The bees fight back

Posted by Beekeeper on Nov 1, 2010 in Asian Hornets, Bee behaviour, Hive problems, Hornets | 1 comment

Asian hornets are still preying on our bees, settling on the landing board and waiting for one to leave or picking off the guard bees who come out to defend the hive – the hornets tap along the landing board to encourage the bees to stick their heads out of the hive, no doubt frustrated that the hornet guards are keeping them out. Many of the bees are too slow to escape as the cooler weather has settled in and as it’s late in the season, the Asian hornets are the new queens getting ready to overwinter – huge beasts, several times the size of the bees.

Honeybee eggs

Posted by Jon on Jul 10, 2010 in Bee behaviour, Beekeeping | 0 comments

During a hive inspection, one of the things beekeepers check for is the presence of healthy eggs as this shows that the queen is in residence and is doing her job, and the next generation of honeybees are on their way. The eggs should be laid in the centre at the bottom in adjoining cells – gaps or random laying may indicate that the queen is getting old or there are some issues in the colony.

A couple of days ago (when it was cooler!) I inspected one of the colonies I had cut out here.

Keeping hives cool

Posted by Jon on Jun 30, 2010 in Beekeeping, Hive management, Hive problems | 1 comment

We’ve hit a patch of warm weather with the thermometer hitting 35°C so we’re thinking about how to help our bees keep cool – the less energy they spend keeping cool, the more honey they can make! Bee colonies have lots of strategies to keep the temperature in the hive regulated – these range from sending bees out of the hive foraging, workers fanning the comb with their wings and dispersing water droplets through the hive, and an increase in water foraging.

Painting beehives

Posted by Jon on Jun 15, 2010 in Beekeeping, Equipment | 2 comments

As our number of beehives has increased, so has their impact on our garden where they sit. Originally I had painted them all with special silver bee paint (thermo-porous & insulating) bought at great expense at our nearest bee supplies shop, but as more appeared in the garden they started to stand out, looking out of place in their somewhat wild surroundings. Searching for photos when starting up this site reminded me just how great a line of multi-coloured hives could look and I started thinking about changing ours.