Apiary Visits

David and Wilma visited the association apiary to check on the Amm bees Here is Davids summary:-

Wilma and I did our impression of melting tomatoes at Barns!

The first apidea, number 3, has black queen and she is ok, building up nicely.

We transferred the mini hive into a nuc with a green marked queen. She is a black queen.

The other apidea, D, has a green marked queen who came from nuc 3. It has has eggs and is ok.

The hive at the shed, number 5, has brood in all stages, Wilma spotted the queen and we marked her green. They are building up and will soon be good to sell or overwinter.

Wilma and Linda led the apiary inspection on 28th June.

Here is Wilma’s report with thanks to Janet for keeping notes.

Hive 2:  queen seen and put into bottom brood box. Charged q cell, frame removed and put into queenless hive 3. Brood frames from top brood box put into bottom brood box so hive is now on single brood with one super. 

Hive 3:  no brood of any description, queenless. So put in the frame   from hive 2 with charged q cell. 5 frames in from right hand side. 

Hive 4:  Yellow marked queen seen. 7 frames brood 11th brood frame added. 

Nuc 1 queen not seen, bees calm, larvae seen. 

Nuc 2:  red queen seen. Brood in all stages.

Nuc 3:  queen found and marked starting to lay. 

Next visit check nucs for space. 

David was at the apiary on the 18th to follow up on the queen rearing. He was joined by Ranald and Peter. Here is Davids report:-

During our visit today to place queen cells in apideas, which we managed and are now with Linda who will be taking them to Kate’s, we did the following;

Hive 1 – shaken out and hive parts stacked beside the sheds. 

Nuc 1 – united with hive 2 over paper, so will need sorted into one brood box at the next visit.

Keys are now in the feeder of the poly nuc closest to the sheds.

Thanks to Wilma and David for covering for Peter.

This is the report from Wilma:-

Hive 1 (cell raiser) :  Cell raiser failed, multiple eggs seen in cells. Laying worker.
Next steps : shake bees out and leave them to drift into surrounding hives. 
Hive 2 (cell raiser) : five sealed queen cells
Next steps : Q cells and bees into apideas, weather permitting David and Linda will do this on Tuesday. 
Hive 3 : Q cell hatched/ slightly chewed. Bees quite. 
Next steps : check over the next few weeks for signs of mated queen. 
Hive 4 : Q cell hatched, queen seen and marked green. Q excluder on. 
Next steps :  usual inspection re brood stores etc. 

Nuc 1 next to “hive 4” queen seen and yellow marking touched up. Building up nicely, could soon be ready to sell? 
Nuc 2 this is the Queen from hive 2 which was used as a cell raiser.  Queen seen brood larvae etc. Light on stores so given fondant.
Next steps : check its building up and check stores/ feeding. 
Nuc 3 : Entrance had blown shut, not sure for how long. Bees move to new nuc to clear some dead bees from floor.  Didn’t see queen. Gave it the last of the fondant. 
Next steps : look for Queen, check for eggs and check stores/ feeding. 
All hives/ nucs have now got numbers on them. Hive 2 will need a queen or need united with an established nuc over the next few weeks.