Wrapped up for winter

With the unendurable weather we've been having of late, where rain has alternated with rain and frozen mornings have turned into freezing days, I thought it was time to shield the bees against the elements. So, with Richie's help and both unprotected, we placed the celotex panels around both brood boxes and dropped the portcullises, also known as mouseguards.

As the celotax panels are all slightly too large (they were originally cut to size when the hive were on their stand-alone stands), I returned a day later to cut off the excess and put in screws so the mouseguards wouldn't slip.

Now winter can come!

The hives in their space suits

Off drugs, on food

After four weeks of stunning Apiguard, which hopefully convinced every last varroa mite in each colony to give up and just drop onto the floor, it was time to do a full inspection and judge how the colonies were faring before the winter.

A quiet Star

The full inspections were fairly easy and swift, as the bees were on their best behaviour. It is possible that they were slightly dopey from the cold, but on the other hand it's hard to imagine they were not luxuriating in the sun and just enjoying the first sunny day for weeks. What made the inspection slightly challenging was the fact that the bees had used their weeks of peace to ensure everything in their colony was stuck down fast and that all gaps were braced. This meant a bit of a clean-up job before lifting out the frames, but it wasn't too bad.

Still quite a few bees there

Both colonies looked good on checking through them. In both the queen is still laying, though a much reduced area and only on two to three frames. Most bees now seem to be the darker, winter type, suggesting the bees are preparing for winter.

Closing up after the inspection - note on how few frames the bees are

However, the stores are not great, with two to three frames empty in each hive. To get those filled as quickly as possible, we put feeders on each hive and I'll be refilling those at regular intervals.

Giving the bees a sugar overdose

Trading trays

Having started the apiguard treatment against varroa (those pesky blood-sucking mites that attach themselves to the bees and weaken them) a fortnight ago, it was time to change it today. With school in full swing, I once again took three pupils for a short and sweet not-quite-inspection.

All we did was change the medication in each hive: take out one tray and put in a new tray. However, a quick peek between the frames showed that the bees seem fine, though they were slightly befuddled and bemused (no surprise with the rain and temperatures we've been having). Lots of brace comb (yes, they've not been idle), so the next inspection will be good fun!

There is too much medication "on dose treyz"

Not a harvest

A bit later than usual, Goulwenn and I spun out the honey today - or, rather, we tried.

Yesterday I installed the crown boards with porter bee escapes (these fancy sounding things are basically one-way doors, so the bees can leave the supers, but not get back in) underneath the supers, so that harvesting today would be bee-less. I had a few interested pupils come to watch me do this and I talked them through what I was doing. The bees were calm throughout and I came away stingless.

A slightly different story today.

But first things first: we removed two supers from the Moon (the third was as good as empty) and none from the Star, as here there was not enough honey to make a harvest worthwhile. We trussed these up and transported these and all equipment to the kitchen without incident and set up base there, as in previous years.

All still seemed fine when we uncapped the honey

We had some difficulty moving the frames around in the new extractor, until we opted for two frames per spin, rather than four. Then all fitted and turned beautifully.

Working out how to put the frames in

However, when we set about spinning, no honey was forthcoming. Most of it has crystallized in the comb. Now, with rape this is standard procedure, and indeed some rape cells (recognizable because they are very light, almost white) were obstinate. But a great many other cells, that should have contained 'normal', flowing honey, were also solid.

Spinning nothing

Dead frames with crystallized honey

So, after carving away at the cappings and spinning till the arm muscles hurt, we actually garnered very little honey - less than in the first year. While naturally disappointed, I guess that's the way it is, when working with nature, rather than mechanized methods of production. Also, the lack of spinnable honey meant we gave it all back to the bees to harvest and store for winter. Hope they can break down the honey and use it.

Double-filtered honey

The first jar (and almost the last!)

Scraping out the last bits

After the harvest, we opened up the crown boards and put feeders on each hive. We also left the supers above the hives, to be cleared, propping the supers open with a pencil, as in past years. We installed a bee gym in the Star, which led to a flood of bees sallying forth and marking me as their victim. I was forced to flee the scene, so aggressive were they. Of course, I was wearing the jacket and I soon had a bee in my back. I changed into the blue suit and that calmed them no end. Somehow, I think the bees don't like the jacket - I have nothing but problems with it.

Hives closed again and supers to be cleared on top

We left the bees in scrums to get either into the hive or the supers.

Extracting wax

Have been leaving the bees alone to get on with their own thing - there's nothing to do really until I harvest the honey, which will be later this year, due to the school kitchen cleansing programme.

In the meantime, I thought I'd sort out the wax I've been collecting and purify it ready for use for candles or whatever. This is rather an arduous process, fraught with stickiness, as wax is a devil to get rid of. Used a lot of my soap-making receptacles and will now have to buy new ones for that, as the wax doesn't come off well enough.

What precedes the whole wax making process, is letting it drip off the honey. This can take ages and doesn't always work so well - depends how viscous the honey is. All through the summer I had a muslin hanging with wax in it and when it got hot, then the honey flowed. Was also a great way to perfect my fly-swatting skills. I got most of the honey out (and now have a good stock for soap-making!) and was left with a waxy gunge.

The wax had a tendency to set again, so putting a lid on it helped keep the wax fluid till all was melted

The first thing you need to do is melt all the wax in a bain marie that has some distilled water in it (apparently tap water ruins the wax a bit). The wax will float on the water and the rubbish will be either at the top or bottom of the resulting wax cake and the honey will dissolve in the water. After all the wax has melted, the whole thing needs to be cooled down gently, so I used the heating blanket to effect that. The result is a round wax cake, with residue on top and bottom, the worst of which you scrape off. All in all I had four of these cakes.

Top side of the cake still in the bowl and the bottom, once taken out.

 
I prepared all for the next step: filtering the wax. As a filter I used an old T-shirt stretched across a tin that I had opened at both ends. This was placed on wooden supports over the plastic tub, in which I would collect the wax. The tub was coated in a film of washing up liquid, to prevent the wax from sticking. 

All ready to filter.

I melted the way in the microwave, which worked well. Towards the end, the residue that transformed into a sediment, started to burn in the bottom of the jug. So I'll have to remove that at regular intervals next time I do this.

Microwaving wax - the whole kitchen smelt beautifully!

While still hot, the wax is poured through the filter, which invariably clogs up. This is not a major issue, as the hot wax melts it again, but towards the end this no longer worked very well and I have a lump of messy wax/rubbish to process next time.

I realized putting cork under the tub might be a good idea. Melted wax has a temperature of around 77°C.

A tub of pure, melted beeswax

I needed another two (smaller) containers to hold all the wax. Of course, despite washing-up liquid, the wax stuck to the large tub and I had to break it out. The other two released their wax with no issues.

Uncertainty, then hope

I gave the bees a little more time between inspections, as I wanted to be sure the putative queens had enough time to mate and lay. Luckily the weather had been beautiful (with the exception of the beginning of this week), so I had hopes both colonies would have laying queens.

As so often, I started with the Moon. Two supers are almost full, but the third one looks very empty. I re-arranged frames in the second super, to try to persuade the bees to fill out all combs with honey, so that it's easier to harvest, when the time comes (soon, soon!). When I got down to the brood box I was once again astonished, that the number of bees does not seem to have declined. There must be an element of drift from the Star to the Moon.

Moon still busy!

Working my way through the frames, I was pleased to see eggs! Not many yet (so the queen must be fairly newly mated), but eggs nonetheless. The Moon is saved (if the bees don't go off and kill her...). As I progressed through the inspection, I had the luck to actually see the queen: quite a tawny one. And, no: I did not try and mark her, but left her in peace to get on with laying.

The Star super is devoid of any noteworthy stores, so I think I'll draw a blank on that one honey-harvest-wise.
The brood box was quieter than the Moon, but had three sides of well-laid out brood. So the Star has a queen, too, who is busy laying. She must have mated about a week before the Moon queen, because some of the brood was capped.
Funnily enough, although I saw drones in the Star, there were none (or no conspicuous ones) in the Moon.
Another weird thing was that although the Star had brood (eggs, larvae and pupae), there was a closed queen cell. I think it's the same one that was there last inspection. Grown cautious through this year, I left it untouched, as I don't know what I might trigger if I remove it. I am not sure whether it is a developing queen or simply a monument to the bees' wishful thinking and hankering for a monarch. Somehow, I think it's the latter.

The same photo - but is it the same cell?

A fond farewell

I did not expect much of this inspection, as last time we had left both hives with no queen. But I did have hopes that the Star might have a mated and laying queen. However, (main) purpose of the inspection was to bid a very fond and tearful farewell to Goulwenn, who has helped so much with the bees over the past year and more. Readers of this blog will know how invaluable his help has been. So, what I'd like to do today, after I have reported the little there is to report, is to give the floor to Goulwenn and photos of what was his last (regular) inspection of the school bees.

We started with the Moon and found, as expected, a whole host of queen cells. Some of these were architecturally questionable at best and we removed about six, leaving only one well-formed and well-situated cell.

Discarded queen cells - thus quickly is a palatial room destroyed!

The Star was a bit of a surprise. While we found the empty queen cell and must therefore infer that the queen has hatched, she is not laying yet and we could not find her. However, we did find another sealed queen cell. This should not be if there is a viable queen in the colony. Having had so many difficulties with queens lately, we decided to leave the cell where it was and see what would happen (if we have any possibility of finding that out).

The mystery cell

Hopefully, fingers crossed, next inspection I will see eggs in both hives.

And that's all about the inspection. I now give you Goulwenn, with heartfelt thanks and gratefulness.

Cap for additional head protection

Goulwenn's unique tool hook technique

 

Always careful not to squash any bees

 

Thank you for all your help!

Good bye - and hope to see you soon!

Not the executioner royal

I checked through the hive records last night and it seems the paint - though possibly the culprit in the latest episode of reginicide - is not to blame. Here are the facts:
Moon queen marked on 20th April, still laying on 30th April and probably gone 7th May, definitely gone 15th May.
Star queen marked 27th May, still laying 9th June but gone by 30th June.
2nd Star queen marked 30th June, gone by 9th July.
2nd Moon queen marked 18th July- and we know what happened to her.

What is shocking in this is that the hives have been through four queens already this year, but even more astonishing is that from 7th or 15th May till beginning July the Moon had no laying queen (though never any apparent decrease in numbers of bees in the colony) and - for whatever reasons - failed to raise a queen once. Drift from the Star could have kept bee numbers up, but it is extraordinary for the colony to survive six weeks queenless I would have thought.
Or did they raise a queen in the middle of that time who laid for a few days and then was dispatched unceremoniously?

Back to a very clueless square one...

Marking queens for sacrifice

Today, finally, I think we solved the mystery of the disappearing queens. With Goulwenn as trusty side-kick at my side, we did a double inspection: while he inspected the Moon, I looked into the Star. Because of this double act we have no photos of the inspection (also because I forgot the camera...)

The Star was quickly inspected and checked: the super is almost empty and the brood box not overpopulated. There is definitely no queen there as there was no brood at any stage of development. I set aside an empty brood frame to exchange for one from the Moon with eggs on, so the Star can raise a queen (ever hopeful that the Moon did in fact have a laying queen).

I was not disappointed in this expectation: the Moon in fact has a laying queen, as evidenced by the brood frames. While I am still somewhat concerned that there are four frames not even drawn out in the brood box, the bees are obviously busy collecting as two supers are getting very heavy.
But back to the queen: I was ecstatic that we had a laying one, as this means we could introduce one into the Star and the line of Ronian regents, so seriously tested of late, can continue. We introduced a frame with brood and a sealed queen cell (why is there a sealed queen cell there?) into the Star, so they can go about making their own. And then, Goulwenn with his eagle eyes spotted the queen! She was a darker queen again, sleek and sultry. I caught her and proceeded to mark her. I waited a bit to let the paint dry and then reintroduced her into the hive. Imagine our surprise when she was mobbed and then balled by bees. The bees packed around her so tightly, we were not able to see her again. Although we tried to uncover her, it was in vain. I'm not sure whether the bees stung, suffocated or overheated her, but I am sure the queen, after a few minutes of this handling, was dead.

Why would the bees attack their own queen? Mulling this over, our first tentative theory was that the paint must cover the queen's scent (possibly it hadn't dried sufficiently). Although it's specialist queen marking paint, it obviously somehow masks the queen's scent, so that the workers attack her when she is put in their hive. This would mean that in the past every time I marked a queen, I was actually condemning her to death. So I was the culprit (and Republican) all along! Trust humans to mess things up...

I will now go through the records this year and check whether each incident of marking is followed by the queen disappearing, which would be fairly conclusive proof. One thing I know for sure: if both Moon and Star rear a queen again now, I will NOT mark her!

Loony Queens

I was eagerly awaiting this inspection as I hoped it would finally resolve all queen issues in both Star and Moon. To recap: last inspection there had been no trace of a queen in the Moon, though I had hopes she was in there, but not yet mated. The Star had just requeened and I had been midwife to a new Star queen.
Goulwenn did the inspection, to get him more confident, as I sincerely hope he will continue beekeeping when he moves to his new school.

Opening the Star (note the cap under the suit to protect the head from stings)

We started with the Star. The feeder was empty and we decided to take it off, as the bees were only storing honey-ersatz in the central frames of the brood box rather than drawing out more comb.

Smoking a somewhat destitute Star

Although I had seen the queen hatch last time and marked her, there was no trace of her. And despite a 10-day-old queen and beautiful weather in the interim (giving her enough time to mate) there were no eggs or larvae in the hive. So, once again, we have to assume the queen has gone missing, mysteriously. Those pesky republican bees must be guillotining her or something!

So all our hopes were with the Moon. If they did not have a laying queen, if she was AWOL as well, then that would be the end of the hives and we would have to get new queens in. Not a palatable setback.
With some trepidation (and also because the bees have stuck everything down), Goulwenn carefully opened the Moon.

Ready to go in!

No matter what is going on in the brood chamber, the bees are busy collecting honey and two supers are almost full with honey now. It's strange: although the Moon has not had a laying queen for more than three weeks now if not longer), there are still many bees in there. I can't honestly say I've noticed any signs of depletion.

A frame almost full of honey

In the brood chamber we were relieved and delighted to see signs of a well-laying queen. We spotted eggs and larvae, most of them still in initial stages of development, as well as some capped cells. So the Moon queen has obviously managed to mate and is now laying. Phew! Despite checking all frames carefully, we could not find the queen herself. But she is in there and laying and that is all that matters!

A hive slowly returning to normal

Ecstatic that the future survival of the school bees is secured, we left them to their antics. I wonder what the next inspection will bring...

Queening gone mad

After the inspection today I felt I had gone mad or through the looking glass into some weird game of chess, where hives are constantly being re-queened. I really don't know what the bees are up to anymore (I feel like an absolute amateur again), but they are definitely not sane.
First, I looked into the Moon. The queen there has hatched - I saw the empty cell - but is not laying yet. I didn't see her during my inspection, which was fairly thorough. There aren't many drones (where would they come from?) and not all frames in the brood box have been drawn out yet, though one super is fairly heavy with honey. The bees were faintly aggressive again (I was stung four times). So for the Moon, it's sit and wait again, though somehow I'm not confident the queen will be a success.
The Star was an entirely different story. If you remember, here we had a dark queen laying well last time I looked and I had decided to feed them up, so they would draw out more comb in the brood box. Well, imagine my dismay when the edge frames were as flat and clear as before and most of the honey was stored in what used to be brood frames. What had happened here? I saw a number of queen cells and thought the bees must be getting ready to swarm. Silly me. I started removing the queen cells and as luck would have it (I must have a generous guardian bee watching over me), from one of the ones I had removed very carefully a queen emerged. I was gobsmacked, to say the least. I quickly caught her in the queen tube and put her to one side, not sure what the rest of the inspection would bring. I removed about five other queen cells, one of which had a queen almost ready to hatch, but still pale. As I went through frame after frame, it became clear that the Star had no queen any more. Where has she gone? Having done no inspection since I saw her last and today, I couldn't have squashed her. The bees have not swarmed, as numbers, I felt, were pretty much the same as last time.

Removed queen cells - one with an almost 'finished' queen

Anyway, I marked the queen, who is as yet unmated, and released her into the hive. My heart missed a beat when on landing on a brood frame a bee went up to her and looked like she was going to sting her! That would have been the last thing I needed. Luckily, the queen was not stung as I saw her later. She will hopefully mate and then all will be fine with the Star again.
Nevertheless, I am at a complete loss. Why are both colonies getting through their queens so quickly? Queens don't leave the hive (unless they want to swarm) - so what happened? I will have to do a lot of reading up over the summer to try and solve this mystery. In the meantime, I hope the bees sort themselves out, so we can return to some semblance of normality.