Budding Cottage

Grabbing a short break between spells of rain, and before it got too cold, I whizzed a peek into the bees to see how they were: Hive A – doing well in just over a week and have expanded from the 6 combs to draw wax on at least 3 more.  Most busy on the […]

Well, I wondered why the bees seemed to be more active at lunchtime.  At first I thought they were up to something.  Then I realised that they seemed to be doing training flights.  Now, apparently this may be the nursery bees spreading their wings, stretching their legs and relieving themselves during the day.  Well, there […]

In the evening I checked how the bees were doing with their sugar syrup. Hive A were definitely gulping it down, and guarding the syrup container (or at least fanning for reinforcements just around the porter bee escape on the crown board when they saw me – I had accidentally left the porter bee escape […]

The swarm girls were very lively indeed on 9 May.  I regularly walked up the garden to observe them as there were more bees circling madly than I had seen before.  However, they too were learning the geography and gradually circling away from the hive in greater loops.  My worry was that they were planning […]

I had put myself onto the Malvern and Upton branch swarm list.  This meant that if a member of the public found a swarm that they wanted moving, the beekeepers would run through a list of call downs and anyone who could collect and rehome a swarm would come out and deal with it.  Whilst […]