Liquid Gold Update

It isn't liquid anymore!

After less than a week in the jar, the mainly oil seed rape honey we extracted last week has already set solid enough for a spoon to stand upright, unsupported in it!  

 

The honey is a pale honey colour.   The texture is smooth and reminds me of Vaseline in the way it half clings to a spoon in a cowlick shape when you scoop some out.  

 

We like the flavour which is mild and floral; not at all what you would expect from the loud and vibrant yellow flowers it’s made from.

 

How much more solid will it get?  I have childhood memories of oil seed rape honey that was so hard it would bend spoons....   Our aim is to eat the honey before it solidifies rock hard and we advise those people to whom we have given jars to try to do the same!

Liquid Gold

 

 

The field next door but one has  oil seed rape in it this year.  These vibrant yellow fields are cultivated for their oil rich seeds and we use this golden, nutty flavoured oil both for cooking and in salads.    The G Bees’ hive entrance faces this field and we noticed that they are making a beeline straight to and from this forage, notwithstanding that the wisteria and pheasant eye narcissi are flowering prolifically closer by in the garden.   The problem with honey made from oil seed rape is that it sets very hard, very quickly.   It can set so hard in the hive that even the bees can’t make use of it.  The Authorities, therefore, recommend extracting oil seed rape honey before the flowers turn from yellow to green, in fact even before the bees seal their stores with wax cappings. 

Noticing that the fields around us are just losing their vibrancy and have a greenish tinge, we organised the hive after this week’s inspection so that the heaviest super containing honey was on the top with a clearer board underneath.  This board allows bees to go down in to the other supers and brood chamber via a kind of no return valve called a Porter Bee Escape but not return to the top super.  (At least that’s the theory; last year, the G Bees glued the Porter Bee Escape open with propolis so they could move both up and down freely!)  

Equipment list for extracting honey

• Wheelbarrow
• sheet
• Extractor
• Oilcloth tablecloths
• Large enamel tray
• Uncapping knife
• STUTBABC (Super that used to be a brood chamber)
• Stool
• 2 x glass jugs
• fine mesh sieve
• honey jars 

 

 

In the morning, there were only 2 or 3 bees in the top super so I whipped it off before the G Bees noticed and put it straight in to the Annex for the honey extraction operation.   This involved spreading 2 large oilcloth tablecloths on the floor to catch spills.   We borrowed a food grade nylon extractor.  First you slice off any wax cappings (using the uncapping knife and large enamel tray). The frames sit in a cage inside the extractor and with minimal effort turning the handle on top, centrifugal force flings honey onto the walls of the extractor from where it dribbles down to the sloping floor via a mesh to catch bits of wax or other debris.  

 

Once the honey is extracted, the wet frames go into STUTBABC until all are empty and then back into the cleaned super to go back on the hive.

I replaced the “wet” frames on the G Bees’ hive immediately after the extraction so they have plenty of space to make more honey – they are bursting at the seams…

After a couple of hours’ settling time, I lifted the extractor onto a small stool, stood a 2 pint glass measuring jug under the tap with a fine stainless steel sieve on top and opened the tap.   Honey glugged out slowly.  I had a moment of concern when the sieve started to fill but nothing passed through but eventually, a thick column of honey oozed through in to the jug.   I had prepared 10 honey jars expecting to get maybe  3 or 4 jars as it's so early in the season but wanting to have some spares ready.  After filling 9, I got two more out of the cupboard but that wasn’t enough and eventually, I filled 14!  

We haven’t heat treated the honey to make it stay runny;   we haven’t “seeded” it by heating it and mixing in honey with crystals of a particular size which is done by some to achieve a creamy set texture:    this is natural honey, as made by the G Bees, just run through a filter.  

 

Game of Thrones

 

This photograph shows one of the frames that came with the G Bees from their old home.  We have replaced it with fresh wax foundation which the bees will draw out into the hexagonal honeycomb cells that you see here.   This photograph of old comb (you can tell by the dark colour) clearly shows the normal size hexagonal cells, where eggs laid by the Queen develop in to worker bees.  Then there the larger hexagonal cells which are where eggs develop in to Drones, the male bees.   Drones are large ‘square’ bees, distinguishable from the Queen who is large but long and thin with a pointed tail.    The large blob on this frame in the red square is a Queen cell.  I draw this to your attention because we have seen lots of queen cells in the G Bees’ hive this year.

 Colonies make new queens for a number of reasons:

i)                  When their queen is getting old.  Ageing queens’ pheromones gradually lose their strength.  Their “smell” is passed all round the colony as the bees feed each other and move around.  When they notice the strength of this smell diminishing they start preparing to make a new queen.  It is said that you can only have one queen in a colony (but once you find “the Queen” who continues to look for another one?) so the new queen will kill off the old one.

ii)                When a colony is big and strong, the natural process for multiplying is swarming. The colony starts making a new queen and before she hatches, the old queen leaves with some of the workers to set up a new colony.  This can happen multiple times from the same colony in one season.

We knew that the G Bees constitute a very large colony and required more space and we didn’t know how old the queen was.   At the first inspection this year we spotted a new Queen.  Queen G was very large and very pale coloured and the new one, named Queen Joan by our weekend guests was dark and stripy.   This implied that Queen G was old and the bees implemented a supersedure process!  I was so pleased that the G Bees knew what they were doing and I didn’t have to go through a “requeening” procedure, which sounds complicated and fiddly.

The G Bees have also successfully moved onto their new deep brood box which is 14” x 12” compared with a normal brood chamber which measures 14” x 8.5”.   They also have additional supers to spread over – these are 14" x  5.5" - but they probably still felt crowded because they clearly wanted to make new queens.  That is why we split the colony into 3 (see the last blog) but this is still a very large colony so I will be taking some emerging brood out to add to and strengthen the nucleus at the next inspection.  The G Bees do have a lot of space and, touch wood, they haven’t decided to swarm yet.

I am feeling very pleased with myself because at the last inspection I marked Queen Joan.  I was nervous about handling her but I used a special little cage that presses in to a frame around her to hold her still, being careful to stick it into honey not brood cells and I blobbed a dot of blue from the special/expensive queen marking pen onto her.

 Will You Rear Good Bees?  This is the mnemonic that helps beekeepers remember the right colour to mark queens according to the year they were born.  Queens born in years ending 1 and 6 are marked White, in years ending 2 and 7 are marked Yellow, in years ending 3 and 8 are marked Red, in years ending 4 and 9 are marked Green and in years ending 5 and 0 are marked Blue. 

So, imagine my surprise when I wrote up my notes afterwards and realised that I had marked a “long, thin, reddish-brown” queen, not a “dark, stripy” queen.  Was it Queen Joan or Queen Joan II?  Is there another queen in there and I just stopped looking after finding and marking Joan II?  I feel with the G Bees that I am running one step behind them all the time and I can’t keep up.  Next inspection I will be looking for multiple queens......

Swarm Prevention - Does it Work?

According to Ted Hooper, when you first see Queen cells with larvae in them you should remove them.  At the next inspection if they have made new Queen cells destroy them again.  He says then many colonies will give up but if they go on to make more Queen cells, the beekeeper has to be ready to put into operation his Swarm Control Plan.  We didn't have one.

 

Rapidly swotting up using Ted's book and with the helpful advisory leaflet "Beekeeping - Making Increase" issued by the Welsh Assembly Government with FERA and The Scottish Government, we devised our own SCP.   Surmising that there would be sealed brood in both the old and new brood chambers, the plan was to take one frame with sealed brood from each brood chamber with a Queen cell and put them in a nucleus (mini-hive) with stores, then, making sure the Queen stayed in the deep brood chamber, to make up a new colony using the frames from the old brood chamber.

 

Monitoring the weather forecast for a suitable opportunity to carry out this operation, we realised we had to act quickly before higher winds and rain return later in the week.   The SCP was put into operation 48 hours after spotting the Queen cells.   This involved an emergency dash home early from work.   The wind was cold and stronger than we had hoped for but later in the week even stronger winds are forecast.   By the time we had drunk a cup of tea (we are, after all, proper beekeepers now), reviewed the plan and gathered all the equipment by the apiary, the afternoon was quietly turning to evening and the wind dropped a bit.  We leapt into action, luckily finding the Queen easily on the centre frame of the deep brood chamber - not a large light coloured Queen but a beautiful normal coloured Queen.  Queen G really has gone whether out of old age or succumbing to a younger model.

 

We set up the nucleus and new colony as planned and left the bees to go to bed, returning later to transport the new colony to the out apiary we are going to have this year about a mile away on the farm.  However, concerned that we might have left a Queen cell in with the G Bees and their new Queen, we naively set up a spare hive in the apiary just in case the G Bees still swarm.  Maybe if they do, they will find a nice home nearby attractive.  More likely they will ignore it completely!

 

Only time will tell whether the new colony and nucleus establish successfully.  There is no question that if we did nothing, many of the G Bees would be moving out at the first opportunity to find more space.  And, does swarm control work?  It looks as though we will find out soon enough!

First Inspection of the Year

Weather and work conspired against us to prevent inspection of the G Bees for the whole of March and in to April.

 

With an early nectar source nearby from willow trees and oil seed rape fields, we wanted  to offer the G Bees a new deep brood box so they could move in to it with the support of that strong nectar flow so on a still but chilly day in early March, we removed untouched fondant (food supplied to ensure they wouldn't starve late in Winter) and put the new deep brood chamber on the hive with a container of syrup on top, keeping disturbance to a minimum.

Bees flying in early Spring

 

 

Weeks passed.  It was cold; it was sunny and windy; there were some beautiful days - but only when we were at work.  Finally, last weekend we determined at least to remove the supers that had been underneath the brood chambers since last Autumn and to give the G Bees a clean floor without inspecting individual frames in the brood chambers due to the brisk wind.

 

By the time we got our gear together, the wind had dropped.  I couldn't lift the two brood chambers at the same time, so we took off the new deep brood chamber which was really quite heavy, then set aside the old brood chamber.  On top of this we observed huge white grubs & wondered what they were.  We weren't expecting Queen cells so early in the season and all the books show Queen cells hanging downwards from the sides or bottom of frames.  These larvae were in cells on the top of frames.

Continuing we reassembled the hive with a new floor putting everything back including one super of stores and an empty super to give them some more space - there are a lot of G Bees.

 

Reflecting later we realised the white grubs had been Queen larvae and most probably their cells were hanging down from frames in the deep brood chamber, becoming unattached when I lifted that off.   Not only that, on the mesh of the old floor we found the body of a large, light coloured Queen - the magical Queen G who I didn't see once last year. 

 

This means we have a very large colony who have "lost" an old Queen and who are making Queen cells.  Ah!   We were certain from the way they behaved that there must be a Queen in the colony but there is no doubt, they are preparing to swarm!  To be continued......soon.

RIP Queen B and The Beebettes

 

 

Sadly we have to report the demise of our lovely Queen B and the Beebettes.

The difference in behaviour between the Beebettes and the G Bees has been more and more noticeable and in the recent spell of mild weather the G Bees were crowding on the landing board of their hive both sunbathing and busily taking off and landing with pollen.

Meanwhile there continued to be no signs of life in the Beebettes’ hive so, with trepidation, we took advantage of the weather to take off the roof of the hive and bang on the side of the brood chamber.  This produced no buzz, no reaction so we took off the crown board.  At this point it became obvious that the fondant (a just in case extra food supply) was untouched.   Likewise the pollen patty.    Then we took out the end frame which was still undrawn foundation.  Progressing the frame by frame through the brood chamber we found the Beebettes hadn’t built up any more than when we last inspected the hive back in September.   There were frames heavy with stores including those around the empty brood cells.   We found a few dead bees emerging from cells and it was a disheartening business.

 

We immediately got out all the information we could find about bee diseases to see whether our bees had succumbed to some disease that we should report to the bee inspectors but it appeared not.  We conferred with more experienced beekeepers too.

When we dismantled the hive we found dead bees covering the mesh varroa floor.  We inspected these carefully for signs of disease like deformed wing virus but they all appeared to be normal little bees.

 

Reviewing our hive records we saw Queen B every time we inspected the Beebettes except at the last inspection before we put on varroa treatment and commenced Autumn feeding.    We assumed she was there somewhere and we just missed her, not least because Queen G always hides but now we wonder.   By October we were recording changed behaviour by the Beebettes on their landing board which we attributed to the time of year.  We also observed wasps entering the hive late in the Autumn when the Beebettes would already have been clustering together.  Our hunch, therefore, is that the Beebettes went in to the Winter without a Queen, there weren't enough of them to defend themselves from robbing wasps and the colony died out.

Beekeeping In Winter

 

If you’ve been wondering what beekeepers do in Winter when their bees are huddled in their nests read on!

 

The AGM and annual dinner of the local beekeepers’ association takes place in the quiet season when beekeepers actually have time to attend.  We went for the first time this year and we thought there must be a lecture as well as the AGM because we couldn’t believe it would last 75 minutes – but it did!

You may be  surprised to hear that bees were barely mentioned.   However, if you've paid attention to our blogs, you will be far from surprised that the main news in the Treasurer’s report was the announcement that new teapots have been purchased.

 

oooOOOooo

 

The dinner surpassed all our expectations.  What kind of 3 course dinner do you get for £8.00 per head these days?  We certainly thought that we would be paying for drinks and coffee separately but no!!!   A choice of starters was followed by a clever, seasonal main course with generous portions and seconds for those who could manage it; then there was a choice of 3 desserts or cheese.  Red and white wine and water were on the table when we sat down and coffee and chocolates were provided too.      Wow!       We could hardly believe it either.

 

oooOOOooo

 

By far the best bit was talking to the other beekeepers there.  All our fears about the Beebettes were allayed by Douglas, who sold them to us.  He thinks their apparent disappearance is quite normal for this time of year… and so is the exuberant activity of the G Bees.  Other beekeepers reported similarly different behaviour from their colonies.  We are encouraged and hopeful that both colonies are OK.

We also heard the heartening story of how a colony of wild black bees was found in January when a large, dead Ash tree was felled just a few miles from us.   A section of the tree, now furnished with a sort of roof for added protection, still homing its resident colony, is now being cared for in a local apiary.  

oooOOOooo

 

But that’s one evening;  we’ve been, painting new lifts and a nucleus hive the fetching shade of house greeny blue to match the hives in the apiary.   We’ve acquired some bottom bee space supers and they have to be routed to make them top bee space to be compatible with our 14x12 brood boxes.   Everything has to be super clean and that means, scraped, scrubbed with washing soda and lightly scorched with a blow lamp to ensure there can be no residual disease on anything.

I didn’t imagine there would be quite so much carpentry or so much cleaning involved  in beekeeping.

 

oooOOOooo

 

Finally, we've been planning the military logistical exercise that is required to move the G Bees onto their new 14 x 12 brood chamber and onto a clean floor (a good hygiene practice).   The G Bees' floor then has to be thoroughly cleaned so we can switch the Beebettes (if they survive) onto a clean floor, and finally, as our spare floor isn't a varroa mesh floor, we then need to clean the Beebettes' floor and switch the G Bees on to that, rendering the spare solid floor spare again.

 

Now we're waiting for the weather to warm up enough for the early inspections and equipment switch.