Category: Beekeeping

The bees they are a swarming! 1

The bees they are a swarming!

Clettwr, the hive that I performed an artificial swarm on last week in an attempt to prevent them from swarming has – you’ve guessed it – swarmed today. So much for the artificial swarm, I obviously didn’t do it right. Our neighbours phoned me just after 10am to say the bees were out and about...

Queen Cells 6

Swarming Bees – Followed by a catch

Well, our inexperience with beekeeping has been shown once again. I was hoping for a nice easy inspection today. We inspected last week and reported that all was well in Clettwr but the bees in Leri had swarmed. Today I had hoped to have a quick check in Clettwr to make sure there were no...

Mating Flights 0

Mating Flights

No, I’m not talking about the ‘mile-high club’, I’m refer to the mating flight of queen bees. Today looks set to be a nice day weather-wise and I’m fairly certain that if all is going well our virgin queen bee should have emerged on Saturday and should therefore be ready to take her first mating...

Well Bee-hived Bees 0

Well Bee-hived Bees

That was nice, a hive inspection without any surprises. I’ve just been out to inspect both hives and the bees were particularly well behaved. Anna was at work and Morgan at school but we needed to check on the hives so I did it on my own today. Maybe having just one person inspect them...

Opening the Hive 2

Our Bees Have Swarmed – We Think

After some pretty poor weather for the bees last week, Friday was a scorcher – 25ºC and wall to wall sunshine and it was our normal day to do a hive inspection, exactly 7 days after the last one. We were hoping the bees would be out and about all day in the sunshine and...

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Good weather for the bees

After the late spring onslaught it looks as though the weather may have settled down for a day or two. Summer officially started on June 1st and as I write this at 7:40am on June 2nd, it is already 15.2ºC out there, the sun is shining and there isn’t a puff of wind. Usually the latter fact...

Slo-Mo Bees 0

Slo-Mo Bees

In a little break in the weather this morning our bees were busy out collecting pollen and nectar whilst they could. I thought I;d play with my GoPro HD camera and see if I could get some footage of them coming and going, so here’s a very short clip of them doing their thing. I...

Honey Bee Eggs 0

Photos of Honey Bee Eggs

Thought we’d take some photos of honey bee eggs during our hive inspection at the weekend. Lots of people seem to have problem spotting them when doing an inspection, so this is what they look like. The are the tiny ‘grain of rice’ like structures at the bottom of the cells.

A frame of sealed brood 0

Hive Inspection Number 3

Things weren’t looking ideal for a hive inspection this weekend, strong winds, rain and a busy schedule were going to make things difficult. Saturday morning dawned warm(ish), fairly windy but with a gap in the rain so we quickly suited up and had a very quick inspection of both Clettwr and Leri. We were lucky...

Leri (left) and Clettwr (right) 0

Happy Buzzy Bees

It seems as though ‘Alice’ and here colony are settling in well to their new home. Yes, we’ve not only named the hives – Clettwr and Leri, but the queens of each colony have names too. Ffion for the queen in Leri and Alice for the queen in Clettwr. Alice’s colony is a little behind...