, and put the new replacements in.  Miriam's colony is more friendly than Florence's - no sign of bad behaviour at all.  It's a nice end to the session as I pop the roof back on.

It's a really warm sunny day, and there is plenty of blossom about - also, the Horse Chestnut trees have started flowering.  There's lots of nectar and pollen to be had, so I hope my bees keep busy and make the most of it!

Plans, and how they change

Delightfully, we had a heatwave this weekend.  Which meant good weather for the two tasks I had set myself this Saturday:

1. Do some groundwork at the apiary, to make it a bit safer, and also put down a new slab for my stack of spare boxes.
2. Look inside the hives!

First task - the groundwork.  The site is on quite a steep slope, and this can make moving around a bit tricky sometimes - especially if carrying supers (the boxes that contain the honey frames) back and forth.  So, I wanted to dig some "steps" behind the hives, to give myself some level ground to walk on.  Also, I wanted to move the stack of spare boxes, which were located just behind and to the left of Miriam's hive.  The problem was that, being so close to the hives, the bees had a tendency to fly into the spare boxes whenever I had taken the roof off (e.g. if I was grabbing a super to put onto one of the hives).  Playing "hunt the bee" could get tedious, and I didn't want to leave the poor thing trapped inside after I put the roof back on.

So, I picked a sheltered spot over on the right-hand-side of the apiary, away from the hives, which needed some additional soil so I could level it off for the slab.  Easy - I can dig out the soil from behind the hives to give myself some level ground, and move the soil I've dug out over to the right, for the slab.  But there's no room for a wheelbarrow, so I'm going to have to do it one spadeful at a time...

Some time later: all the soil moved, a bed of sharp sand for the slab, slab down, check with a spirit level - all good.  Then move the stack of spares to their new location:

Yes, I'm happy with that.  So, I now have a spare slab over on the left, which I can use for something - but not anything that will contain frames of comb.  No problem - I have these things, which I move over to the spare slab:

These are for a project that I have planned later in the year - I will explain more next week!

So, back home for a shower (bees don't like the smell of sweat), and then back to the hives to take a look inside.  Well, that was the plan, but it didn't work out like that - the skies darkened, and heavy raindrops began to fall.  I can't open up the hives while it's raining, so I decide on plan B, and go home to listen to the rugby.  In fairness, the rain stopped before the second half, so I could have gone back to see the bees.  But then Bath started winning!

I can open up the hives tomorrow...

Now with email subscriptions!

I had a chat with Ruth from Ruth's Garden the other day, and she pointed out that I hadn't added email subscriptions to my blog.  So I had a fiddle, and there's now a box over on the right-hand side of the page, where you can enter your email address.  Then, you'll get an email whenever I post some bee news!

2016 Bee Visits for Widcome West Residents

I've now set up the calendar of visits for 2016.  So, if you're a resident of the Widcome West area, why not come along and see the hives for yourself?  You'll get to see inside a beehive, hold a frame of honeycomb, and maybe - if you have sharp eyes - you'll spot the queen!

There are a few things you need to know first - all of which are explained on this Information Sheet.

When you're ready, sign up to one of the sessions by clicking this link:  http://tinyurl.com/BeeVisit

Spring!

I haven't seen inside my beehives since the end of September.  Half a year has passed while my bees have gone about their business, uninterrupted by me, waiting out the winter.  And April has been colder than usual this year, so I've had to wait a while for it to be warm enough to open the hives (15°C is the minimum temperature).  Finally, on Wednesday, we had a warm sunny day.  Time to take a look inside!

I started with Florence's hive - she was a late-emerging queen, after the hive had lost their previous new queen in a swarm.  The colony had been without a laying queen for two months, and the number of bees had fallen significantly.  They'd recovered numbers slightly after Florence started laying, but the colony was still small at the end of Autumn.  Small colonies can struggle to get through Winter, so I wanted to see if they'd made it through.

The colony is still small - there are bees on only three frames, and they have clustered on the right-hand side of the hive (the end that gets the evening sun - the hives are in shade at midday, so the western-facing side is the warmest).  There is still plenty of honey on the frames - this is good news, because colonies can starve if they run out of winter stores and then the spring is too cold for foraging.

When I get to the cluster, I see some good news - freshly-laid eggs, as well as older brood that are almost ready to emerge:

Honey, nectar, pollen, brood, and bees!

There's plenty of positive signs on this frame:  honey stores are good, and there is also freshly-collected pollen.  The bees need both the honey (carbohydrates) and pollen (protein) to feed the new grubs.  I can also see freshly-gathered nectar, so I know that they have been foraging well on the spring blossom.  I didn't see Florence, as this was quite a quick inspection, but there are recently-laid eggs so I know she is in there somewhere.

And, because it's a sunny day, there are foragers regularly flying in and out of the hive:

A few bees coming and going

I put the roof back on, and open up Miriam's hive.  Her colony was much larger in the Autumn, so I am surprised to see bees on only four frames.  Have they had a disaster, and lost their queen?

Good news!  I spot Miriam scurrying around one of the frames, and I can see some eggs that she laid today.  Perhaps the cold April weather has made things difficult for them?  Not to worry - they have plenty of honey and pollen, and the warmer weather will be here soon.  I'll check again in a fortnight - I expect both hives will be busier then.