Wednesday 22 July 2009

Prepare for Hols





















Last night I checked the monitoring boards. The main colony had 5 over 3 days, the queen right nuc had 0/3, and the queenless nuc had 2/3. I thing the queenless nuc was being robbed so have sealed for a few days and going to put a robbing screen in front of the entrace.
The lime trees seem to bloom for two weeks, starting the begining of July.

Sunday 19 July 2009

Queen rearing

Yesterday checked the colony which the queen appeared to fly from and they had open QC, the worst feared. So gave some syrup and will let them get on with it. May be too late for them to build up for winter! The QC should be hatching on 26th July?
Put Monitoring floors in all colonies, check in a day or two.

Wednesday 15 July 2009

Longsdon apiary

Moves quick








Found 1 queen on sunday and marked green.
Mike gave me a hand tonight, we found the unmarked queen, got a photo and then we think the queen flew off. Hope she ends up back home!

Friday 10 July 2009

Hooray

Quick check tonight and found both nucs with 2 frames with lave and sealed.
The tough task of finding and marking the queen now!
The main colony has a little capped honey in the super.

Saturday 4 July 2009

colony checks







John gave me a hand today to check my starter colonies for eggs and the main colony for space or queen cells. We did not see a queen or eggs in either small colonies but the main colony looks good. Need to keep feeding and checking small Colonies. Pics of lime trees.