New Generation Beekeeping

At Last the sun is shining but it’s not warming up yet It’s almost mid March and the sun is shining but after a day or two earlier in the month that persuaded the bees to have a cleansing flight and start thinking of Spring we’ve had some very sharp frosts at night. I lost a small colony in a Warré hive even though they had some candy, I suspect that the number of bees was too small to keep warm. I’ve just looked in a National hive in a neighbours garden where the bees were flying quite well ten days ago, I had a quick peek in and they seemd to have enough stores with some full frames in the Super directly above the cluster but today they are alll dead. They have starved to death presumably because they didn’t move to a frame with stores in when it was warmer. I thought that it might have been because the queen had started laying and they didn’t want to leave their eggs but I couldn’t see any. It just goes to show that despite having plenty of stores very near to the cluster they couldn’t seem to find it. I have a Warré in my garden which has lost a lot of bees this winter, judging by the amount of corpses on the floor, and they too got some candy when the weather eased after Christmas. The difference being that the cluster moved onto a different comb when the weather was warmer and today they are busy foraging, possibly for water, but small amounts of pollen are also being collected. The Warré in the photo is the July 09 swarm photographed at the beginning of March. There are two and a half boxes full of bees all getting ready for the new season.

Keeping in Touch This Winter I’ve been setting up different ways for those who are interested in my bees and their activities. I started the winter with 3 National hives and 11 Warrés in the UK and 1 Warré in France. If I had the colonies I could place another 40+ Warré hives in gardens in the UK. So I now have a blog at http://newgenbees.blogspot.com/ where I can add bits about the bees quite quickly. If you find it interesting or have bees feel free to add comments and observations or pictures. I also have a Linkedin Group at http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gi d=2747834&trk=hb_side_g for people who are ‘Friends of NewGenBees and either have a hive or are waiting patiently for one. If your on Linkedin ask to be connected