The only activity we did on the bees was a treatment for Nosema using the very strong solution of VitaGold - 10ml per seem of bees of a mixture of 450ml syrup to 50 vita gold.
It was another day we could not get onto the bees, so we had a quiz here are the questions.
Beekeeping Quiz.
1) How many days does a worker bees spend as a unsealed larvae?
2) How many days does a Drone take from egg to hatching?
3) How many days does a Drone take from an egg to become mature?
4) Name a notifiable pest (to beekeepers) not currently located in the UK?
5) What brood disease is sometimes called rattling comb?
6) Which brood disease looks like a chinese slipper?
7) How many legs does a varroa mite have?
8) Which notifiable brood disease is most obvious on sealed cells.?
9) Name a possible control method for EFB which does not involve destruction.?
10) Name the three elements, one of which must be separated when doing swarm control? (3)
11) Name three swarm control methods (3)
12) Name Four hive styles (4)
13) Name the two types of wax moths (2)
14) What is the minimum recommended number of bees in a sample for a Nosema test
15) When assessing a queen for rearing purposes name three attributes you might look for in your queen (3)
16) Name an important wild food plant for bees in our area in Spring, Summer, Autumn (3)
17) Name three spacing method for frames (3)
18) What temperature will honey start to melt at in ceclicus?
19) what temperature will wax start to melt at in ceclicus?
20) Tie break What was the approximate total main honey crop of Lydney Apiary in 2010
Thursday 19 April 2012
Sunday 15 April 2012
Winter Blues
Well we are deep into spring now, so how did our apiary come through the winter.
There was one loss, early in the year due to a drone layer, another loss in about February, (not enough bees/ no particular reason. And ??? well "?" because the THREE dates we have been down the apiary so far this year it has been to cold to look at bees correctly, I think two more are unlikely to make it.
Anyway the poor weather has given us chance to do some other activties down at the apiary. We have done some Nosema tests and found it so are now treating that with Vita Gold as per instruction on the bottle. Praticed getting our sample of bees, done some acetic acid, and lets of talking.
There was one loss, early in the year due to a drone layer, another loss in about February, (not enough bees/ no particular reason. And ??? well "?" because the THREE dates we have been down the apiary so far this year it has been to cold to look at bees correctly, I think two more are unlikely to make it.
Anyway the poor weather has given us chance to do some other activties down at the apiary. We have done some Nosema tests and found it so are now treating that with Vita Gold as per instruction on the bottle. Praticed getting our sample of bees, done some acetic acid, and lets of talking.
Thursday 19 January 2012
Oxalic Acid 2012
After a very successful demonstration of how to make oxalic acid from crystals and everybody had a practice with water on an empty hive. The Oxalic acid was applied to the hives on the 15th January 20121. Below are the results of the count which were done 4days and 2 hours after application.
As you can see the mite drop was very low. This is in direct contrast to my hives at home were the count on some hives was estimated at 300 after only 3 days. There were so many I could not count. Now for a little background info. At the Apiary in Lydney we used the treatment of APIVAR Life - whilst at home I used Hive Clean in the autumn. Okay this is no true test as I think I always have more mites at home than in the Lydney apiary - but it is interesting.
Another interesting thing to note is that the hive at Lydney which gave the highest drop by some way was hive 15. Thid hive I am planning to re-queen because of temper issues but they gave the best crop of honey! The theory normal is that the nastier hives bring in more honey as they are disrupted less but all the bees get looked through as much as any other. I shall let you draw your own conclusions.
| 4 day count | ||
| Hive | Seams | Mites |
| 1 | 3 | 3 |
| 2 | 5 | 1 |
| 3 | 5 | 0 |
| 4 | 5 | 1 |
| 5 | 3 | 2 |
| 9 | 3 | 2 |
| 10 | 4 | 0 |
| 11 | 6 | 3 |
| 12 | 3 | 1 |
| 13 | 7 | 1 |
| 14 | 1 | 0 |
| 15 | 6 | 22 |
| 16 | 14 | 3 |
| 17 | 5 | 1 |
| 18 | 6 | 2 |
| 19 | NO FLOOR | No count |
| 20 | Nuc | No count |
| 22 | 7 | 0 |
| D | Dead – Drone Layer |
As you can see the mite drop was very low. This is in direct contrast to my hives at home were the count on some hives was estimated at 300 after only 3 days. There were so many I could not count. Now for a little background info. At the Apiary in Lydney we used the treatment of APIVAR Life - whilst at home I used Hive Clean in the autumn. Okay this is no true test as I think I always have more mites at home than in the Lydney apiary - but it is interesting.
Another interesting thing to note is that the hive at Lydney which gave the highest drop by some way was hive 15. Thid hive I am planning to re-queen because of temper issues but they gave the best crop of honey! The theory normal is that the nastier hives bring in more honey as they are disrupted less but all the bees get looked through as much as any other. I shall let you draw your own conclusions.
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