Barns on 14^th May and next visit 21^st May

Guest: Norman Jarvis, Border Beekeepers: has been keeping bees since 1996; was hoping to find a spare queen cell to take away but none found! He would be delighted to return in a fortnight!

The hives are now all numbered, apart from the nuc that was created on 7^th: a small QC was spotted in that, will need to be checked by 28^th or 4^th June to see that the queen is mated and laying.

All hives except 6 and 7 were checked.

1: Super added; and super with brood now underneath the brood box. Once brood has hatched, put this under 3’s brood box (see below)

2: No queen cells, queen seen, (re)marked & clipped. Brood box added ABOVE so bees can start drawing out foundation – this to be removed once some frames have been drawn out so that they can be used for nucs/swarms.

3: shallow frames in brood box  with unstable comb beneath, suggest removing the super from underneath Hive 1 as soon as it’s empty of brood, and putting this super beneath the brood box, with the 2 shallow frames (removing unstable comb first) until the brood in the shallow frames has hatched. This colony is producing very irregular comb, clean up, add fresh frames and enough dummy boards (in store cupboard) to close all gaps.

4: had 2 queen cells and few bees – left, inspect on 21^st or 4^th June

5: empty

6: nuc created from this, it should be acting as normal.

7: nuc created by this by removing queen and frames – this needs to be checked  by 28th or 4th June to see that the queen is mated and laying.

The paths and hives area has been neatly strimmed – thank you!

Runners for frames have been left in the store cupboard

AC took away one nuc box – a molehill had come up underneath it, the 3 frames inside were damp and mouldy, the interior was damp and had some soil in it; the exterior has been slightly strimmed on one corner. I’ll get some exterior filler and paint; clean the nuc box and fill it with fresh frames and foundation.

Taken away: Em MacKie took away one nuc box and one empty hive with frames, in preparation for splitting colonies at Kailzie.

Summary of the first of this summer’s regular Sunday meetings
The Association is developing a rota so that every Sunday we can have an experienced beekeeper on site, to check over the colonies and to help this year’s beginners who have been allocated a “foster” hive to look after.

At the Apiary

Three of this year’s beginners – Shirley, Ilknur and Brian – were allocated 2 of the hives to foster: Shirley and Ilknur opened the hives themselves and carried out the inspections with David and Mandy on hand to give encouragement. Excellent first attempts: and as both hives were very full of bees, they were split to form nucs. It’s now a matter of waiting, and counting the days until the new queens are due to hatch, fly, mate and then start laying eggs.

Spot The Queen

The aim is to keep enough colonies for a teaching apiary, and to produce nucs for beginners and active members, reducing the need to bring in bees from outside area (with the accompanying risk of disease).

The other colonies were checked – no queen cells were found, there was sufficient space and stores in each. One had already swarmed (sealed queen cells were found) and one looked as if it needed a little extra TLC.

Inspection

Jobs for the next visit: put hive numbers on the boxes, check the colonies for space, stores and signs of incipient swarming – create nucs from any that look as if they might swarm.

Next visit: (weather permitting) 14th May 2-4pm with Mandy and Janet: if you are coming and need to borrow a beesuit, please let Mandy know.
If we have to cancel at short notice, an email will be sent round at 11am, so please check your emails.

On Sunday 28th May we’re delighted to be welcoming West Linton Beekeeper’s Association, at our Association apiary, Dave Stokes might be persuaded to be one of the demonstrators on the day. We hope that other experienced local beekeepers will come along and be a guest demonstrator for one of the