Recent Blogs Posts

I have a big colony at the bottom of the garden which was on double brood and 4 supers at one point over the summer. The top brood box was almost completely full of capped honey with just a couple of small patches of brood at the bottom of 3 of the centre frames. I extracted the supers a couple of weeks ago and decided to remove the top brood box with the honey before starting Apiguard treatment. On the spur of the moment I decided to make up a nuc with the 3 frames which had a little brood. I added ...

I thought I'd move it here, but without further ado.

1. The best laid plans...
   It's well and good making lots of grand plans in advance but sometimes you just have to go with the flow.
   This year I was going to expand up to 6 hives, have more honey than I knew what to do with and maybe experiment with queen rearing so I ordered loads of kit well in advance. 3 new complete hives, 10 more supers, frames and all the other bits and bobs I thought I'd need.
   
   

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Tonight I had a dander to see the bees. Three colonies are left in the apiary while their more populous cousins are up in a favoured spot in the mountains. Two of the stay-at-homes are focusing on Himalayan balsam and one wasn't. The one that wasn't had four bees all doing the same dance on one frame. OK, let's have a look. Six seconds. Six?! On the Sussex scale posted earlier by Nellie that means a little over 7 km. Which way? Over the hills? With the benefit of Google Maps I can see ...

Very newby. Have smith hive and have been reading every book and forum I can but the more I read the more confused I get. Bees are still busy with balsam and willow weed and now wonder if I should start with the apiguard as early August is frequently advised for treatment and when should I remove the supers. Advice would be appreciated

Today I made my first ever sale of honey. An historic first not just because it is our first sale, nor because it is almost certainly the first honey to be sold from this garden in its long 350+ year history, but it is quite possibly the first jar of honey ever produced and sold in this group of islands. Although at this stage I'm growing bees rather than producing honey, I had reason to remove a ’super’ I’d put on to allow the bees to keep their own winter supplies. I’ve no proper extracting equipment ...