This is an email I sent out last year. Hope it helps.

Preparing for the Winter - Feeding

It is considered that for overwintering, hives should have at least 30lbs of honey on them, preferably more.  If this is not the case, then you will need to feed your bees.

A full national frame weighs about 5 pounds and a 14 x 12 frame full of honey weighs 7 pounds. If this all gets too confusing then bear in mind that if you can easily lift your brood box up, then the bees do not have enough honey. If the hive weighs a lot and you find it difficult to lift up, then the chances are they will be alright for food.

We still are not at the end of September so you still have time to feed the bees if necessary. A thick syrup is recommended. You can make this up easily by using a 1 kg bag of sugar and a litre of near boiling water (or 2lbs of sugar to one pint) and then multiply up the quantities for the extra weight you want to put onto your hives. The weather is still warm enough for them to be able to convert this sugar into stores.

I have started to see bees with K wings in my hives. This is an indication of acarine mite. However I am not too worried as I treated the bees with Api life Var and so the varroacide will have killed the Acarine as well.

Malcolm Wilkie August 31^st 2017

Notes on some of the beginners group apiary setups

Last Saturday Keith, myself, Lesley, and Steve Davies went to see some of the beginners and their apiary set ups. I asked Steve to write down some comments. These you will find below, together with any further information that I have felt relevant. This will be useful not only for our beginners but also for anyone who is new to beekeeping. Also a reminder to those who are more experienced but have forgotten.

These were Steve's concerns.

1) Apiary locations - although several had taken into account prevailing wind etc, some apiaries could be improved with a little effort.

People forget that winter sun should hit the hive for at least two hours - preferably longer. They site a hive in a cold part of the garden. If it is cold in summer, then it will certainly be cold in winter. A cold damp hive will lead to the bees developing fungal infections.

2) Hive locations - the position of some hives within the apiary need to be reassessed. Some are too close together and others in flower beds making it awkward to work on. As well as providing the best for the bees, the beekeeper needs some TLC as well.

Make sure there is enough space around your hives so that you will be able to place the roof on the ground and then any supers on top of the roof. Make sure there is plenty of space for you to stand behind the colony or to the side of the colony. Make sure there is space to put a second colony.

3) Hive entrances - several hives had the entrances completely open which is harder for  small colonies. I've just had to reduce the entrance on one of my small hives as I discovered a wasp repeatedly going in without being challenged!

We are into wasp season and temperatures have now gone down, so think about reducing the entrances. Small units will find it much more difficult to defend their stores. If you are feeding, you don't really want to be feeding the wasps.

4) Queen excluder - some hives had queen excluders in place with no super above. Perhaps a reminder on when to use them and when to remove?

One of our beginners had the Queen excluder above the frames and no crown board. This is not a good idea particularly as this was an extremely small unit. The bees need the crown board in order to be able to keep the brood warm. A queen excluder should only be added when the bees require a super to put the nectar into. A super should only be added once nearly all the frames in the brood box have been drawn out. Beginners in their enthusiasm to get honey add supers too early.

A lot of our beginners were making this mistake, so I assume a lot of you who are starting out are making this mistake too. If you are now in the scenario where all the frames in your brood box have not been drawn out, and you have a super on top of your brood box, remove the super from the bees and feed sugar syrup (the super can be given back to them once the frames in the brood box have been drawn).Add one piece of fresh foundation  (and I mean fresh foundation, not some stale wax that has been kicking about in the bee shed all summer) at the edge of the brood nest. Place this fresh foundation nearest the sunniest side of your hive next to the brood as the bees will find it easier to draw it out in that position. Once they have drawn this one out, add another piece of fresh foundation next to the brood. This will be an uphill struggle as the bees are less keen to draw out wax for you now that we are getting further away from the summer solstice.  Perhaps the following sentence will help you remember what it is that you should do in future :

"Always make your bees go outwards before you let them go upwards"

In other words, don't put a super on the bees until they have drawn out the frames in the brood box. Or rather almost all the frames in the brood box.

A word of warning - don't add lots of frames of foundation because the bees will just chew them up. Lesley calls them hooligans. Add a frame each time you inspect, and only add a frame if they are working on the previous one that you added.

5) Supers - some hives had one, or more, supers in place even though the brood frames hadn't been drawn. I know both Helen and yourself sent out emails earlier in the year about this but perhaps it needs to be mentioned again (and how to get the bees to draw stores down from a super that will be removed).

This has been partly dealt with in my answer above. If you want the bees to draw down stores into the brood box, then place your crown board above the brood box, reduce the holes in the crown board (where you would place the porter bee escapes if extracting honey),  place an empty super on top of the crown board, add another crown board on top of the empty super and then add your super of stores. And of course another crown board on top of your stores before you put the roof on. You can never have too many crown boards ! The bees think that the super is not part of the hive and so they rob it out. You may need to score a few frames. This doesn't always work but it does most of the time.

6) Small colonies in full hives - what to do if they don't build up in time for winter? Reducing the hive size using large dummy boards etc and why.

Our beginners are still finding it difficult to judge what is a big colony and what is a small colony. Those who attended the whole day of the bee safari will have now learnt what a large colony looks like as we saw two large colonies at the end of the day. If you have a small unit now, you need to work hard. I would make a cellotex dummy board and put that next to the frame of foundation that I was adding next to the brood nest. This will help the bees raise the temperature so that wax can be drawn out. I would place a piece of cellotex in the roof to try and help them keep warm. I would feed, and then not feed, and then feed again. Your work will be cut out.

 Hope this gives you all food for thought. My timely reminder from Bee Craft suggests we should all look for disease in our colonies. If you have a beehive with less than five frames of brood you should consider combining it with another unit if it is disease-free so that you have a large enough unit to get through the winter.

A final word about honey. Unless you are in a particularly good area for forage, you are probably not going to get any more honey. The exception is if you live in or near the Ashdown Forest. Heather has just come into flower and it is possible that you will get a crop from that although it'll be very difficult to extract. Lesley in Saint Leonards on Sea got a late honey crop but I suspect there are a lot of exotic trees and these were expressing nectar. She also had a super strong colony. Beginners, please remember that you are only going to get honey if you have got loads and loads of bees. This is the challenge of beekeeping. You need lots of bees to get honey but when you have lots of bees they want to swarm. However the one comforting thought for all of us is that the swarming season is now over. This doesn't mean that the bees won't swarm but they are much less likely to do so! Remember what Keith says :

                      "Bees never do anything invariably". 

They are, after all, wild creatures. And we are trying to artificially make them do what we want them to do!!

The following are Steve's final comments.

Hope I don't sound too officious and the info is relevant. It would be nice to get feedback from them all next spring to see how they coped with their first winter.

Please thank all of those who opened their apiaries for us, it was immensely rewarding and I thoroughly enjoyed seeing everything (except the rain).

Hope the BBQ went well and I'm sorry not to have been able to join in. Look forward to catching up on Tuesday.

Kind regards

Steve Davies

Malcolm Wilkie July 27th 2017

The crazy nectar flow continues

This is the first time since I began beekeeping seven years ago that I have experienced such a huge nectar flow for such a sustained period of time. When I am out and about gardening there is still moisture in the soil and weeding is not difficult. This is unusual for me as a gardener at this time of year and is a clear indication that plants can get hold of moisture and express nectar. Coupled with high temperatures this is leading to a huge nectar flow.

What is the consequence for our bees? On opening up hives yesterday I have discovered that the bees are chucking nectar into the brood nest. For me this is of concern because I know that if this continues that is going to trigger swarming. Why wouldn't a hive want to divide given the perfect ideal conditions that we have got at the moment? I have already lost a swarm from a really good box of bees and I am just kicking myself. They were congested and I should have known that that was the case. I was also silly in that I left them for one week without checking. A mistake given how strong a hive they were.

So what can you do? As usual you need to respect the adage that the brood box is for brood. Remove frames of stores and place foundation into the brood box. On a hive that is not too strong, place the foundation at the edge of the brood nest. On a hive that is very strong, place the foundation into the brood nest. Remember this is a sin but given the current conditions we had all better sin than not. Then you need to check your supers and, of course, give the bees  a super with foundation so that they can be kept busy drawing out wax.

I refer you all to Willy Shaw's article about how to renew comb. This article is in the current BBKA magazine. On a strong hive he is removing four frames of stores and splitting the brood nest four times. In a week, given the current conditions, a strong hive will draw out those four frames of foundation (Lesley and I have done that on her strong hive and they certainly drew out the foundation no problem. In fact they drew out four frames of foundation placed in the brood nest and a whole super of foundation placed just above the brood box). And that should take their minds off swarming for the week. The other thing that you can do is to extract the honey you have on the hive. This, of course, will give the bees more space. However if these conditions continue, the challenge of  (a) how to prevent them swarming and (b) making sure that they are not congested, is going to continue. Good luck and try not to lose a swarm as I did, particularly as she was my best queen.

Malcolm Wilkie 6th July 2017

'The current crazy nectar flow'

Just a word of warning to everybody with a big prosperous colony. Evidently a lot of nectar has been going into large hives and this has been causing a problem. Do make sure that your bees have enough space. You may have to do as Helen has done below and add a frame of foundation into your brood box

Here is Helen's message sent to me this morning.

On checking my brood boxes yesterday, they were all full of nectar, so I removed a frame and gave them all a frame of foundation to draw out. Nectar everywhere!!! Queen cells also in amongst the nectar, brood pattern a mess as they have filled every vacant cell with nectar!!! I did say there was a massive nectar flow on. I think I got it wrong last week when I realised there was a crazy nectar flow I should have given the bees more to do, i.e. Given them frames to draw out.

Remember bees need a lot of space to process nectar and convert it into honey. Being a good beekeeper involves trying to be aware of what is going on in the environment and what the conditions are like and then responding accordingly. These high temperatures have made the clover express nectar(temperatures need to be above 70degrees Fahrenheit) and the bees have been collecting this in quantity. Extremely high temperatures make plants express nectar like crazy as long as there is moisture in the soil ; that is currently the case.

Do remember Margaret Ginman's advice : 'Keep your bees busy and then that will take their minds off swarming'. She says that if you treat your bees like a bunch of adolescent boy teenagers, then you won't go far wrong. A responsible parent would never leave a bunch of young teenage boys with nothing to do, because if they did so there would be trouble. In other words make sure you give your bees something to do because, just like teenage boys, if they have nothing to do then at best you will have a sticky mess, and at worst you will have to cope with swarming.

So that means putting in a frame of foundation into the brood box, and adding supers, preferably with foundation in them. If your bees are busy making wax, they won't want to swarm. And making wax will use up some of the excess nectar they are finding in the environment during this current nectar flow. If today you are one of the people where there is a heavy downpour, watch out as that will make the nectar flow even more.

Malcolm Wilkie 22nd June

'Brood boxes are meant for brood'

Now this statement might appear blindingly obvious but as a beekeeper it is easy to lose sight of the fact that the brood box is meant for brood. And I have just seen so many hives where there is no room for a queen to expand at all and the beekeeper just seems to be unaware of that fact.

We encourage beekeepers to inspect their colonies once a week during May and June which are the prime months for swarming. Each one of you should be asking themselves about whether a queen has enough space to lay eggs every time they go into a colony. Well it is all fine and well to ask yourself the question, but what are you in fact doing to give her enough space? Here are some ideas which might help.

1. Is there some empty drawn comb that could be moved next to the brood nest?

2. Is there a frame of pollen near the brood nest that could either be removed from the hive or moved next to the hive wall? Some beekeepers talk about a pollen barrier. The Queen finds it difficult to cross the pollen barrier and expand her brood nest, and you as a beekeeper can help by moving it out the way or removing it completely.

(If you find a pollen barrier in your hive it is easy to recognise; pollens of different colour covered by honey. The frame on which you find  the pollens looks sticky and is gummed up. This is because  the bees have made bee bread which is their way of storing the pollen and keeping it fresh. However what it is important to bear in mind about such a frame is that it is nigh impossible for a queen to put eggs into it. So do something about it.)

3. Should you add a frame of fresh foundation? This should be placed next to the brood nest or if you have an extremely prosperous colony you can commit the  ultimate sin and split the brood nest with your frame of foundation. Only do this if they are really strong.

4. Perhaps your scenario is very different. Perhaps you have split a colony and they are desperately trying to expand but just don't seem to be getting on very well. Are you using a dummy board, preferably made from cellotex? Just give them one frame of foundation to work on at a time. Put your cellotex dummy board next to that piece of foundation. And then I would also feed such a small colony. However don't make the mistake of feeding continually because they will just fill every frame with sugar syrup and then the Queen will have nowhere to lay. Remember a small colony does not have enough young bees to draw out much wax so this is going to have to be a gradual process. Often with a small unit what you would like them to do in one week is realistically going to take them two. If you can get your head around the fact that bees are programmed to take advantage of a nectar flow and so will collect your sugar syrup and stuff it anywhere they can, even putting the queen off lay, then you will have grasped that too much feeding in one go may be counter productive. It is also jolly stressful for a small unit that has not yet reached the tipping point needed to easily expand, if you are continually pouring sugar syrup all over them. For a colony that needs to expand, feed and then don't feed, and then feed again and then don't feed, and then feed once again. Work put in by you in June will pay dividends in September. The longer you neglect supporting a weak colony, the more difficult it will be for them to grow into the box you have provided for them. Of course if you have drawn comb, by all means use that but beginners don't usually have the luxury of drawn comb.

Space in the brood box is fundamental. Congestion in the brood box can lead to swarming. And as beginners are rapidly finding out once the bees have decided to swarm there is  nothing you can do about it except manage that swarming instinct. Just remember, please, a brood box is for brood.

Malcolm Wilkie 15th June