Jon

19c today and I must have seen about 20 queen wasps out and about.
There were 6 around a little piece of fondant I had dropped beside a hive.
I saw several trying to get in a hive and and one was killed by half a dozen guard bees who dragged it off the landing board.

I marked two more queens (bees not wasps) and re-marked another whose spot had almost worn off. (couldn't count in last blog entry)
One thing I noticed is that most colonies have good pollen stores.
They typical colony has about 3 frames of brood with a side of pollen at the front and another at the back as well.
I am pretty sure there was nectar coming in to day as well and I saw quite a few dandelions have just opened.
I checked some of my 2009 colony records and I reckon the colony size is 3-4 weeks behind where it was last year.
There is still no drone brood at all apart from an isolated cell or two.
I have a couple of very small nucs which are really just a frame of bees but I feel more confident that they will pull through with this good weather we are having.
I checked the bees which I put in an Apidea on 17th March and there was a small area of sealed brood with a few bees hatching. This was a big colony last September so not quite sure what has happened other than guessing nosema. At least the queen is still capable of laying but who knows what she might be like heading a full colony.

Yesterday I set up two brood boxes full of frames to fumigate with acetic acid.
I have extra frames as I have been transferring small colonies into nucs or even the Apidea mentioned above.
I placed the two brood boxes one above the other on a solid floor inside a large binliner.
I then put an eke above the top super and inside this I set a flora tub with about 100ml of acetic acid.
This evaporates and kills spores, especially nosema spores.
The fumes are heavier than air so the acid is placed above the equipment to be cleaned.
I put a crown board and roof on top and sealed the whole thing up.
It has to be left for a week.
This gets rid of almost all disease spores apart from AFB.