Beekeeping
Our project this spring is beekeeping, we now have two hives with two Nucleus of Bees( a queen bee with around 5 or 6 frames of bees) and the protective clothing works. The first day the bees spent reorientating themselves and are now flying out looking for pollen, this is fed to the developing larvae, the nectar is used to make honey. Recommended reading 'Beekeeping for Dummies' by Howland Blackiston available on Amazon is a really good read if somewhat American.
The recommended essentials are, having a space that is south or south east facing( not absolutly essential) sheltered from strong winds, located so it doesn't cause a nuisance to your neighbours or passers by. I have joined the local branch of the National Bee Keeping Society as not only do they provide useful information and support but also public liability insurance is included in the premium. ( I haven’t found the time to go along to a meeting yet but will this summer).
There are three main types of bee hive the National, the WBC and the Langstroth all have their advantages and disadvantages, I have decided on the National as it is one of the most readily available and as space is at a premium it is the smaller of the three.
Below is a varoa floor this is a mesh floor with a removable drawer type floor that can be slid out for inspection and cleaning it is normally painted white so any varoa mite that drop off fall through the mesh and can be spotted easily on the floor and removed to inspect the colony for varoa a kitchen fork can be used to break open some drone cells and look for any mite on the larvae.
I have been making up the frames for the hives, eleven per brood or super, the brood frames are for the queen to lay her eggs in, the super is for the worker bees to put the nectar in which will eventually become honey . The brood fames go in above the floor with a queen excluder above (a mesh device, see below) with slots in it just large enough for worker bees to fit through, but too small for the queen, this prevents the queen from gaining entry into the super frames and laying her eggs.
The bees are really working hard in the hot weather, they now have a full 11 frames in the brood chamber and both hives queens are laying well. they are building comb really quickly and in places its not wanted and putting honey around the top of each frame, it is the pale white capped bit at the top of the frame in the video. I decided to put the supers on both hives today to give them the space to put the honey in instead of the brood chamber (hopefully) please excuse the start the shutter didn't open up.
