“Should I leave a super of honey for the bees over winter?” - by Malcolm Wilkie

At this time of year this is the question that I am most frequently asked by beginners and by more experienced beekeepers. If you follow these topical tips that I try and send out regularly, you will realise that there is often no one straightforward answer. It all depends on how you manage your bees.

Leaving a super of honey or taking the supers away from the bees all depends on how you wish to manage your charges. And I would argue it all depends on what the level of varroa is in your colonies and how many bees you have got in those colonies. If you have done as the BBKA recommends you will already have extracted your honey, and you will have left an inspection board in for one full week in order to calculate the natural mite drop in your colony. If your colony is a medium-size one or a small one, then you will have taken back the super/s after one day once the bees have licked out the honey left over from your extraction. This is an easy scenario because if you need to treat for varroa then there will be no supers on the hive and you can use a thymol product like Apiguard together with an eke and that will clean up the bees ready to go into winter.

If you have a super full of honey and your varroa drop is still high then you can always take that super away from the bees, treat, and then put the super back on them. This will have the added advantage of encouraging them to put any nectar they collected this time of the year into the brood box, which is where you want it. However, be careful how that is stored because wasps and local honeybees can move into your garage or bee shed if they find that honey! The difficult situation comes when you have an extremely large colony with three or four supers on them. Removing all those supers and crowding the bees into the brood box may not be a very intelligent idea. Crowding bees at any time of the year can encourage swarming!

A large populous colony will no doubt have varroa and that can be building up at this time of year. They may still be collecting nectar and making honey and some people will still be able to do an extraction in early September. The catch 22 is that a lot of the treatments against varroa mite only properly work when the temperatures are high enough. And so, this treatment should be carried out now in August. And those treatments cannot be used if there are supers on the hive.

It is because I often experience the above scenario that I do not often treat in August but sublimate with oxalic acid in December. I know our French counter parts would argue that that is not good because it is the winter bees being made at the moment that are the ones that are going to carry the colony through the winter. However, I make one proviso. That is that if I find a huge mite drop at this time of year and distressingly see that there are a lot of deformed wings, then I will make sure that I treat. That is a good tip for you all – look now for DWV on your bees. If you see it, alarm bells should be ringing. And if alarm bells are ringing, do something.

Malcolm Wilkie 17^th August 2019

“Bees and the current heat wave” - by Malcolm Wilkie

Today temperatures are going to reach 30° in some parts of Kent and Sussex.

Most of us keep bees in national hives and we have a flat or gabled metal roof on top of the hive. If you have your beehive situated in full sun, then this will be scorching to the touch. This is not good for the bees and will stress them out.

Most colonies will cope as long as there is a super above the brood box. However you will reduce their potential to forage because instead of collecting nectar they are going to have to go and fetch water in order to cool down the hive. In effect you are reducing their potential to collect you honey.

Smaller colonies that you are growing into a full sized hive are really going to suffer. This may well be the case if you are a beginner and have started with a nucleus. This is because your roof is directly above the brood nest. Just consider how hot that roof is getting in full sunshine and, of course, that high temperature is being transmitted to the brood frames below! In nature the bees would be in a hollow in a tree and there would be no metal to heat up anywhere near their nest.  If we do nothing to shade the roof we are creating the equivalent of the black hole of Calcutta for our bees. In effect you are virtually cooking them alive.

In fact I believe you will be stressing the bees so much that there is bound to be an adverse effect and that is that, in consequence of not being able to cool the brood to the correct temperature, fungal infections will set in -particularly chalk brood and sac brood. In past years this has been my experience where I have not shaded the roof.

This will not be a problem for owners of WBC hives because the outer skin created by the lifts shades the box. Owners of Poly hives may need to shade the roofs but you will not get the extreme temperatures created by pieces of metal heating up.

So what do you do? Use thick celotex either inside the roof or simply placed on top of the roof. If placed inside, make sure you cut out holes for the ventilation. Pictures of Lesley’s hives are included.

We are now in the midst of a nectar flow and the bees are making honey for you. Make sure that if you have a prosperous colony that they have enough space. You may be in the position of trying to get them to cap the honey. This can be tricky but you can help. Make sure there is a little space between each super frame. You might also consider removing the end frames of each super so that there can be a good airflow around the nectar that they are trying to convert into honey. During the next week or so temperatures are above 20° and the bees will want to convert that nectar into stores for the future. Help them as much as you can while the heat window allows. July is all about honey and then for most of us it is all over.

The better beekeepers among will have got large colonies and they are the ones that are going to make honey. A colony has to have an excess of foragers before they can make honey in any quantity. Well done if you are in the fortunate position of bees collecting you honey.

Malcolm Wilkie 29th June 2019

“The June gap” - by Malcolm Wilkie

I don’t know if others have noticed, but we have recently experienced the June gap. Colonies in response to the dearth of nectar will have reduced the egg laying rate of the Queen or even put her off lay completely.  Other stronger colonies will have been eating stores from their honey super.

Experienced beekeepers with strong colonies and supers on their hives have nothing to worry about. Even if there is little in the brood box the super of honey will have sustained the bees - that is unless an extraction has already been done. However if swarm control has already been done by the more experienced among you there may now be a box of bees that is extremely light on stores, and this could also be a problem. Even more so with all this wet weather we are having because this is forcing the bees to stay at home instead of getting out and bringing back nectar. And if they stay at home, they munch.

So please check your colonies and the stores that the bees have available to them. If you don’t have a super on your hive yet and there are no frames of stores or at least capped honey around the brood nest, then you should feed.

Beginners often buy a nucleus which they then put into a full sized hive. So they too, more than anyone else, are in the above situation.

Are they feeding these bees? Are the bees being given the food necessary for them to draw wax and to build a full sized brood nest? Of course one cannot continually stimulate by feeding sugar syrup, otherwise your bees will swarm. However some stop start feeding to encourage them to build up sufficiently so that you are then able to put a super on is a good investment of money. Have beginners even noticed that their bees are struggling?

The above colony looks really prosperous. However notice how little honey there is. In fact I cannot see any honey at all! These bees belong to Lesley and are absolutely fantastic and prolific but they do not put honey above the brood nest on their 14*12 frames. Such a colony (and what a colony) could have great difficulty in finding enough food If they have no stores available to them or if we as Beekeepers have stolen the honey from them. Remember large colonies (without stores) are the ones that can starve the quickest as there are just so many mouths to feed.

Ironically things are about to change. The south east has been battered by storms and there is now a good reservoir of moisture in the soil. What does this mean? Once temperatures rise again anything in flower will exude nectar in abundance and there will be a huge nectar flow. Anyone with a large colony will be able to put supers on their hives and collect honey. Sweet chestnut and lime are preparing to flower as we speak.

You may therefore be wondering why I am sending you this topical tip if a nectar flow is just about to start. It is so that you know that each one of you should be looking carefully at the environment around them and what is in flower and how much moisture there is in the soil. I picked up last week that things were difficult for the bees and so I fed any boxes without supers. This will have kept the Queen laying eggs and means that when the sweet chestnut does come into flower these colonies will be sufficiently big for me to then add a super and to collect that nectar so that I get honey.

Bee farmers will no doubt be combining colonies in order to create a huge foraging force under a new queen. Why do they do this? In order to guarantee a good honey crop because it is only when the bees can collect nectar in excess of their own requirements that you get a good honey crop for the beekeeper. A strong foraging force is the key to good honey crops.  It is also, of course, a way of keeping down their colony numbers (those of you who are less squeamish then myself shudder at the thought of what happens to those old Queens).

One of the beginners on my course this year has just shown me his hive records. On it he does not mark the stores available to the two colonies he has. One should fill in this section as it helps you to assess whether any feed needs to be given. Now when I fill in my record sheet I put on my record sheet a number which equates to the number of super frames of honey available to the bees. So if I have a full super on the hive (11 frames) and two full brood frames in the brood box (14*12 so 2 brood frames would be equivalent to 4 super frames) I would write down under the ‘Stores’ section 15.

Such a system enables me to immediately see which are my most prosperous colonies. So one of my colonies at one stage had 44 frames of stores whereas there were others with only 12 or 13. Assessing how much honey a colony makes is information that can then be gathered at a glance.

If you are not already using one of the hive record sheets from our website, the BBKA does a good hive recording system which anyone can download. It is the clearest system I have yet found anywhere.

Malcolm Wilkie - 14th June 2019

“Queenright or Queenless?” - by Malcolm Wilkie

A lot of Beekeepers have colonies at present that have been split or have swarmed. A new Queen takes at least three weeks to come into lay and this is a tense time for the beekeeper and for the bees. Many beginners assume they have no Queen and quite often go and purchase one needlessly from a beefarmer.

If you know that your box has swarmed, you will roughly know when this happened and so will know when you can start to look for eggs and young larvae i.e. three weeks after your Virgin has hatched.

A box that has swarmed or has been split and is raising a virgin, should initially be left well alone. You don't want to confuse a virgin returning from a mating flight. If she gets lost due to your 'fiddling', you will then have a Queenless colony. However once those three weeks have passed you do need to start to look.

If you see eggs and larvae, then all is well and you will then need to assess the brood pattern. However more often than not you will find no eggs or larvae. This does not mean that your colony is Queenless however. This is the moment when you need to carefully inspect the brood frames. Blow or smoke the bees out of the way.

A Queenright colony will be preparing a brood nest for their new Queen and everything is alright if you see an area of cells on a couple of frames that have been cleaned out and polished in readiness for the new Queen to start laying. There will probably be pollen above these cells and stores in the corner of the fames. In other words the bees are organising themselves and it is order that you will see within your hive. But if you do not see this order after three weeks and you can still see nectar chucked randomly into cells, then there may well be a problem and you should give them a frame of eggs from your other hive. If they raise Queen cells, then evidently they were Queenless. If they seal the brood without creating Queen cells, then you may have a virgin or you may have cussed bees who have decided they no longer want a Queen.

If you get into this scenario, and still after several weeks you can find nothing, then your only hope is to try and get hold of a failing old Queen from someone and come and ask me how to introduce her. She will have low pheromone levels and could possibly be accepted by your Queenless colony. Once the old lady starts laying it will then be possible to bump her off and introduce a Queen. A scenario to be avoided if at all possible as it is difficult to bring back a colony from the brink.

Malcolm Wilkie – 23^rd May 2019 (Resent from June 2017 and May 2018)

“Bee viruses and the damage they can do to our colonies” - by Malcolm Wilkie

Above is a dead queen cell larva removed from one of my hives today. This was the only queen cell I had left in the colony so I will now have to find a queen cell or a virgin queen to bring this colony back from the brink.

This virus is black queen cell virus and only affects queen cells. Worker and drone larvae are not affected.

On the positive side at least I am on the ball and so with this colony I had gone in to check the cell and as it was still sealed (and that was a week after my calculations that it should have hatched), I opened it up and found this dead larva.

I know we tell beginners to leave everything well alone when a virgin is emerging (there is always a danger of squashing ‘her’ if one is unlucky). However, I only gently go into the hive and then go straight to the frame I marked with the drawing pin. Of course, if I have heard a virgin piping (yes, I always do listen) I don’t disturb. So, the positive is I know I need to do something.

We teach beginners about DWV (deformed wing virus). Varroasis (having let varroa get out of control) is a sad sight to behold with dead pupae half emerged from their cells with their tongues hanging out. Varroasis would be the consequence of ignoring DWV.

The worst to behold is chronic bee paralysis virus. This is even more upsetting as the bees all quiver and shake. Usually destruction is recommended although Helen Hadley and Peter Coxon have managed to successfully turn around a colony. But what you have to do is brutal.

There are also many other viruses and they are prevalent because varroa transfers viruses between bees, and so something that would naturally only ever be a background problem can suddenly get out of hand.

We all need to be aware of problems that occur and strive to keep healthy bees. Changing comb, treating against varroa if necessary, shook swarming, giving feed if suddenly there is a dearth of nectar in the environment, making sure in August that the bees emerging are in tip top shape to carry the colony through the winter and of course feeding properly in September.

There are also products which promote bee health such as Hive Alive and these also can be used and, in my experience, seem to boost the number of bees you get in a colony.

Malcolm Wilkie 19th May 2019