Bee Keeping

'swarm? You're telling me 'swarm? I'm melting...

Neil

Re- swarms, we have several wild bees nests here in the woods, they last at most a couple of years until disease overtakes them. I personally would not take a swarm from them as the Varroa with its virus vector carries on the virus load in the swarm. Ideally now all wild swarms and nest should be eradicated to help protect the normal bees.

Down the road they took over a wood peckers hole in a cherry tree, they lasted 2 years before dying out, now the Squirrels are back in the holes!

Checked over mine last Tues. and they are just now starting to draw comb in the honey boxes., very late indeed having now missed all the Hawthorn, fruit blossom and Bramble flows. All thats left now is Ivy. and a bit of wild flower and if it gets warm for a week or more then some Clover.

It also looks now as if I will have to bring on the Nucleus hives as I have no takers this year. So into a National hive and up goes the price to £155. and they supply the Hive.

Clive. PS, the Lavender out front is normally crowded with Bumble bees at this time, I see none except for a couple of honey bees, where are the Bumbles?

Is it true that all British bees died out during the first world war and had to be replaced by Mexican bees? I think I heard it on the radio recently but it's possible I dreamt it!

Cheers,

Dave

That does sound like dream material, then again it's scratching the surface on some of the freaky stuff i have to deal with sometimes. If i could trade dreams i would.

Michael W

You might be referring to the , 'Isle of Wight' disease which pretty well devastated British bee keeping at the time, the original British bee is a black bee and recently a few people say they have found wild colonies but seems now they are being very quiet about it. Also there is an isolated Island in Denmark which has these black bees and from what they know these seem to be the original strain. They are in quarantine and this to protect them from any disease that could damage them.

Re- the bees now, these mainly consist of Caucasion bees, also some Italian type bees but these do not like our climate and can be ferocious to work with. I did at one time have a colony of yellow bees but they were lazy and made brown wax and died out, no idea what they were. Many people have tried imported bees but they usually revert back to the bees that can live in our climate. Bees will mate with any other bees or types, so you usualy end up with Mongrel bees anyway as you cannot keep them pure or separated.

You have to understand that bees in a temperate climate behave differently to bees that live in say a Mediterranean climate or even a North African climate. As some of the hotter climate areas the bees are migratory such as the African bee Adonsi Adonsi, of the Brazilian Killer bee that got loose and is now invading the USA Southern States in the USA. and Mexico.

Clive, any questions happily answered.

Edited By Clive Hartland on 21/07/2016 18:13:50

Thanks Clive - fascinating stuff! Trouble is I might get nightmares featuring Mongrel Brazilian Killer bees now.

I get lots of bees in my garden but how can I tell if they're honey bees or not? I don't think there are any beekeepers for miles.

Cheers,

Dave

It was the noise from the swarm that made us aware of their presence but even when standing 18" away from the compost bin they had tried to make home there was no sign of any hostility. When the lid was lifted on the bin the ring of bees around the top of it was 2" deep by 2" high and when moved to the transport box there really wasn't much space left in it for the bees.

As a result of this encounter we are considering getting two hives in the garden, looked after for us by experienced keepers. In return our garden is pollinated and the vegetable patch should be even better next year.

Edited By AndyA on 21/07/2016 21:27:34

Edited By AndyA on 21/07/2016 21:30:35

Edited By AndyA on 21/07/2016 21:31:22

Eradicate all wild bees and nests eradicated? So speaketh a true environmentalist? Banning beekeepers might be a better proposal!

Not Done Yet, You have missed the point of my explanation. If it were not for beekeepers using medication to treat the bees in hives then there would be no bees to keep. Varroa is a vector for about 7 Viruses, all deadly and damaging to bees. It will never now be eradicated but sadly we have to live with that.

As a Philanthropic bee keeper I pay through the nose to keep my bees as there is no profit and it is just a hobby, yes, I could walk away but I feel I have responsibilities and one of them is to make sure that any residual source of virus should be eliminated at source. Without control wild bees spread the Varroa by contact with other bees on flowers, passing the parasite from bee to bee unknowingly which is then carried back to the hive/nest and there it starts it's insidious task of killing off it's hosts.It's breeding cycle is 10 days against a bees 21 days and plus the damage done to Pupa in the comb causing deformed wings and 'K' wing virus. I am surprised that they survive all this ans I do my best to treat them.

Ask any environmentalist and sometimes it is necessary to kill off diseased stock. like Foot and Mouth or chickens that get ravaged by disease. At this moment there is a situation running with a virus that is killing rabbits, heamoragic something, But they are pests anyway. Nature can be cruel in many ways.

Clive

they say you learn something new every day

just watched part of a channel 4 program about icing sugar

and it showed a clip dusting bees with icing sugar to control varroa mites

the idea being as the bees cleaned each other the mites would lose their grip and fall off and land in the bottom of the hive

John

Edited By john swift 1 on 03/10/2016 22:06:21

Dustig bees does not work. Yes, it gets rid of a few phoretic mites, but around 85% of the mites will be 

busy reproducing in the cells at most times.

Only useful for colonies with no brood, IMO. One problem is that the sugar, if too much, can damage or kill some of the brood. I have only used it on swarms or splits with no capped brood, by removing all the bees from the hive, rolling them in icing sugar, and then allowing them to crawl back into the hive.

The main problem , for survival of the honey bee, is humans. Who spread the varroa across the planet in double quick time, by transporting bees around the world? Who sprays/seed dresses insidious insecticides around the environmement, affecting all manner of non-target insects? Who lose lots of swarms, to become the next round of feral colonies each swarming season? Who parks bee colonies in close proximity to o

ne another so disease vectors are more easily transmitted between colonies? Who continually treats the bees with medications to remove most, but not all, varroa, thus keeping non-varroa-resistant colonies alive?

Yes, beekeepers, farmers (mainly, but horticuturists and gardeners, as well) and purveyors of nerve agent type poisons are very much to blame for the sorry state of our honey bee population.

Edited By not done it yet on 03/10/2016 23:22:56

Your turn Clive - I do love your bee features!

Rik

Me too, although there is the possibility of getting a bee in the bonnet.

The dusting of bees with powdered sugar is only to get them to clean themselves and each other, a reward of sugar for doing so. As, 'Not done yet' says, the varroa mites live in the cells feeding off the pupa body liquids.

I have dusted my bees but found it not effective.

The life cycle of the varroa is complex, but the basics are that it can breed 10 x quicker than the bees . This eventually overwhelms the hive population and it dies out due to a lack of workers. Further to this the Varroa is a vector for all the viruses that affect bees, Israeli virus, 'K' wing virus and others. Another horrific thing is that in the cell it affects the bees wings and they emerge from the cell minus wings and of course are flightless. A badly affected wild nest will have hundreds of bees running around beneath it. Control of Varroa is done at a time when the hive has a low egg laying cycle like this time of year when varroa, treatment is most effective. Impregnated strips of plastic can be hung between frames or Thymol impregnated pads can be put in and left over winter. There are new treatments coming onto the market all the time claiming all sorts of effective treatment control. Varroa seems to prefer Drone cells, and good control is to give drone base foundation and then burn it to kill the varroa.

While in Spain I spoke to a beekeeper and asked how he treated for varroa and he showed me a small tin of a treatment for sheep ticks and said that he diluted it 1000 to 1 and the varroa just fell off. Reading the tin showed it was a nerve agent pesticide so I would not eat Spanish honey.

Day before yesterday I treated all my bees with a Thymol pad which some hives chew up and throw out. I am not sure what that signifies, are they varroa free? I have used Oxalic acid diluted as a drip method between the combs, The point is that the varroa will become immune to treatment so you have to use another type.

During the US CCD problem they were importing bees from Australia and then found that they were importing bees infected with all sorts of problems. One cause of CCD ( Colony collapse Disorder) is what they call, 'Monoculture' pollen and nectar. This is where the bees are stuck collecting only one type of pollen, say, Almond, and they need multifloral collection to keep their immune systems good. Man is good at transferring dangerous pests and diseases around the world, Influenza is a good example.. Look at the Zika virus which has now reached many other countries.

One has to factor in other things like the weather and the changing pattern of seasons now, As a child I remember Easter being warm and sunny and swimming in the river, not now as it is cold wet and the river is foul from effluent from a supposedly safe sewage treatment works. We had determined seasons then but now the pattern is disrupted badly. This affects everything like the bees, pollination and growing seasons.

All I know and see is that the world is changing and not to the good. For years I collected honey in hundreds of lb's but now I am lucky to get 50lb's or so, and some hives give nothing and will barely survive winter. In 1976 I took more than 400lb of honey, a drought year but warm and sunny! The bees loved it!

Clive

If you want to keep bees without any hassle (or honey!) put up a bug house with plenty of bamboo tubes in it, making sure they are clear right through. If you are lucky you will be rewarded with being the custodian of a collection of mason bees or leaf cutter bees. These little bees are amazing, and give me and family hours of fun watching them work through their relatively short life cycle. No sting, no honey, but amazing work ethic, and amazing engineering capabilities! Well worth investing in a bug house just for that, we now have three on our fence right by the patio, where we can sit and watch.

This coming from the USA, this year We typically have different pests in a sort of schedule, June bugs then horse flies, then Tiger lady bugs. This year is the first time none of these have shown their heads. Only 1 tick, no fleas this year.When I mowed the grass Barn swallows and Swifts would circle around getting the bugs, not this year. There has been a big change bug wise from last year. Two years running only 1/2 of an apple tree was pollinated by Bumble Bees.

So what did the Swallows and Swifts do? This sound like the collapse of a food chain, very ominous.

JA

Today I went to the bees and fitted mouse guards to the entrances, until last year I have never been bothered by mice but lost one due to them last Winter. As I worked fitting them I noticed Mr. Wood pecker had been attacking the boxes so the next job is putting on sewelling plastic to stop them. Got two stings today, one on the ankle and one on my inner thigh, i must have squashed him as I squatted down to work the hive. Thats only three stings all year so far.

Re the last post about bugs, bugs are cyclic and sometimes will miss a year as they remain in dormancy. If conditions are not right they will not emerge. True, that a non emergence can upset tye food chain and cause a decline in a population of dependent animals or birds. Here the the UK, if the little green caterpillar on Oak trees does not come at the right time then Blue Tits cannot feed the young and they abandon them.

Clive

one on my inner thigh, i must have squashed him as I squatted

Steady on Clive! You know, as well as I, that drones don't have a sting!

OK, it was bee with a sting! neutral gender MK 1. Usual exclamation, 'Ouch' 'Git'. They are getting a bit dozy now and that is why I leave them to wake up a bit before I start in the Autumn.. Also a lot of the bees are out foraging so less to deal with. I did notice that as I worked at the front of the hive the bees stacked up behind me waiting to get into the hive, just like Heathrow..

The Russian Vines are flowering and they are bringing grey pollen now.

This Wood Pecker worries me, as I had not seen the Green one for a while. Now, suddenly there is a flurry of Wood Pecker activity. They are protected of course and I am pleased to see them but not around the hives.

Clive