Beekeeping Guide

Omlet Guide Issue 1 Page 1 Table of Contents Introduction 3 Swarm control 23 What do you need to start? 3 What are swarms? 23 The history of the 3 Swarm control methods 23 The role of the beekeeper 4 Catching a swarm 25 Why are so important? 4 How to hive a swarm 26

About bees 5 The beekeeping year 27 Queens, drones and workers 5 January 27 bee population 5 February 27 Bee anatomy 6 March 27 What do bees forage for? 6 April 27 Bee life cycle 7 May 28 June 28 Beekeeping 8 July 28 Equipment 8 August 28 Components of a 8 September 29 Siting your beehaus 10 October 29 Acquiring your bees 11 November 29 Transferring bees to your beehaus 11 December 29 Moving your beehaus 12 Bee stings 12 Bee health 30 Best health practices 30 How to inspect your bees 14 Pests 30 Preparing to Inspect your beehaus 14 Varroa 30 Smoking your bees 14 Varroa treatment 30 How to open your beehaus 14 Foulbrood 31 How to inspect the frames 15 Sterilising your beehaus 31 How to mark a queen 16 When to add honey supers 16 Honey 32 Managing your beehaus with Supers on 17 How do bees make honey? 32 Honey in jars 32 Advanced beekeeping 19 Honey collection 32

Feeding your bees 21 Getting additional help 33 Making sugar syrup 22 When to feed? 21 Trouble shooting 34

Bee glossary 36

Contributors License & Copyright This guide could not have been made without the help and advice from This guide is copyright Omlet Limited 2009. It many experienced bee keepers. We would like to thank the following: is licensed under the the Creative Commons John Chappel, Caroline Birchall, Robin Dartington, Paul Peacock and License: Attribution-No Derivative Works 2.0 Sally Wadsworth. UK: England & Wales.

This means that you are free to copy, distribute, display, and perform the work under the following conditions:

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Omlet Beekeeping Guide © Copyright Omlet 2009 Page 2 Introduction The history of the bee This bee guide has been written as an introduction and manual to The honeybee is a highly sophisticated insect that has evolved over keeping bees. It does not cover every single beekeeping activity, however millions of years. The earliest recorded Bee was found in Myanmar. It it covers all the basics you need to get started in beekeeping. In this was found encased in amber and has been dated as 100 million years fantastic guide to keeping bees you will learn about the bees, the role old. It’s likely that the bee originated in the Far East. In those early days, of the beekeeper, how the beehaus works and much more. the bees were more like wasps, eating other insects rather than nectar and pollen. It’s unclear exactly when bees decided to become vegetarian There is also a complete instruction manual for assembling and but considering the choice between eating a fly and some delicious, using your beehaus which you should have received with your sweet tasting nectar from a cherry tree in full bloom, it seems like a beehaus. This guide will assume that you have read this instruction good decision. manual first. Today bees live all over the world and there are approximately 20,000 We hope you find the guide useful. If you have any feedback orany species. These range from the giant leaf eating bee, which is over 3cm queries please email [email protected] long to the tiny dwarf bee which is just 2mm long. The honeybee is just one of these species. Most other bees do not live in colonies preferring a more solitary existence. for example live in burrows in the ground.

As well as crop pollination scientists believe that bees are responsible for the rich flower diversity we enjoy today. Most flowering plants cannot self-pollinate and pollination that relies on the wind to carry their seed is not very efficient, so flowers evolved with bright colours and markings to attract bees and to ensure that they were rewarded for the pollination What do you need to start? service provided them with a nutritious nectar too. The bees drink the nectar and transport it in a special stomach back to the hive to share If you are reading this guide you have most likely received a with the Queen, of course, and also to feed the hive bees and the larvae beehaus kit. In addition to the beehaus the minimum requirements for which will become the new bees. keeping bees are as follows: For early man, discovering honey Bees was as life changing as the discovery Obviously to keep bees – you need to find some bees. There are lots of of fire. Until the invention of the options for finding bees and this is covered in more detail on Page 11 beesuit it produced a similar painful sensation if you got too close. Equipment However, the bravery was worth it Beekeeping requires a few pieces of essential equipment including because it seems humankind had, clothing, tools and (obviously) a beehaus. These are covered later in the in preparation, already developed guide. See Page 8 a sweet tooth.

A location for your bees Honey was the most important Bees can be kept anywhere from country orchards to urban gardens sweetener for food and alcoholic to small city balconies. It is a common misconception that you need drinks in ancient times. So a large garden or the countryside on your doorstep. Although lots of important were these activities that space can make siting your bees easier, urban gardens are arguably parents named their children after better. Nectar and pollen can be gathered from a wide variety of plants the bees. Both Deborah and Melissa that will give your honey a wonderful flavour. This means that there is mean “bee”, in Hebrew and Greek often a constant source of food throughout the summer and a lack of respectively. It has been sought as harmful pesticides. This is covered on Page 10. an antiseptic and sweetener for at least 100,000 years. In Ancient Time Egypt and the Middle East, it was Keeping bees requires small amounts of regular time with the bees. used to embalm the dead. During the summer you typically have to spend around one hour per Spanish cave painting dated around week with a hive. You can do this at the weekend or, if the weather 6000 BC is still good, when you return from work. Most beekeepers would like Surprisingly then, it wasn’t until to spend more time with their bees rather than less, as beekeeping is Egyptian times that peoples started highly addictive. Unlike keeping other animals, the bees mostly look to keep bees at home. The Egyptian after themselves and will not notice if you go on holiday. From October hive design was a simple upturned through to February you don’t need to inspect your bees at all as they straw basket called a skep. These hibernate over winter in the hive. In all, you might spend 20-30 hours are still used today although mainly over the course of a year with the bees. for temporarily housing a colony of bees that has recently swarmed. Support Beekeeping is an interesting hobby with lots to learn and it is often Early , such as the skep, helpful to have someone friendly to support you. You can do this by were not designed for long attending an Omlet Course and meeting follow beekeepers (see www. term use. The honey couldn’t be omlet.co.uk/courses for more information). It’s also a good idea to extracted without destroying the join your local Beekeeping Association (see www.britishbee.org.uk for hive and therefore the colony. The more information). system only worked if the colony produced enough bees to create a swarm, which would be caught and go on to provide the honey in the following year. Otherwise, each An early Greek hive year a new swarm of bees had to be caught. There was a desperate need for a way of keeping the same colony of bees year after year so that more honey could be produced and the expanded.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 3 A breakthrough discovery in beekeeping was made by a man Why are bees so important? called Lorenzo Langstroth. He The most important reason for bees are the pollination service that they discovered that bees would keep a provide. Pollination is the process by which many plants reproduce. It ‘bee sized’ pathway clear within a involves the movement of pollen between plants - i.e. the male gametes hive if it was between 6 and 8mm (or sperm) are transferred to the female gametes. The is one wide. He named the discovery ‘spazio of many essential pollen transporters for the plants. They are responsible di ape’ ( or ‘bee space’ in English for the pollination of a wide variety of crops, fruits and flowers. ). This discovery was important because it led to the development How does pollination work? of hives with moveable frames of The plants and bees have a symbiotic comb. This allowed the beekeeper relationship. The plant provides to remove comb and honey without food for the bees in the form of destroying the hive. It also enabled nectar (a sugary water produced the beekeeper to start manipulating as a by-product to photosynthesis). the colony; helping it develop and As the bee collects the nectar it grow. This discovery is often sited as Lorenzo Langstroth brushes against the anthers of the the start of modern beekeeping. plant and pollen grains stick to the bee’s hairy body. When the bee then visits another plant some of The role of the beekeeper the pollen on its body will rub off Bee covered in pollen on the stigma of the plant. By this The role of most beekeepers is to provide a comfortable home for a bee process bees pollinate about a third of our food. colony and to nurture it while disturbing it as little as possible. It’s good to think of bees as being wild. Even though you can keep them in your Pollination Services garden - it’s impossible to stop them leaving if they want to. To be a Unfortunately, the number of wild successful beekeeper, you must understand the natural instincts of the bee colonies has decreased over bee and the organisation of the hive. The activities of beekeepers today many years, as their natural habitat are increasingly important as the numbers of truly wild, unmanaged has been cleared to make way for colonies has declined due to pollution and the destruction of habitats farm land. Now, many farms often in the wild. have to hire bees to help pollinate their crops. This is especially Your mission as a beekeeper, should you choose to accept it, would important in America where about be to help the colony to grow strong and healthy. If successful, the 50% of all beehives are transported colony would produce more honey than it requires and you would be to California each year to help able to harvest the excess. There are three main types of beekeepers in pollinate the almond orchards. The the world: Truck with pollen beehives are loaded onto pallets and then transported 1000’s of miles across the country on trucks. This is Amateur Beekeepers obviously stressful for the bees and many believe that this is one of the An amateur beekeeper might have anywhere between 1-40 hives. Over factors in the colony colapse disorder. this number and you have to start spending all your time with the bees.

An Amateur Beekeeper A Commercial Beekeeper

Commercial Beekeepers Commercial beekeepers typically have over 40 hives and spend most of their time tending to them. They may be keeping bees to produce honey or hiring the bees out to farmers for crop pollination. Hiring colonies has become a huge business - especially in America where some bee farmers have literally thousands of hives which they move to wherever they are needed.

Bee Inspector A bee inspector is a beekeeper with a large amount of experience. If you keep bees, then at some point you may have your bees inspected. Every area has a local bee inspector and it’s a good idea to find out who your local inspector is. If your bees become ill, sometimes you are required to report the illness to the inspector. You won’t be in trouble but will be helping reduce the risk of your bees transferring the disease to other colonies. The inspectors are managed centrally by the National Bee Unit visit http://beebase.csl.gov.uk/ for more information.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 4 About bees The Drones - 1000 per colony A is a male bee. It is about the same size as the queen but is much This section will give you a good understanding of the behaviour, life of more squarely built. His wings completely cover his abdomen and his the bees inside your beehaus. large round head is distinctive for its two eyes which meet at the top. He has no sting. Male bees appear to have a very easy life. Queens, Worker and Drones The Queen - 1 per colony The is the leader of the bee colony. She is the only fully mature female bee in the colony and is usually the mother of all the other bees. The queen is recognisable from other bees because she is the longest bee in the hive. Her wings extend about half the way along her abdomen, which is pointed at the rear. Her head is proportionally small for her body.

The Drones

They do not work in the hive, do not forage for food, cannot defend the hive (as they have no sting) and are looked after by the workers who feed them honey. Their one purpose in life is to mate with the queen, after which they die. They do not survive over winter and any that are left in the hive in the autumn will be escorted out by the workers (girl power?).

A marked queen surrounded by workers The queen’s main purpose in life is to reproduce. A good queen will lay around 2,000 eggs per day (which would take a chicken over 6 Bee life cycle years to produce!). She is, in fact, a terrible mother, having completely lost any instinct to care for her young. The queen relies on the female All bees start their lives as eggs. These grow into larvae and then worker bees to raise her young. She controls the workers’ behaviour by pupate into fully formed bees. The Queen, drones and worker bees producing pheromones which affect their behaviour. take different amounts of time to complete the stages. This is useful to know when you come to inspect your hive and need to know how long The Workers - 10,000 - 50,000 per colony ago the queen has laid a particular type of egg. The worker is the smallest bee and is about half the weight of the queen and drone. The abdomen is pointed and the wings are short. Female worker bees literally work themselves to death over the course of their lives. They typically live for only 3 weeks.

QUEEN DRONE WORKER The Workers Days after Days after Days after laying laying laying They provide food for grubs, drones and the queen bee and build the wax honeycomb that forms the hive’s integral structure. In fact, they are Hatching of egg 3 3 3 model citizens - they clean, ventilate, defend and repair the hive, and Cell sealed 8 10 8-9 most ingeniously of all worker bees are experts in air conditioning. Spinning of cocoon 9 12 10 Moult of pupa to adult 15 22 20 Emerges from cell 16 24 21 Ready to mate 20 37

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 5 How long do bees live? Honey bee population The average length of life is also different depending on the type of The colony population expands and contracts with the seasons. bee and when they are born. A typical colony will build up its population using the nectar of the early flowers in Spring. Then with a large workforce, itcan QUEEN DRONE WORKER harvest the higher quality nectar in the summer, which it will store Summer 3-4 years 22 days 36 days over winter.

Winter 3-4 years 59 days 6 months Population Growth You can see how the bee colony changes in size in the diagram below:

Cell Types The type of cell the egg will be laid in depends on whether the egg is fertilized and whether the egg is destined to be a new queen. The 3 types of cell are as follows:

1. Drone Cells - Large hexagonal with a domed cap. More often drone cells are found at the bottom of a frame.

2. Worker Cells - Small hexagonal with a flat cap.

From March onwards, the colony is dedicated to the development of the brood and the queen increases her egg laying rapidly. The brood numbers peak around May/June. The ratios of adult bees to brood at this time is around 2 to 1. The amount of food that is required by the colony will, at this point, remain static and the bees will be intensively storing nectar. The overall bee population peaks around July / August and reaches it lowest point around February / March. 3. Queen Cells - Large, thimble shape and hang vertically. These Temperature Control can appear at any time of year if the bees are producing a queen. The temperature of the brood is critical and must be kept within the range of 32-36degC. They do this by either fanning their wings to cool the hive or by metabolizing honey to heat it. The brood also produces heat as the larvae and pupae grow. If the colony is too hot, the workers douse their bodies in water and bring it into the hive. They then fan the air with their wings, thus bringing the temperature down by evaporation. In cooler times, they huddle together around the brood of eggs to keep it warm.

How does the queen lay? The queen measures the cell size with her front legs and either adds sperm to fertilise the egg in her vagina (if it’s a queen or worker cell) or simply lays an unfertilised egg (if its a drone cell). When the egg hatches into larvae, it looks like a little maggot and the nurse bees start to feed it.

The nurse bees feed the larvae with bee milk. This is masticated pollen and is an extremely nutritious food, the cell is regularly topped up for [Image of bees fanning their wings] the first three days, thereafter it is fed less frequently until thecell is capped. Bee eggs are parthenogenetic, which means they will hatch even if not fertilized and this is the deciding factor as to whether the egg The queen cell is fed bee milk with a higher sugar content than worker that hatches is a male or female bee. Unfertilised eggs will produce larvae. This super beemilk is called and the queen larvae are males, known as drones. Fertilised eggs will produce females, which fed as much of this as possible until the cell is capped. This difference will be either workers or queens depending on how they are fed produces a strong queen with properly developed ovaries. by the workers. There are no queen eggs or worker eggs, they are exactly the same; the difference occurs in how they are fed when Drones are thought to be fed a similar ration to the workers. Incidentally they hatch. An egg that is selected to be a new queen will be fed only the cell caps are a mixture of pollen and wax which is breathable. royal jelly - an extremely protein rich food producted by the bees.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 6 Bee anatomy What plants are good for your bees? All bees are made up of three distinct parts, the head, thorax and There are lots of plants that are fantastic for bees. As a general rule, abdomen. Like most insects, the bee has a strong exoskeleton (i.e. it has you should try to plant as wide a variety as possible. You should aim ts skeleton on the outside of its body). to plant them in clumps to make it easier for the bees to find and if possible choose local plants rather than exotic ones. Some of the best are: Basil Lavender Berberis Love-in-a-mist Borage Michaelmas Daisy Buckwheat Phacelia Californian poppy Poached egg plant Calluna vulgaris Rosemary Catmint Sedum Crocus Sunflower Doronicum Thyme Geranium Viburnum Globe thistle White sweet clover Hebe Willow

Nectar sources throughout the year

Plants March June August May August September Brassicas – includes No oil seed rape

The head - The head contains the eyes, mouth and antennae which are Dandelion used for communicating. They have a sophisticated tongue to taste the Sainfoin quality of nectar essential for making good honey. Sycamore The Thorax - The thorax consists of three segments below the head. The Clover first bears the first pair of legs. The second bears the second pair of legs Lime and the first pair of wings and the final segment bears the third pair of legs and the second pair of wings. The wings move at an amazing Blackberry 11,000 times per minute and can carry the bee up to 12 miles an hour. Willow Herb All segments are covered in hairs which are long and feathered in the worker for collection of pollen. The drone has shorter hairs and the Heather queen has only a few.

The Abdomen - The abdomen contains the bee’s digestive system, honey sack and, in the females, the reproductive organs and sting. The Pollen sources throughout the year honey sack can hold approximately 0.25ml - so it takes a lot of flights Pollen source March June August (approximately 20,000) to create even just a single jar of honey. May August September Coltsfoot How do bees find food? Anenome Bees are fantastic foragers and pollinators. The bees will fly over 3 miles Winter aconite away from their hive and continually adapt to the changing season and plants. A typical bee will make 3,000 visits to flowers in a day and will Dandelion keep visiting the same area until all the nectar is finished. Elm

The waggle dance - In a colony, over half the bees will spend their time Hazel foraging. Within these foragers, there is a small number of elite ‘scout Broom bees’. The scouts spend their time looking for good sources of food. Once Gorse they have found a good source of quality nectar, they return to the hive and tell the other bees where to find it. They do this by performing the famous Meadowsweet waggle dance. Blackberry Ivy Sweet Chestnut Clover Michaelmas daisies Heather Ling Brassicas The bees waggle at an angle This is the same angle as the flowers Christmas Rose to vertical. The longer the waggle the are to the sun further the nectar Sycamore

The scout bee stands on the honey comb and dances. Like any good Horse Chestnut dancing club - it’s quite dark in the beehive. The other bees have to feel Hawthorne the dance with their antennae. The scout also shares some of the nectar, Maple to let the other bees know the quality that they have found.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 7 Beekeeping Components of a beehive In this section you will learn the basics of beekeeping from setting up To start, you will need to learn the various components of a beehive your beehaus, introducing your bees and inspecting them throughout as they are referred to in the guide. Bees need a warm, secure and dry the year. place to live. In the wild, bees make their nest in a variety of places such as hollow trees and holes in rocks. The beehive was developed to make it easier to manage a colony of bees and collect honey. There are lots of different hive designs throughout the world, which follow the same basic principles.

Lid

Bungee

Cover boards

Super Frames

Supers

Brood Frames Divider Board

Entrance Blocker Brood box

Inspection tray

Legs

Dummy Board

Clearer Boards

An exploded image of a beehaus.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 8 What are the main parts of a beehive called? Equipment The diagram on the left shows a beehaus with a section removed so that you can see the inside as well as the outside. From the outside you can A Beehaus - The beehaus comes with everything see the main parts of a beehive are the lid, the supers, the brood box, you need to get started including: brood frames, super the entrance and the stand. These are each described in more detail frames, 4 supers, 4 queen excluders, inspection tray and below. entrance blocks

Outer Lid - This protects the hive from the cold, wind and rain. It provides year round insulation. Bee Suit - A good bee suit is essential for enjoying Supers - The supers are used by the bees to store honey. A colony will spending time with your bees. It should protect you from store honey throughout the summer in preparation for the winter. If being stung and also keep the bees away from your face your bees are successful they will have surplus honey which you can - making it a stress free experience. There are a wide harvest for your own use. variety of suits available including full body, upper body or even just the veil. We recommend purchasing a full Super frames - The Super frames are shallower than the brood frames. body suit because it is the simplest way of guaranteeing They hold the that the bees build the comb on. you are bee proof. Of course, once you own a suit - you will never be short of a fancy dress costume again! Brood box - This is the colony’s home, the place where the bees live and where the queen lays her eggs. These large frames are referred to as brood frames. When inspecting your hive these are the frames that you look through. Your beehaus comes with 11 brood frames with wax Gloves - Although not essential - most beekeepers foundation sheets. wear gloves to protect their hands. You can wear leather ones, marigolds (the height of Brood frames - The brood frames are where the bees store nectar and fashion for London rooftop beekeepers) or if pollen for their immediate use. It’s also where the queen lays the eggs your bees are especially gentle, no gloves at all. that will hatch first into larvae and then metamorphose into new bees. However, for a new beekeeper it is best to be There are lots of slightly different sizes of frames. The beehaus uses deep completely covered. National frames which are the most common size used in the UK.

Entrance - Every hive must have an entrance to allow the bees to come and go. The entrance is sheltered from the wind and rain. It leads to an inner hive entrance which is large enough for the bees to bring in nectar Boots - Welly boots are good protection against bees. The and pollen - but small enough to bees crawl upwards, so you should tuck your trousers into defend easily. the boots so that the bees cannot crawl up your legs

Stand - A good hive stand should bring the working height of the hive up to waist height to reduce the effort of handling the parts of the hive. It will also keep the hive out of cold pockets of air in the winter. The beehaus comes with sturdy legs that raise the top of the hive to 0.8m. Liquid Smoker - You will need either a liquid smoker Cover board - The cover board is used to seal the bees inside the hive. or a traditional smoker to help keep your bees clam. In the winter, when there are no Supers on the beehive, the cover board When the bees smell the smoke they naturally assume sits on the brood box. In summer, when the supers are on, the cover that their hive is on fire. Like all good organisations, they board sits on top of the Super. The beehaus comes with 4 cover boards initiate a well practiced fire drill and start to eat honey - one for each Super. in preparation to leave the hive. Smoke also masks the communication between the bee so that they cannot raise Queen excluder - The Supers are just for storing honey but the queen the ‘alarm’ as you open the hive. doesn’t know this and will sometimes lay eggs in them. This makes harvesting the honey difficult so a special sheet called a ‘queen excluder’ is placed directly on top of the brood frames. The queen excluder has holes big enough for the workers to get through but too small for the - Bees make a glue called from the resin queen and therefore prevents the queen from climbing up into the of trees. It is used to seal up cracks and crevices including supers. The beehaus comes with 4 queen excluders, one for each Super. the moveable honeycomb. The hive tool is the Swiss army knife of beekeeping. It is a metal lever which helps you prise Insulation - Bees need to maintain a constant temperature to raise open parts of your hive or scrape up any mess that the bees their young. The better insulated a hive, the less energy the bees will have made. have to expend on maintaining this temperature. The beehaus has all round triple pocket insulation that greatly reduces the heat loss from the hive in winter and helps the bees keep the hive cool in the summer. Notepad - It is good idea to keep notes on your bees. You should have a beekeeping notepad with your beekeeping Mesh floor - Some beehives have a solid floor but the best type of equipment so that you can jot notes as you inspect floor for a beehive is made of mesh. This provides all-year round draught the hive. free ventilation in the hive. Good air circulation is important for healthy bees. The mesh floor also allows debris to fall out of the hive, saving the bees the effort of having to remove this themselves. The beehaus has a full length mesh floor.

Inspection tray - To make full use of the mesh floor, the best beehives have an inspection tray underneath. The inspection tray catches any mites or debris that fall from the hive which you can then examine to learn about the health of your bees. The beehaus comes with an inspection tray as standard.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 9 Siting your beehaus Rooftop Bees You can keep bees on a rooftop or balcony in the town or the country. The position you choose for your beehaus is very important. You can place You should check that the roof is able to take the weight of a full colony your beehaus in a variety of places from rooftops to country orchards. with honey (approx: 200kg). Like you would in a garden, you should Choosing the right location will make it much easier to manage bees. give the bees room to fly out of the hive. You can locate a hive up to 100 Once you have put your bees in location it can be slightly complicated stories off the ground. We recommend you secure your beehaus to your to move them, so it is worth giving it some thought. There are a few roof to insure it can’t be accidently knocked off. general things to bear in mind regardless of the situation.

• Choose a quiet, level location away from busy footpaths where the hive is unlikely to be disturbed.

• Ensure you leave about 1m of space in front of the hive entrance to give the bees room to fly in and out.

• You can encourage your bees to fly up and away above head height by placing an obstacle (such as a hedge or fence) a short distance (i.e 1.5m) from the hive entrance.

• You should try to shelter the entrance of the hive from the prevailing C wind to make it easy for the bees to take off and land. A

• Ideally you should have a water source near the bees but not within 3 meters as the bees will not drink from this for hygiene reasons. If this is B not possible, don’t worry, the bees will most likely find water locally.

• You should avoid locating your bees near horses (which bees don’t like), high voltage power lines, children’s playground or under trees which might constantly drip on the hive and irritate the bees.

Garden Locations Generally it is a good idea to place your beehive at the bottom of your garden unless this is very close to a busy part of your neighbours garden. You should ensure you leave space for access to your beehaus. You should be able to stand or move around easily. Try to avoid cramming your beehaus under a bush, low tree or behind a garden A) and B) are good locations as the bees have a clear flight path. C) Is a shed. Below are shown examples of possible hive locations within poor location, a the bees will fly straight into the neighbour’s balcony. your garden.

Country You can keep you bees in an apiary. You should not have more than 10 colonies in an single location as there is unlikely to be enough forage for the bees. A poor apiary layout. There is not shelter from the wind and the hives will look almost identical for the bees. The bees could drift into A the wrong hive by being blown off course while landing.

B

Diagram showing a poor country apiary set up

A good apiary setup. The hives are out of the wind and randomly scattered to so the bees can easily identify their own hive.

Only A is in a good location

A) is a good spot at the back of the garden. Out of the way of the path and trees, but sheltered from the wind. B) is a poor location with the bees flying close to the lawn and path. Diagram showing a good country apiary set up

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 10 Acquiring your bees Transferring bees to your beehaus There are lots of places to find bees for your beehaus: If you are new to beekeeping then starting with a nucleus colony is a great way to get going. Your nucleus colony will come in a small box Purchase a nucleus hive. just the right size for the number of frames you are purchasing. To A nucleus colony is a small working successfully transfer the bees to your beehaus you need to move the colony of around 10,000 bees. If brood combs, the adhering nurse bees and all the flying bees – i.e. you have not kept bees before this everything in the box. There are two approaches to transferring your is a great way to start because a nucleus depending on how far the hive it has travelled. small number of bees are simpler to manage for a beginner. You A) Short Distance Move - If the colony is only travelling a short can purchase a nucleus colony at distance, you can transfer the bees in one day. It is best to move a colony any point during the bee season in the evening, when flying is over for the day. After you have collected (March – September), however the your bees, you should smoke them a few minutes before moving them to best time to purchase one is in the quieten them. You should then leave them for three minutes so that the Spring. The bees are packed in a smoke can take full effect. You should then lift the frames carefully and specially designed box ‘nucleus box’ put them inside your beehaus. If you are starting with a nucleus you can which usually has enough space for add a few extra frames wax foundation onto which the bees can expand. 6 frames. Instructions for how to If there are any bees left in the box these should be bumped off directly in transfer a nucleus to your beehaus the beehaus. You should then replace your cover board and lid and leave are covered below right. We can the bees undisturbed for at least three days while they settle into their help you purchase a high quality, new home. A nucleus box - big enough for healthy nucleus colony through transporting 10,000 bees one of our local bee breeders.

Purchase an established colony. If you are a member of a local Beekeeping Association - you may meet someone who can supply you with a well established colony perhaps of 50,000 bees. This is a quick way of getting started but it is not for everyone. For a novice a large colony can be slightly overwhelming. Building up a colony from a nucleus will give you time to get to grips with them. beehaus

Catch a swarm Sometimes luck can play a part in starting out with bees. A swarm of bees may land in your garden or Transferring frame from nucleus box to beehaus you may be given a swarm of bees from a friend. Starting out from a B) Long Distance Move Over 10 hours - If you are moving your swarm is riskier than starting from bees over a long distance or long time (i.e. over 10 hours) then you either a full colony or a nucleus. You need to transfer your bees in the following way. Instead of transferring will not know the temperament, your bees to their new home immediately on arrival, you should place health or state of the queen when your nucleus where your beehaus will ultimately go. You should then you start. This is a problem for both let the bees fly for a day in order to settle and recover from travelling. the novice and also the experienced Swarm After one day of flying you can then start to transfer the beesto beekeeper alike. There is an old your beehaus. saying for swarms: “A swarm in May is worth a load of hay; a swarm in June is worth a silver spoon; but a swarm in July is not worth a fly”.

Registering your interest in swarms If you are interested in catching a swarm of bees then you should either register your interest on www.swarmofbees.com or tell your local Beekeeping Association Swarm Officer. If someone finds a swarms of bees, they will most likely contact the swarm of bees website or beekeeping association. In turn they will contact you and ask if you are interested in catching the swarm. Swarms are most likely to occur between May and July. It is worth keeping your swarm catching equipment prepared at all times.

Day 1 - Place nucleus box where the Day 2. - Beehaus in the same place as hive will be the nucleus was You should simply place the beehaus in exactly the same place as the nucleus hive. You should then transfer the frames from the nucleus to the beehaus. Any flying bees will then return to the beehaus.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 11 Moving your beehaus Bee Stings Sometimes you may want to move your bees to a different location - for There is no way around it - as a beekeeper you will get stung from example if you are moving house or rearranging the garden. The simple time to time. Although bees are not aggressive creatures, they can be rule for moving bees is understandably defensive of their home. You can generally tell if a bee “You should move a beehive less that 3ft or over 3 miles” is becoming defensive. It will fly around your face and produces a high pitched buzzing. If you are not in your beesuit then you should calmly The reason for this is quite simple: Bees learn their local area by sight walk away. very accurately. If you move the hive over three feet, the flying bees will fly back to the original site, not find the hive and certainly die. Sadly bees usual die after they have stung you, but not always. The bee’s However, if you move the hive over 3 miles - the bees will not recognise sting evolved as a means of defending the hive from other insects’ intent any of the surrounding area. They will learn their new location. If on stealing honey and larvae. When a bee stings a wasp, the sting can be you move the hive less than 3 miles - there is a chance that the bees extracted again without damaging the bee. However, our skin is much will recognise their old flight area and attempt to return to their old more elastic and it is almost impossible for the bee to remove it. The hive position. bee flies away and will die from dehydration as her body can no longer retain liquid. Preparing your beehaus You will need to secure your Dealing with a sting beehaus before moving it. We If you are stung, you should scrape recommend using a ratchet strap to the sting and bee away using the secure your beehaus whilst moving hive tool or a finger nail. You should it over a long distance You should avoid squeezing the bee or sting put the entrance blocker in and as this will force more venom into tape it securely in place. you. Spray the area with a little liquid smoke to disguise the smell which otherwise would attract Scrap the sting with your hive tool more bees.

The sting will feel like a mild burning sensation and might produce a Beehaus will lid straped down. swelling reaction up to 3 days after the sting. In most beekeepers this is the worst that will happen and an antihistamine cream will relieve the hot itchy sensation associated with the swelling.

How to move the hive A small percentage of people have a more severe reaction to bee stings. The best time to move the hive is in winter because the bees are not The area around the sting swells greatly and these people should seek flying. However, if you have to, you can move the bees in flying season medical assistance. and here are some simple rules: A tiny percentage of people are allergic to bee stings. They will have an extreme reaction and will be unconscious within 10 minutes of being stung. Urgent medical attention must be sought.

How to avoid getting stung There are several things you can do to avoid being stung. • Don’t stand in front of the hive where the bees are flying • Don’t wear shiny jewellery • Don’t stand directly in front of the hive entrance • Don’t stand near the hive after eating strong tasting food or alcohol

If a bee gets into your hair, the best thing to do is to calmly and quickly squash it by whacking your hand on top. Our hair is like velcro to a bee and they find it almost impossible to get out.

How to stop a bee chasing you

After you have inspected your beehaus, you may find that the odd guard bee will continue chasing you after you have left the hive. You can stop them from following you by:

1. Squirting them with liquid smoke. Lifting the hive. One person at either side 2. Standing in amongst the branchs of a tree or bush. 1. Wait till dusk when all the bees are in the colony 2. Block the entrance with your entrance block [Image of a person standing in a 3. Make sure that the lid and cover boards are secured with a tree] ratchet strap. 4. Gently lift and move the hive to its new location - less than 3ft or more than 3 miles 5. Once in their new location, wait fifteen minutes for the bees to settle and then open the entrance block 6. Turn the entrance block round and put it back in to the entrance with the word ‘wasp’ now showing on the outside. The reduced entrance will slow the bees down as they try to exit the hive and make them consider that something has changed. After no more than a week remove the entrance block entirely.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 12 How to inspect your bees Smoking your bees

Spending time inspecting your bees is probably the most exciting and You can use smoke as a simple way of calming your bees while you inspect fun part of beekeeping. Beekeeping is so much fun that it is tempting them. The smell of the smoke makes the bees think that their home is on to open the hive and inspect your bees every day - however this isn’t so fire and they instinctively start their fire drill. Instead of spending their good for the bees. A weekly inspection through the season (from the time defending the hive, they start to eat honey in order to prepare to Spring to the Autumn) will be fine. Throughout the winter you shouldn’t leave and find a new home. After you have carried out your inspection disturb them at all. and stop smoking, the bees will return to normal.

Why do you inspect the hive? You inspect the hive in order to find out how your bees are getting on. Preparing your Smoker You get to see directly inside the colony and gather lots of information There are two main types of smoker: about your bees. Typically, you should be looking for the following information: Liquid Smoke - If you don’t like using a traditional smoker - help is at hand in the form of liquid smoke. • Is the queen present and laying? There is no lighting required, it is impossible to burn • Has the colony got enough room in the hive? yourself and it will never go out. You buy liquid smoke in • Does the colony have sufficient stores of pollen and honey? a concentrated form and dilute it with water. • Is the colony healthy? Liquid smoke • Are there any queen cells or other signs of ? Liquid smoke is made by condensing the smoke given off by wood as it smoulders. It is completely natural and will not harm your bees. You It is good to go through the five points in your mind before you start the can then simply spray it from an ordinary garden sprayer. It is easier to inspection. You may find it useful to make a note of the answers to these use than a traditional smoker but doesn’t quite have the glamour of five points in a notebook, so that you can compare the state of the hive a traditional smoker. However, it is taking off and as John Chapple a to the last time you did an inspection. beekeeper of 30 years says, ‘I wouldn’t use anything else.’ You should avoid spraying the super before collection with liquid smoker as this can When is the best time to inspect your bees? leave a residue. The best time to inspect is between 11am and 4pm on a still, sunny, warm day when all the flying bees are out foraging. The temperature must be Traditional Smokers - A traditional smoker is over 16’C (600 F) otherwise the brood can get cold and die. Ideally there simply a metal container with bellows attached in should be only a little wind. You should avoid opening the hive if it is which you light a small fire. The aim is to get the raining. Before the beehaus is opened make sure you have cleared the fuel to burn badly - producing lots of thick cool area around it so you can easily get access to all of the parts. smoke. You can use a variety of materials such a old hessian sacking, dried leaves, cardboard or tightly How long should an inspection take? packed dry grass. It is important that the smoke is Typically, inspecting your bees should take around 30mins - 1hr per cold and does not burn the bees. hive. Time flies when you are having fun and you can quite easily find yourself lost in a world of magic - however it’s important to try to keep Traditional smoker the inspection time down to a minimum so as to reduce the stress on the bees. Mastering the traditional smoker is perhaps the hardest part of beekeeping and you should practise starting and keeping it alight. If you are using a traditional smoker, you should light it before putting on your veil (there have been instances of beekeepers peering into the smoker to see if it’s alight only to find that it is, when the mesh of their Preparing your equipment veil has caught fire!). Preparing your equipment before inspecting your hive is always a good idea. Firstly, you should make sure you have all the tools and equipment How to use a Smoker together that you need for the inspection. This list will depend on what You should puff a little smoke around the entrance to the hive about you are about to do but as a minimum you will need: 5 minutes before you open it. This starts the fire drill and they will hopefully be full of honey and calm when you open the hive. Once Essential Items: inside the hive - you should smoke a little on the tops of the frames as • Hive tool you inspect the colony. • Smoker (liquid or flame)

Additional items: • Bee brush or goose feather. • Extra Frames • Supers • Queen excluders • Clearer Boards • Feed (either liquid or candy) • Queen catching apparatus • Queen marking cage and paint • Medications for treating any Items to inspect your beehaus health problems Puffing Smoke Around the Entrance Puffing smoke onto the frames

Temperament Not every colony reacts the same to being inspected. Some are very docile and will hardly need smoking at all, some will benefit from being smoked at the entrance and then by lifting one corner under the cover board and giving a few more puffs of smoke a few minutes before the hive is fully opened. This allows the bees to smell the smoke and they will have time to eat some honey, which makes them easier to work with.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 14 Opening your beehaus without supers

Opening your beehaus should be done delicately and gently. You should move in slow motion and not rush.

Having loosened with a hive tool, Place the super on top of another at gently lift up the first super the other end

A typical beehaus with single small colony without supers.

Repeat the process Be methodical and place the supers in for the second super an order such that you can easily put them back in the same order

Taking the lid off Slowly push down to lever the How to inspect your bees coverboard When you take the roof off, place it to one side, don’t put it in front of Looking out for the queen the hive entrance, as anything in the path of returning bees will annoy Once the cover board is removed, check it to make sure that the queen them. You should approach the hive from the side. is not on it. Although it is unlikely, but if she is then you should return her to the hive. The best way to do this is to walk her back into the hive by guiding her in with your finger. Alternatively let her walk up onto Opening your beehaus with supers your hive tool by placing it in her path. Once on the tool return her, If you have supers on your beehaus, your beehaus may look as ideally to a brood frame. Most likely she will quickly scuttle between the follows. Before you can inspect the brood box, you will need to move frames. Take great care doing this as any damage to the queen’s legs can the supers. severely impair her ability to lay eggs.

At this point you may need to apply a little smoke to the top of the frames as bees make their way back up to see what’s happening. You may notice some standing on their hind legs swivelling around following your movements. These are the guards but a little whiff of smoke will send them back down again leaving you free to carry on.

One of the great advantages of the beehaus is that you have space to move the frames apart without having to first take one out. This is something that you will appreciate if you have ever tried extracting the first frame in a traditional hive, where the frames are packed in with no room to move sideways. Lifting out a frame

A typical beehaus with single large colony with supers.

Use hive tool to help loosen the frames Gently lifting a frame for inspection Take your time, move in slow motion and consider the weight of the frame as you lift it. It’s interesting to note the different weight of frames Don’t stand in front of entrance Lean lid up making sure it isn’t in front containing empty cells, those with plenty of honey, and pollen stores of an active entrance and those covered with brood. Lift with a straight slow continuous Once opened you should place the lid to one side away from the entrance. motion to avoid crushing bees on the sides or rolling them over the bees You can us the beehaus as a work bench to clear an area for inspection on the frame next door as this also annoys them (although not as much you can move the supers to the opposite side of the beehaus. as being crushed).

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 15 How to hold a frame Identifying parts of the comb

Once you have fully extracted the frame you can hold it up to eye level There are five sections of a frame which are: capped honey stores; to inspect it. Avoid tipping the frame horizontally as nectar and unsealed nectar; pollen; brood; and empty cells. These are easy to identify, all are brood are at risk of dropping out. Instead hold the frame in front of you important and their quantity and distribution need to be noted. like you would a book and begin to read the pattern. Always hold the frame over the hive so if anything drops off the frame, it will land in the Capped Honey - There should beehaus. be a reserve of capped honey at the very top of the frame, this Rotating a frame - You should inspect both side of each frame. You often extends around the corners. should do this by rotationing as shown in the diagram below: If there isn’t, then the bees are running extremely low on food reserves and you will need to feed them. This can happen at any time of year, even in summer if the bees Side B Side B Side A Side A haven’t been able to fly for a week because of bad weather.

Nectar - In the rows of cells immediately underneath the Turing a frame without it becoming horizontal capped honey, there should be stores of nectar. This is a snack food for bees, the equivalent of having a bowl of nuts on your desk, which you can dip into as you work. The bees consume this and feed it to the larvae. Uncapped nectar looks shinny.

Pollen - This may not be so clearly defined but you should see cells packed with pollen, often different shades ranging from bright orange and red to almost black. Pollen is the protein, which bees eat, if there is none it would probably coincide with a prolonged period of bad weather.

Reading a frame like a book. Hold the frame over the beehaus ensuring any bees that fall off drop into the hive Brood - A good brood patch is circular with a high density of cells Example Frames containing either eggs, larvae or Below we show some example frames that you might see. sealed brood, depending on how long ago the queen was active on Perfect Brood - This frame shows that frame. If the cells containing a perfect circle of brood. The queen brood are sporadic, (i.e. there are a is laying very well. There are only a lot of empty cells) it is a sign that few empty cells. either the queen is failing or the bees have ejected diseased larvae. The cell caps should be flat for female bees and raised for male (drone) bees. If the caps are sunken there could be a problem. See health section at back of guide.

Queen Cells - If you discover a queen cell (which suggests that the Brood with honey around the colony is making a new queen - see edge - This frame shows only a small picture right) you will need to decide area of brood with loads of capped whether to leave it or whether to honey around the edge of the brood. remove it. A colony with a strong Notice how dark the honey comb is queen, plenty of space and a secure around the brood. This is cause by a home are unlikely to be thinking build up of old cocoons. of swarming. However you see the sign of swarms on Page 23.

Empty cells - During the day Queen laying badly - many of the bees are out foraging but at night they all cluster in the hive. If there are no empty cells at the very bottom of the frames then the message will spread that a new home is needed and the colony is in danger of swarming.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 16 When to add honey supers Queen excluder Your bees need space to store honey. Normally in the wild, the bees A queen excluder stops the queen would simply build more comb. However, in a managed colony, you need and drones from walking up into to provide the space as the bees require it. To make it more convenient the supers. This stops her laying in for the beekeeper this extra space is given as boxes of frames which fit the supers which are designed for on top of the brood box. This makes sense for the bees too as they honey storage. You might not need naturally store honey upwards. a queen excluder when using the beehaus because the brood area The time to put the supers on is when the bees have drawn out the wax is sufficiently deep to hold all the on all the frames in the brood box (you will have added 6 new frames of brood. However, just in case, some foundation in March/April). This is likely to be end of April beginning of are provided. When you first put a 4 Queen Excluders May. If you live in an area of Oil Seed Rape, you must put the supers on queen excluder on, the bees might before the flowers appear. not initially move through it. (Note: in the winter you must make sure that the queen excluder is removed - to ensure that the bees and queen Can you add supers too quickly? can get access to the honey stores without hindrance.) Yes. If you provide the bees with top much space, you increase the amount of air that they have to keep warm and you also make it harder Can you add supers too quickly? to inspect the hive by having to handle a lot of unused boxes. Yes. If you provide the bees with top much space, you increase the amount of air that they have to keep warm and you also make it harder Preparing the supers to inspect the hive by having to handle a lot of unused boxes. You can preassemble the supers with the frames inside ready to put on the hive. You should remember that the supers will be holding honey that you will eat - so you should try to keep them ‘food safe’ (i.e. not put them directly on the ground and get them covered in mud). How to mark a queen When inspecting the beehive, it can be useful to check that the queen is alive and well. However, this is easier said than done with a strong colony of over 40,000 bees. So, to make your life easier, you can mark the queen with a coloured dot on her back.

What do you mark her with? You can mark the queen with either a special colouring pen, paint or even a stick-on dot. You can buy either of these queen marking kits from most bee suppliers (including us).

Marking pens zz You can stack supers on top of each other What colour to choose? Can supers be stacked on top of each other? YEAR ENDING QUEEN Yes, you can either put supers above or below other supers, you would Unfortunately there isn’t a large do this if there is a large nectar flow. 5 or 0 Blue colour swatch to choose from. In fact there is an international colour 6 or 1 White code for bees. This allows you to tell 7 or 2 Yellow the age of any a marked queen. For example if you requeened a queen 8 or 3 Red in 2012 - you would put a yellow 9 or 4 Green dot on her abdomen.

When should you mark the queen? The best time to find the queen is in April, at the start of the season when there are only a small number of bees in the colony. Alternatively, if you are buying a nucleus of bees then it is worth asking the bee supplier to mark the queen for you.

A large colony with one layer of supers.

Queen marking plunger When the queen is held at the bottom of the plunger you can put a dot on her back Once you have found the queen, you can either pick her up with your fingers or use a queen cage. While the queen is on the comb,you should lower the cage over the queen. The worker bees will escape from A large colony with two layer of supers. the spikes but the queen will remain. Using a queen marking pen or numbering kit - you should put a dot on the back of her thorax.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 17 Using your inspection tray The inspection tray provides useful information about the health of your bees. It can be used to monitor the number of varroa that are in your bees and also examine any debris that has fallen from the hive. You can keep your inspection tray in all year around, however you should check it and empty it regularly to avoid a wax moth infestation.

Removing your inspection tray. An inspection tray with debris.

Monitoring varroa with the inspection tray You can monitor the size of the varroa population in your colony by using your inspection tray. You can simply count the number of mites that are on your tray. You can then calculate the a daily mite drop by dividing the total by the number of days since the last inspection.

If there is a lot of debris on the tray, the mites can be difficult to find. To make your life easier you can mix the debris with methylated spirit in a container. The mites will float to the surface and the debris to the bottom.

You can look up how you colony is doing on the chart below. If you have more a higher daily mite drop than the critical daily mite drop, you should do a varroa treatment immediately. See the health section for more details on Page ?.

MONTH CrITICAL DAILY MITE DROp January 0.5 Febuary 0.5 March 0.5 April 0.5 May 6 June 10 July 16 August 33 September 20 October 10 November 0.5 December 0.5

A varroa mite that has fallen onto the inspection tray. They look like a shiny miniature crab. Note the bee’s leg to the right for scale. The other ‘crumbs’ in the picture are bits of pollen and wax that have fallen through the mesh.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 18 Advanced beekeeping This section covers beekeeping techniques that you might not use very often but may come in handy.

Making a nucleus colony Once you have kept bees for a while you might want to increase your number of colonies you have or perhaps you would like to some money by selling a nucleus colony. Making a nucleus colony is fun and rewarding.

When is the best time to make a nucleus? You can divide a colony any time from spring until late summer. May or June is the best time, as this gives the bees time to build up strength and A strong colony from with 12 frames of bees and good food stores. stores for the winter. You should make the colony on a good day, when the bees are flying well. Step 5 - You should now close the nucleus colony, add the wasp guard What sort of colony is suitable for division? to reduce the chances of robbing and move it to its new location. The flying bees will leave the new nucleus colony and return to the old hive, You should only divide a colony which has less over 8 frames with bees. leaving just the young nurse bees to look after the larvae. You should not divide a colony that is less than only 1 year old as the disruption may not allow it to recover from being split. Finally, you Two days later should also only make nucleuses from health and well tempered bees. After two days you will need to make a decision about how get a queen in the new colony. If you are planning to use a new queen (perhaps How many nucleus colonies can you make from a colony? from a specialist queen breeder) then you can do so now. This is the You can make two nucleus colonies from a very strong colony (I.e 16 or best method because otherwise it will take the colony 30 days to raise a more frames) or one nucleus from a weaker colony (9-15 Frames). If you queen and a further 30 days before any new eggs are hatched. Basically, are making a nucleus from a colony, it is unlikely that you will have any introducing a new queen will get the bees off to a flying start and is surplus honey at the end of the season. highly recommended. To introduce a new queen see Page ??.. The Method Raising a queen in the nucleus Step 1 – You can either prepare a complete new beehaus or nucleus It is possible to get the nucleus to raise a new queen itself – although this hive or best of all you can use your existing beehaus. You can do this by is not recommended. If you would like to do this, you should make sure dividing your beehaus in two with the divider board and opening the that the new colony has day old eggs and drones which the new queen second entrance. Using your beehaus has the benefit of sharing warmth can mate with. between the two colonies. Looking after a nucleus colony Once you have established your nucleus colony there are few tips and tricks to ensure that your nucleus colony does well.

1. It is a good idea to feed sugar syrup (see feeding section) so that the bees have a good amount of food.

2. Once you have a laying queen, you should ensure that they have enough space to expand.

3. Finally, if you need to strengthen the number of bees in the nucleus colony, you can add brood taken from a stronger colony. You should ensure that there are no bees on the brood when it is moved. A strong colony from with 12 frames of bees and good food stores.

Step 3 – Smoke the bees lightly and wait three minutes for the smoke to take affect. Open the hive and find the queen. She should be secure in a cage or match box and keep safely out of the way. This will ensure that she is not transferred to the nucleus colony.

Step 4 – You should move two or three frames of brood and one frame of food to the right hand side of the beehaus or nucleus hive. The frames should have a good number of young nurse bees on them. You should then add the divider to your beehaus to separate the two colonies. You should then shake two more frames of young bees into the new colony. Add two more frames of foundation or drawn comb either side of the other frames so that the nucleus colony can expand as required.

The food is important because the brood and nurse bees will require a large amount of food to grow quickly. If the weather is cold or there is not good honey flow you should feed the bees using a contact feeder. You should now return the queen to the hive and close it up.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 19 How to unite two colonies Sometime it is necessary to unite two colonies of bees together to become one larger strong colony. The most common reason for uniting colonies is to save the bees of a small colony which has become queenless and is too small to survive. The two basic principle of uniting two colonies is to allow the bees to mix slowly using a temporary barrier between them You can use this method to unite either two colonies that are living in the same beehaus or uniting two colonies in two different hives.

Step 1 - Move the hives close together. If the hives are over 3 feet apart, you should move them so that they are about 3 feet apart. This may take several days to do and you can read about moving hives on Page 12. You should always move the weaker, queen less colony towards the strong colony, thus disturbing the strongest colonies the least and reducing the chance of failure.

Step 2 - Check that only one has a queen. You should never try to unite two colonies that both have queens. If both have queens and you want to unite them, then you must remove the queen from one of them - preferably the weaker of the two.

The beehaus has a newspaper divider board. Step 4 - To unite the colonies you will need a large sheet of newspaper, some scissors and sello tape. First, smoke both colonies and wait about 3 minutes for the smoke to takes it full affect. The best time to unite the colonies is in evening when the bees have stopped flying. This reduces the chance of robbing when you open the hives. You should open the stronger colony and remove the divider board. You then sello tape the sheet of newspaper to the walls of the hive – thereby making a barrier. You should remove the dummy board and push the frames so that they are up against the barrier.

Step 5 - You can then transfer the weaker colony into the beehaus. You should ensure both entrances are open. You do not need to punch any holes in the newspaper. The bees will nibble away at paper and make entrance.

The beehaus after the new frames have been transferred.

You should leaves the bees for a week and hopefully when you return the bees will have integrated. You should then move the frames to back toward the front of the hive. After a further 30 days you can then close the rear entrance.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 20 Feeding your bees Sugar syrup feeder types Feeding your bees in a vital part of beekeeping. A colony must have a Syrup feeders come in all sorts of shapes and sizes and it can sometimes good supply of feed including pollen, water and nectar / honey. You be confusing. Here is rough guide to the basic types of feeder. may need to feed them at any point in the year when their supply of food is low. Typically there are four main times: Contact Feeder Spring Feeding This is simple plastic tubs with a After the winter the bees supply of honey may be running low. The bees mesh bottom through which the will have eaten most of their stores over the winter and in the spring bee suck the syrup. They range in the queen will start laying again. However, there will only be a small size – but the beehaus can hold a number of flying bees in the colony to collect nectar and if the spring is feeder of 2.5 litre contact feeder. late or very wet the bees can starve. If this is the case, you should feed Directions for use are as follows: Fill your bees. You can also feed your bees in the spring to encourage the the tub and close the lid so that it is queen to start laying quickly. airtight. Then place the upturned tub on top of the feeder hole on Summer Feeding the clearer board. The bees will It might seem unusual to need to feed your bees in the height of summer then suck the syrup from the mesh. but sometimes it is necessary. If the summer is wet and cold your bees This is our recommended method of can run out of nectar sources and might well starve. There is something feeding your bees. called the June gap – in many areas there is a gap in the supply of nectar and in June and if you have taken honey off after the spring flow your bees may run out. You can spot this when you inspect your beehaus and Frame Feeders if you find your bees running very short, either give them some of their These are hollow tubs are the same honey back if you haven’t extracted it or feed them some sugar syrup. shape as a normal frame and they are placed inside the brood box. Autumn/Winter Feeding There have floats, ledges and wire This is the primary feeding time of the beekeeping year. At the end of mesh which stops the bees from the season you feed the bees to help prepare for the winter months. If drowning. These are simple to you have taken honey from the beehaus you can provide the bees with use but are not recommended for sugar syrup, which is a honey substitute. The bees put the sugar syrup winter feeding as you have to open in the comb and evaporate any excess water and then cap it for safe the brood box to fit and refill them. storage. You should start winter feeding at the beginning of September Generally frame feeders hold and finish no later than the first week in October. If you feed later than around 2 litres of syrup (i.e. 8kg the first week in October the bees might not have time to evaporate of sugar). excess water from the syrup and it could be stored uncapped and ferment. This would cause the bees digestive problems. Circular or Rapid Feeder Feeding a nucleus colony of swarm A circular feeder uses the same If you have purchased a nucleus colony or have caught a swarm of bees technique as frame feeder, however you can help them get established by feeding them. the feeder is located in a super in the same way as a contact feeder. You can place this kind of feeder directly What to feed your bees? on top the clearer board (without the bee escape). Generally circular There are two main types of feed for your bees – sugar syrup or fondant. feeders hold around 1 litre of syrup The sugar syrup is easier and faster for the bees to handle than fondant. and the bees remove the syrup very However, fondant is easier for the beekeeper to handle as it is not liquid. quickly – so you will often need to As a general rule, you should feed your bees sugar syrup in the autumn refill the feeder every day. and spring. At other times, you can use fondant.

Feeder Comparison Chart We recommend using a contact feeder in your beehaus. Although this When to feed? is not the fastest method of giving bees the syrup, it is easy to handle and you can give the bees are large amount of syrup in a single visit to You should add feeders to your hive in the early evening when most of the hive. the bees have stopped flying. When you start to feed your bees, the hive will become very active and the excitement can spread to other hives TYPE SURFACE AREA VOLUME and lead to robbing of the bees. It is a good idea to put your wasp guard into help reduce any possible robbing. Contact Feeder Small Large Frame Feeder Medium Medium Note: You should never open a hive without protective clothing. When Circular Feeder Large Small your are refilling a feeder, you should wear your veil, gloves and also have a smoker handy in case the bees don’t like you presence and you need to calm them.

Wasp guard in place

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 21 Making sugar syrup How feed fondant

Making sugar syrup is straight forward. The ingredients are simply white A good alternative to using sugar granulated sugar and water. You should not use brown or unrefined syrup is to use fondant. This is a sugar which can cause dysentery in the bees. Using imperial measures semi solid lump of sugar which can it’s quite easy to remember the ratio which is one pint to every two be purchased from us or bakers. It pounds of sugar. Variation from this classic ratio can cause the bees is very simple to add to you hive. problems. Too much water will take the bees a long time to evaporate You simply lay a piece of fondant into ‘honey’ and can also cause digestion problems. on the top of the frames. It is not recommended to winter use WHITE SUGAR WATER because it is very slow of the bees to use. 5kg 3 Liters 10kg 6 Litres 15kg 9.5 Litres Fondant from a bakers 20kg 12.5 Litres Feeding Your Bees for the Winter How much? You need to ensure that you feed your bees enough to last the winter. This can depend on the type of bees that you have and the size of your colony. If you have Italian honey bees then they will need a large amount of feeding compared the local British Bee. However more food is better than less as you cannot over feed bees. Once they have enough, they will stop taking the feed. The chart below shows the estimated amount of stores that your bees need through the winter. If you estimate the bees have 10kg of stores in the brood frames then you need to make up the difference with sugar syrup.

Mixed sugar into water Pouring sugar into feeder TYPE OF BEE Total stores Required You will need a large saucepan or jam making pot. First, bring the water (Ho n e y + Sy r u p ) to the boil and then turn off the heat. Pour in the sugar and stir until Italian Bees 30kg all the sugar has dissolved. You should then wait until the water has cooled. Do not test the temperature of the sugar syrup with you finger British Bees 20kg – because sugar syrup can cause serious burns. If you cannot wait till it is completely cold then you can use a jam making thermometer. Once cold, you can then decant the feed to the feeder. Estimating the stores that they currently have. Your bees will probably live over winter on 9 brood frames. You can estimate the stores that your bees have by looking at the frames. When Adding a contact feeder to your beehaus you inspect your bees note down the rough percentage of honey in each of the brood frames. You can then use the chart below to estimate You should add the contact feeder, mesh side down, on to clearer board the amount of honey that they have. Note: The beehaus comes with with the bee escape attached. standard Super frames and Deep National brood frames. However, we have included the weights for the Standard National frames which you might have purchased with a nucleus with colony.

FRAME SIZE HONEY WEIGHT Super Frame 1kg Standard National Brood Frame 2kg Deep National Brood Frame 3.5kg

Placing the contact feeder over the Adding a super frame over the hole in a clearer board contact feeder

A contact feeder placed in the beehaus. A full Super - containing 1kg of honey.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 22 Swarm control Swarm Control Method 1 - Easy What are swarms? Eggs to front, Queen and brood to back Swarming is part of a colonies natural yearly cycle and is one of the most This method is very easy to do and is very effective since it leaves all important aspects for a new beekeeper to become familiar with. the ‘swarmy’ bees without a queen. Bees without a queen are unable to swarm, so instead they raise a new queen who will stay to head the As individual bees cannot survive without the colony it is the colony entire colony. which must reproduce itself in order to ensure survival of the bee species. When a colony has done well and increased in size it becomes Starting point large enough to split in two. A swarm is made up of the queen and as At this point in the year your beehaus should have a total of 15 many as half the adult worker bees. They leave the hive in search of a frames. There should be 3 new frames in front of the 9 frames the bees new home leaving all the frames of brood and stores to the youngest overwintered on and a further 3 frames behind. You should also have a bees who remain in the hive to raise a new queen. couple of supers over the brood. The beehaus should look like this.

In this way the old queen and the bees she takes with her try to ensure that the hive they leave behind is in the best possible shape to grow again and continue as a colony. The old queen on the other hand is in a very risky situation, her workers must find a secure new place to live within 3 days or they will all die, unable to survive outside. In the wild only 1 in 4 swarms survive but by intervening and ‘artificially’ swarming your bees you can make sure that all your bees stay and survive in the hive. Queen Doing nothing is not an option! You should assume that your bees will swarm every year. Therefore, if you don’t manage your bees during the critical months for swarming (May, June and July) you risk loosing some of your bees and if you live in a built up area causing people to panic because a swarm of 10,000 bees suddenly landing in the garden is quite a scary sight if you’re not expecting it. Before

When will my bees have grown large enough to swarm? When the brood nest reaches its maximum size, usually some time in May, the colony is liable to start preparations for swarming. The beekeeper can monitor the growth of the nest at each visit by marking the rearmost frame containing brood (with a drawing pin) - and then leaving an empty frame behind it. If there is brood in the empty frame at the next visit, the nest is still expanding. If not the brood nest will have reached its maximum size and you must turn your full attention to Queen swarm control.

What are the signs of bees preparing to swarm? These are the tell tale signs of a colony preparing to swarm: • The bees are not flying strongly, which means they have been diverted from foraging.

• When you raise the front cover board, there is a clump of bees hanging quietly underneath – these are young bees that are waiting for the signal After to swarm out. The queen slows her egg laying and slims in readiness to fly, while around 1500 young bees continue to emerge each day from Method the sealed brood for whom there is less and less work – so they join this 1. Divide the colony by moving all but the first four frames to the rear incipient swarm cluster. of the hive. The queen should be on the brood frames that are moved to the rear of the hive. • There are queen cells on any of the frames. Preparing to swarm takes around 8 days, starting with the laying of eggs in queen cells (strictly, 2. Add the divider board to completely separate the two halves of into the cups that the bees develop into queen cells while the larva the colony. grows). If you find queen cells on any of the frames the bees will be at an advanced stage of swarming and you must take immediate action. 3. Open the entrance block at the rear of the hive. The older, flying bees will all return to the front entrance. These are the bees that would swarm. When and how? 4. Four frames are left at the front. You have to check that they contain It’s a good idea to pre-empt the urge to swarm. As soon as the colony some nurse bees on open brood and eggs. If there are no eggs in the has reached it’s maximum size and before you see any of these signs front four frames then another frame must be brought forward from you should divide the colony to avoid risk of a swarm issuing. There the back, which does have eggs in it. are several methods of artificial swarming but the following two are recommended. 5. Insert six empty frames behind the front four frames. Replace the supers and the cover boards. Put the lid on top and relax! Method 1 follows the natural pattern from the bees point of view and is a very good reliable method. Method 2 is hard but is useful because it also incorporates a varroa treatment. One week later The nurse bees at the front of the hive are queenless and will have begun to create queen cells. You should remove all but one queen cell. When the new queen emerges allow a week for her to mature and mate and then remove the divider board. Remove any frames containing just stores from inbetween the two brood nests. You can now either remove the old queen or leave her to lay alongside the new queen. The bees will cease to feed the old queen over time and she will die.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 23 3. Starting with the frame at the Swarm Control Method 2 - Harder back of the hive, lift out and shake Queen to front, brood to back the bees off the frame into the The basic idea of this method of swarm control is to mimic a natural swarm box with the sugar in. The bees by removing all the brood frames that contain the next generation of that fly out are older bees and bees from the Queen. The bees that stay with the queen have to spend are the ones who are preparing all their time building new comb for the queen to lay eggs in while the to swarm. They are also less likely bees in the other half of the hive have to raise a new queen. to have varroa on them. The nurse bees wil stay in the sugar. It’s a very good way of managing your colonies urge to swarm and although a bit more complicated than the first method is quite straightforward to do. Division of the colony also creates a good opportunity to remove varroa mites. There is no sealed brood in the A box of bee coated in icing sugar. ‘swarm’ (the brood frames at the front with the original queen on), so all the mites are exposed on the adult bees and can be dislodged by applying icing sugar. Three weeks later, all the sealed brood will have 4. Every 2 or 3 frames give the box a shake to make sure the bees are hatched out in the ‘parent’ (the brood frames you moved to the far end well coated. of the hive) and none of the new queen’s brood will be old enough to be sealed. The ‘parent’ can therefore be treated in turn. 5. As you do this, you should move the first 11 frames including the original nine brood combs that the bees will have stayed over winter on, Starting point to the far end of the hive. At this point in the year your beehaus should have a total of 15 frames. There should be 3 new frames in front of the 9 frames the bees 6. When you come to the last three frames return them so that they are overwintered on and a further 3 frames behind. You should also have a right at the front of the beehaus (these were added earlier in the year as couple of supers over the brood. The beehaus should look like this. foundation frames and now contain new drawn comb) and move them so they are up against the front wall of the hive.

7. Add a further six empty frames behind (ideally, three drawn plus three foundation frames) on which the bees will develop a new brood nest. The beehaus will now be completely full of frames.

8. Now place a board up against the front entrance to the beehaus and tip the bees out onto the board. The bees will walk up the the board and into the hive. All the young nurse bees will return to the brood Queen frames at the back of the hive.

9. Add the divider board to completely separate the two halves of the colony.

10. Release the queen on to the top of the front three frames. The flying bees will all return to the frames at the front of the hive. Replace the supers and the cover boards and put the lid on top and relax.

Before 3 Weeks Later You should inspect your colony once a week however three weeks after the original separation all the sealed brood in the frames that were moved to the rear of the hive will have now hatched and these can be treated for varroa using the icing sugar method.

4 Weeks Later A virgin queen should emerge from her cell after about four weeks. She will have flown from the entrance to mate and come into lay. You can check for a compact patch of brood one month after the original division and, if satisfactory, the rear brood combs are re-united to the main stock by simply removing the division board and the new queen is Queen moved to the front to head the colony. The old queen is removed if seen – although in natural supersedure the mother and daughter queens lay alongside each other for a time. You should leave the rear entrance open as some bees will still be using it.

6 Weeks Later After All the bees should be using the front entrance and you should close the rear entrance. Method 1. Place a large plastic box in front What can go wrong? of the hive and sprinkle a 1kg box of The new queen may fail to mate satisfactorily in a cold spring. If so, she icing sugar in. is removed, and a frame with eggs transferred from the ‘swarm’ into the ‘parent’. The process re-starts, with queen cells being raised this time 2. Find the queen and put her into a under the ‘emergency’ impulse as the parent is now queenless. queen cage or a matchbox with lots of holes in. This will keep her safe throughout the operations. Place this in the entrance to the beehaus.

A box of filled with icing sugar.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 24 First lightly smoke the bees and then spread a white cloth below the Wild swarms swarm to catch any falling bees. You should then place the collection If you are lucky enough to see or hear about a swarm of bees you can box or skep directly below the cluster. If the cluster is located in a attempt to catch it. If you are a new beekeeper and have not kept bees bush, you may sometimes need to clip branches to make space for the before it is not recommended that you start out with a swarm because collection box. you will not know the health or temperament of the bees. That said, only a small number of swarms survive in the wild and by catching and hiving a swarm you are helping the bees.

What is a swarm like? A swarm is like a large cloud of bees moving through the sky. The bees will often leave their hive on a bright, sunny day before midday and take about 20 minutes to settle near by. The swarm will first cluster within about 10 meters of the original colony. They will often move in the direction from the hive that the bees most often fly. They normally settle on a branch or a tree, wall or sometimes deep in the bushes. However, most will be easily visible as the bees need to fly to and Catching a swarm Image of swarm fro easily.

The swarms starts when scouts drive the bees from the hive and the Then with a sharp jerk of the branch the swarm drops into the box. The queen follows. The bees then cluster and the queen joins it – if the box should then be turned over and placed on the ground where the queen fails to do so, the cluster breaks up after about 20 minutes and stragglers can find it. You can use a stick to raise one side of the box to the bees return to the hive. make an entrance. A few flying bees may return to the branch but they will soon disperse and join the rest of the swarm in the collection box or Once the swarm cluster has settled down, the scouts search for a return to their original hive. suitable site for the new nest. The bees need a dry cavity protected from the weather, large enough for the combs to house the larvae and the stores of honey and pollen (40 to 100 litres), with an entrance small enough to be defended. The bees are said to prefer the entrance to face south – perhaps because the dark hole shows up more strongly in sunlight.

What is the cluster like? A cluster can range from the size of a rugby ball or just under a pint of bees. Most swarms are quite calm – as they have eaten enough honey to survive for three days. Amazingly most swarm clusters are hollow. The bees make a wall around an empty space where the queen can move about. If the cluster remains for some time, the bees will actually build combs inside the cluster and the queen starts to lay. If you look closely at the cluster you can see dark patches which indicate passages for returning bees to go inside. Returning scout bees can be seen arriving and going in. Scout bees dance on the surface of the cluster to report finding a possible new home – when the bees have decided which scout to follow, the cluster will take to the air - and is then lost to the beekeeper.

How to catch a swarm To catch a swarm you will need a essential bits of equipment:

• A skep or cardboard box • Hessian sack • White cotton sheet • Smokers • Protective clothing • Saw and secateurs • A bee brush or goose wing • Some old brood comb or wax

After you have gathered your equipment you should access the swarm. Sometimes the swarm may be high up a branch or on a roof. If there are onlookers that are not in protective clothing – then you should advise Bees instinctively walk up a ramp. This provides an easy way of transferring them to leave the area or go indoors. The aim of the game is to get them from awkward branches into a temporary box/hive. the bees into your skep or box as smoothly as possible without annoying them too much.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 25 Transporting a swarm Once the swarm is secure within the box you can seal the box or skep with a sheet. You must ensure that box has air ventilation and is kept cool. Most beekeepers like to hive the swarm in the evening that they have caught the swarm. You can keep the swarm wrapped up in a sheet for up to 3 days if necessary but only if it is kept cool.

A captured swarm covered with a sheet.

How to transfer a swarm to your beehaus

There are two ways or transferring the bees to their new home.

1. Shake the bees straight into the beehaus. It is common practice for beekeepers to dump a swarm straight onto the top bars of the new hive. This gives no opportunity for a controlled entry and the formation of a structured cluster. It treats bees as though they were bucket of pebbles. They deserve more respect – and if you work naturally, with the bees, rather than treating then as inanimate objects, it makes beekeeping a much more rewarding hobby!

2. Walking bees into the beehaus An alternative to shaking the bees straight into your beehaus is to shake them onto a sloping surface leading up to the entrance of the hive. It is amazing to watch as the queen naturally crawls upwards and her colony follow her in. You can use the lid of the beehaus.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 26 The beekeeping year March This is the month by month guide to what your bees are doing, what What are the bees doing? you should be doing and what the beehaus should look like. The exact There should be some activity now with foragers eagerly collecting timing of some of the bees behaviours and the actions you take vary pollen and any early nectar. The queen will be laying at a good rate and according to size of colony, weather and the temperament of your bees. the colony will be increasing in size. The bees will be consuming a lot of It starts in January and assumes that the colony has overwintered in honey and pollen and their stores may be running low. the hive. What should you be doing? Choose a warm day if possible when the bees are flying and have a quick January look inside the hive. If you find the stores are very low (i.e less than What are the bees doing? 5kilos) - then you need to emergency feed with either a block of fondant The bees are in a cluster. The bees will raise the temperature of the on top or a liquid feed but at a lower concentration than in the winter. cluster from the winter norm of 15-17 degrees centigrade up to 33-35 You can also gain any insight in the state of colony by watching the degrees centigrade in order to stimulate the queen bee to start laying. entrance of the hive. Bees should be coming and going with pollen for On a clear day you should see some bees flying. These are cleansing the brood. flights (bees don’t like to relieve themselves in their own home). They may also be collecting water to dilute the stored honey. You should add the inspection tray and after a week count the varroa mite drop. If more than 1 mite per day prepare to cull drone brood in What should you be doing? April. If it’s a warm day (at least 15degC) you can open the beehaus to You can remove the wasp guard and clear any dead bees from the have a quick look at the bees. entrance using the curved end of the hive tool. You shouldn’t open the beehaus, this will chill the bees. If there is snow on the ground this can What will the beehaus look like inside? confuse the bees into thinking it’s a sunny day and they fly out en masse. They quickly become cold and many will die. To prevent this shield the entrance with a board to cut the light out.

What will the beehaus look like inside?

If warm some early activity will be seen with bees starting to fly out.

April What are the bees doing? Bees clustering on 9 frames The colony will be growing daily as the eggs the queen started laying in February and March have now hatched into bees. Some of the new bees will already have matured to foraging status so you should see a lot of bees out flying bringing in bags of pollen on their legs and nectar in their stomachs. The queen should be laying at full speed now and the brood increases rapidly in size. You may see the first few drones flying. February What should you be doing? What are the bees doing? A full inspection of the colony should be first on your list. Note the The bees will still be in their cluster with the queen laying at the centre following: available stores, calculate laying rate of queen. Finding the of it. On a clear day you should see some bees flying. These are cleansing queen will be reassuring. You should add 3 additional brood frames with flights. They may start collecting water and new pollen. foundation at the front of the brood and 3 behind to give the queen room to expand the nest. Add 2 supers for honey storage. The bees will What should you be doing? move any honey left in the deep frames that might otherwise restrict On a warm day you can put a block of fondant (also called candy) above the queen from laying and you may be able to take advantage of an the brood, to ensure your bees don’t starve. You should start to repair early nectar flow. If the mite drop was more than 1 per day in March, cull old equipment and new frames. drone brood to reduce the infestation.

What will the beehaus look like inside? What will the beehaus look like inside?

A block of fondant ensures the bees have extra food if they need it. Add 3 brood frames infront and behind the brood and add some supers

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 27

mention queen laying rate page in April text.. May July What are the bees doing? What are the bees doing? The brood nest will be growing. A sign of growing maturity is the There should be a lot of activity now with foragers eagerly collecting building of drone cells on the bottom bars of the brood frames. The bees the main summer nectar. The queen will start to reduce her rate of will be taking full advantage of the spring nectar flow. If the weather laying eggs. The number of bees will still increase because the eggs will has been very good the bees may be preparing to swarm. be hatching.

What should you be doing? What should you be doing? You should pay very close attention to your bees to spot any signs of Add supers as necessary. If you did artificially swarm your bees in june you swarming preparations. Visit them once a week. If any signs of swarming should unite the two colonies once the new queen’s side has produced are seen, you should immediately artificially swarm your bees to avoid a compact patch of brood – approximately one month after the original the risk of them leaving the hive. If no signs of swarming are evident but division. Enjoy watching your bees collecting all that delicious honey! the colony has reached its peak you could artificially swarm your bees as Keep a close eye out for swarming signs. a precaution. Take the opportunity to treat your bees for varroa during the artificial swarming procedure using the powdered sugar method. What will the beehaus look like inside? Add more supers, especially if you live in an area of large nectar yield such as oil seed rape.

What will the beehaus look like inside?

The hive at full production capacity! Enjoy some honey..

If your supers are becoming full, add some more on top.

June August What are the bees doing? What are the bees doing? The bees could be making preparations to swarm. There may be a dip The population in the hive will have reached its peak and will now reduce in nectar available leaving a lot of bees with little to do. New queens quickly. There will be far fewer bees flying because there is little nectar reared under the artificial swarming technique will be ready to mate available. The drones start to be evicted from the hive by the workers who realise that they are no longer needed and will just be a strain on What should you be doing? resources over the winter. The queen will be laying to build the colony If you haven’t practiced swarm control because the colony was still up again. Keep an eye out for robbing by wasps or other bees. growing you should now artificially swarm your bees. Take the opportunity to treat your bees for varroa during the artificial swarming What should you be doing? procedure using the powdered sugar method (Method 2). If you did If there are a lot of wasps around restrict the entrance to prevent robbing. artificially swarm your bees in May, you should unite the two colonies There is very little risk now of swarming so you can go on holiday! once the new queen’s side has produced a compact patch of brood – approximately one month after the original division. Collect some honey stored in the supers, although be careful if the weather turns bad What will the beehaus look like inside? because the large colony can quickly run out of stores if they are unable to collect any nectar for a few days.

What will the beehaus look like inside?

Diagram of the bees on 15 frames

Diagram of the bees seperated by artificial swarming

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 28 September November What are the bees doing? What are the bees doing? The queen will be laying very few if any eggs. Although there will still The bees will be clustering on the frames. The queen will be at the be some brood waiting to hatch. The drones will all be removed by the centre and the bees will be vibrating their bodies to keep themselves end of the month. warm – this is very similar to shivering.

What should you be doing? What should you be doing? You can collect the honey in the supers and any brood frames in the brood There isn’t anything for you to do at this time of the year. You shouldn’t box leaving the bees on 9 frames. Start feeding to leave the bees with open the hive to check the bees as this will very quickly chill them. You 20kg of stores for the winter. You should be able to fit 20kg of stores into can remove the wasp guard and clear any dead bees from the entrance the brood frames. You should not leave any supers on over the winter. using the curved end of the hive tool. Treat your bees for Varroa using a varroacide such as apiguard or oxalic acid after removing the honey. Monitor the treatments effectiveness. What will the beehaus look like inside? You should do this before the air temperature drops below 15 deg c.

What will the beehaus look like inside?

The bees will still be overwintering on 9 frames

Bees clustering on 9 frames with contact feeder in a super

October December What are the bees doing? What are the bees doing? The bees will be finishing preparations for winter and will not spend much The bees will be clustering on the frames. The queen will be at the time outside the hive. They will be processing any feed given at the end centre and the bees will be vibrating their bodies to keep themselves of September. warm – this is very similar to shivering.

What should you be doing? What should you be doing? You should finish winter feeding. The colony winters on nine deep There isn’t anything for you to do at this time of the year. You shouldn’t frames, positioned half-way down the body - nine frames are enough to open the hive to check the bees as this will very quickly chill them. You hold the bees plus 20kg of stores. The outermost combs are insulated by can remove the wasp guard and clear any dead bees from the entrance the pair of dummy frames and if wanted, a board can be laid flat under using the curved end of the hive tool. the frames to shield the bees from draughts through the mesh floor. Put the wasp guard in to protect against mice. If you are storing equipment What will the beehaus look like inside? and frames, you should protect them against attack from pest such as wax moths. You can also start making things from your produce such as candles or polish. The National Honey Show is also a good highlight of the year.

What will the beehaus look like inside?

Your bees won’t be doing a lot now, just sitting tight.

Your bees in overwintering mode, clustered on 9 frames.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 29 being so actively guarded. Therefore, you should always have the frames Bee health pushed up towards the entrance of the hive so that the colony is above One of the biggest responsibility as a beekeeper is to ensure that your the entrance and ready to instantly respond to any intruders. bee are healthy. Bees are obviously highly mobile creatures and disease can be spread from one colony to another. This can be to colonies You can set up a wasp trap and a simple plastic drink bottle filled with within your garden or even colonies miles away. Therefore it’s not just a some sugary pop with the top inverted will do the job as well as anything. responsibility to your own bees but to other beekeepers as well. To stop bees falling into the trap you should add a good slosh of vinegar which will deter them but not the wasps. A drop of washing up liquid You should check the health of your colony each time you visit. Often will break the surface tension enabling the wasps to be wetted easily there are treatments for most common diseases - however if the illness is and prevent them from escaping. serious - your bees might require a visit from the local bee inspector. This section covers all the basic health problems you might encounter. Varroa

Varroa is a mite that lives on bees and unless it is controlled can eventually cause the colony to collapse. Varroa are extremely widespread and it’s likely that you will come across them too. The good news is that there Best health practices are lots of ways of treating varroa and by being vigilant and spotting an infestation early you can reduce the number of mites to a level that isn’t You can reduce the chances of your bees becoming ill by some simply harmful to the colony. best practises. This is especially important if you visit your local apiary or help a friend with their colony. How to spot a varroa mite: You might think that the varroa mite would be difficult to spot but if • Check your bees regularly - so you can catch any problems early. you know what you are looking for they stand out quite clearly. The • Regularly keep your health knowledge up to date so you can spot picture below shows an adult female varroa mite. disease quickly if it occurs. • If you have more than 1 hive, you should aim to set them up in a way to reduce drifting of bees from one hive to another. • Do not you transfer combs between colonies without first checking for signs of disease. • Regularly wash you bee veil and gloves to stop the spread of disease through your clothes. • If you are inspecting multiple beehives in a visit - use disposable gloves between hives. • Avoid second hand equipment unless from a trusted previous owner - a good ebay rating is not sufficient.

Pests There are a few pests that can attack your colony of bees. This normally happens in winter when you bees are hibernating and not guarding the entrance 24hr a day.

Wax moth A varroa mite that has fallen onto the inspection tray. They look like a shiny miniature crab. Note the bee’s leg to the right for scale. The other ‘crumbs’ in the Amazingly there is a special type of moth which is rather partial to bee picture are bits of pollen and wax that have fallen through the mesh. wax. The moths don’t attack the bees themselves but simply lay their eggs in the brood comb. This comb is full of protein from the cocoons How do the mites live? of the bee larvae. If left untreated the moth larvae eat their way from Varroa mites live off the bee themselves. They reproduce inside the most of the comb. You can kill the wax moth larvae by putting any affect sealed cells of the brood. Just before the cell is sealed the female mite frames in the freezer overnight. nips inside and sits under the larvae. Once the cell has been sealed over the mite establishes a feeding site on the immature bee. She will then Mice lays about 5-6 eggs. The female mite lays just one male egg and this mite A nice warm sheltered beehive seems like a great home to a mouse in mates with the females when they hatch. The male dies when the cell is winter. In the summer the hive is busy with bees which stops the mice opened and any female mites not yet mated with are therefore sterile. from entering. However, in the winter the hive entrance is often left The mites like to favour laying eggs inside drone cells because these take open to mice. If a mouse does get in the hive the bees will most likely not longer to hatch than the worker bees. attack it. So, the best treatment is prevention. In the winter you make the hive entrance as small as possible. During the summer the mites live for about 2-3 months. They survive over winter by living on the adult bees but aren’t able to reproduce because Woodpeckers the bees aren’t raising any brood. The mites won’t start increasing their This is not a problem with modern plastic hives - however wooden numbers again until the spring when the queen starts laying again. beehives are susceptible to attack from woodpeckers, which create a hole in the side of the hive and eat the honey. What effect do mites have on bees? The bees that are in the cell with the varroa mites usually survive but are Wasps not able to grow properly. They may be smaller, have deformed wings or In the summer (August - October) wasps will start getting interested in simply not live as long as healthy bees. the hive and its contents. You will often see the odd one or two flying around inquisitively when you are going about the weekly inspection. Wasps are opportunistic hunters and if they discover a weak colony, especially one that is queenless or has a failing queen they will attack the de-motivated bees and rob it of its stores and larvae.

A strong colony will defend the hive killing any wasps that try to gain access through the entrance. However, as wasps continue flying later in the evening than bees, the hive is at risk when the entrance is not

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 30 If you are unsure if your bees have either of these diseases, you should Varroa treatment the National Bee Unit. For more detailed information about either Varroa is a common problem for bees to suffer and there are often new American Foulbrood or European Foulbrood you should visit the Bee treatments available to try. Here is an outline of a few: Base website for their helpful advisory leaflets

1 - Varroacides There are three main chemical treatments for varroa which are easy to Sterilising your beehaus apply and can have high success rates of eliminating 95% of mites. They are Apistan, Bayvarol and Apiguard. Apistan and Bayvarol are plastic If you had a disease such as American Foulbrood or European Fouldbrood strips that you hang on the frames between brood comb, Apiguard is in your colony, you will need to sterilise your hive. It is also good practice a slow release gel that you place on the top of the frames and it works to sterilise your beehive whenever you get a chance or if you are selling by evaporation as well as contact and the bees eating it. Good practice or purchasing a secondhand hive. is to alternate your treatments, this helps reduce the resistance that the mites build up to any one particular chemical. The best time to treat your Sterilising your beehaus bees is between harvesting honey and preparing your bees for winter. Wood or plastic hives can be sterilised using common chemicals such as The aim of the treatment is to protect the last new bees who will over bleach, caustic soda or virkon 5. The only thing that chemicals cannot winter and start the colony going again in the spring. It’s also a good to treat is wax and you would need to remove this before doing the treat your bees in the spring, especially if you find that large numbers of sterilisation. We recommend that your read the office Defra advice mites have survived the winter. If not the mites are likely to increase in leaflet here: https://secure.csl.gov.uk/beebase/pdfs/fbleaflet.pdf - page numbers rapidly with the increase in brood available. 34, under the head Chemical Sterilisation.

2 - Drone brood removal Frames and Wax The mites prefer to lay their eggs in drone cells (because these are You can sterilise wax by using gamma rays from a radioisotope of cobalt. bigger and take longer to hatch) so a good way of controlling their As you probably won’t have a gamma radiation machine to hand, it is numbers is to put a brood frame in the hive with only a half strip of recommended that your depose of the wax and old frames by burning foundation at the top. The bees will build drone cells below this and them in a fire. once they are capped you can cut them out and destroy them. You can do this from April through to July when the bees will happily build lots of drone cells. This is good practice but is not effective on it’s own.

3 - Open mesh floor Some mites naturally drop of the bees and comb. If the hive has a solid floor these fallen mites can then climb back up onto the bees.The beehaus has an open mesh floor which lets the mite drop safely outside the hive, from which they cannot return.

For more detailed information about varroa and for keeping up to date on treatments you should visit the Bee Base website for their helpful advisory leaflets

Foulbrood Foulbrood is a very serous disease for bees. It is a nasty bacterial infection of larvae and pupae. Unfortunately it highly contagious and if no action is taken it will certainly kill a colony. It is good idea to familiarise yourself with the symptoms because it important to take action fast.

In fact, if you suspect that your bees have either of the two types you are legally required to contact the National Bee Unit - so that your local bee inspector can examine your hive. You do not need to be embarrassed about discovering this disease, in fact quite the opposite; you have done a service to the bee keeping community in stopping the spread of the disease. There are two types:

American Foulbrood (AFB) This is the most serious of the two but the least widespread. Contrary the what the name suggests - American foulbrood is not an American problem - it occurs in the UK also. American foulbrood is a bacterium that infects the larvae. It lives in their guts and causes them to die after the brood is sealed. Unfortunately, there is no way of curing a colony with AFB and the colony will have to be destroyed. The symptoms are:

• The capped brood will appear sunken, moist and dark • There may be an unpleasant rotting smell • It still a matchstick into an infected cell - the cell can be drawn out like a mucus thread

European Foulbrood (EFB) This is slightly less serious to AFB but is much more widespread. This is bacterial infection similar to AFB, however the larvae are killed by the bacteria before the cell is capped. There are treatments for EFB, but only if it is caught early. The symptoms are:

• The larvae turn yellowish brown and twisted

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 31 Honey Honey collection How much honey will you be able to collect from your beehaus? The first thing to point out is you can’t act like a big brown bear and take all the bees honey! You need to leave enough for the bees to last them through the winter when they need the honey as fuel to heat their home. In a good year you will be able to collect 30-50kg of honey without affecting the bees stores but in a bad year you may even have to feed the bees with sugar syrup without even taking any honey for yourself.

Bees actually stop moving below 8degC so it’s vital that they keep their home above that temperature. In practice bees will keep themselves clustered together on the combs at about 20degC. They don’t generate this warmth by lighting little stoves and fuelling them with honey. They have a much more ingenious solution. They generate this heat by vibrating their biggest muscles, which are their wing muscles, very fast. How do bees make honey? You may be thinking that thousands of bees flapping their wings would Bees make honey from nectar. During the spring and summer the colony surely also create a chilly breeze cooling the hive rather than heating it. sends out thousands of foraging bees who collect the vast amounts Well it would but the bees have a trick up their sleeve. They are actually of sugary water produced by flowering plants as a bi-product of able to dislocate their wings so that they can vibrate the muscle without photosynthesis. A single cherry tree can produce 2kg of nectar per day flapping their wings. Amazing! and honeybees have evolved a long straw-like tongue for collecting it. The beehaus is triple insulated so that radiated heat losses are kept The best nectar collectors to a minimum. The more of the warmth that your bees can retain the Honeybees are simply the best collectors of nectar around, they are more likely it is that they will come through even hard winters without so good that they have very little competition from other insects. But running out of fuel and will be in good condition the following spring. because there are not enough bees to collect it all, thousands of tonnes of nectar goes to waste every year. The bees will need 20kg of honey to see them comfortably through the winter. If the bees have stored 30kg you can remove 10kg without The amount of nectar that the bees can collect is influenced greatly by any consequence. However, if you need to take 15kg of honey because the weather. In very wet summers the nectar produced by plants and you’ve promised all your friends, neighbours and aunts and uncles a jar trees is much diluted and therefore of poor quality. In very hot weather for Christmas you will need to make up the 5kg deficit. the plants stop producing nectar entirely. You do this by feeding the bees the equivalent weight in sugar as a The amount of water in the nectar is a measure of its quality and your syrup. This is quite simple to do and the bees will store it in the cells bees will actively source the flowers producing nectar with the lowest exactly as they would if it were honey. percentage of water and the highest percentage of sugar. In a good season the bees will actually become quite discerning about this and The time to do this is in September and is simply done by placing the foraging bees who return with watery nectar will have their load fondant on top of the clearer board with the bee escape removed. The rejected by the hive bees and sent out into the field to do better. bees will quickly move the sugary liquid into the cells in the middle of the combs and seal it. The foraging bees transfer the nectar at the entrance of the hive to other bees who have the job of packing it into the storage cells. Firstly, There is more about feeding bees in the Beekeeping basics section. they will make sure there is enough instant access honey around the brood but when a surplus occurs they will need extra storage space.

Honey in jars Have you ever wondered how a tiny little insect like a bee could ever fill a jar of honey? If it were just down to one bee it would be a mighty task but the work is shared by many thousands of bees and is a great example of what can be achieved by a co-ordinated effort. Think of it in terms of humans creating something like a pyramid.

A jar of honey weighs 454grammes and a bee can carry about 0.04grammes of nectar. But nectar is only about 40% sugar and honey needs to be about 80% sugar so the bee actually only carries about 0.02grammes of honey on each trip.

Now how many bees would we need to fill a jar of honey? The answer is 454/0.02 grammes which equals =

22,700 bees are required to fill a single jar of honey.

This sounds impressive enough but of course a colony of bees doesn’t just make one jar of honey. Over the year the queen will produce between 100,000 and 200,000 bees that will each spend between 10 and 20 days collecting nectar.

At its most productive a single colony of bees could theoretically produce around 800kg of honey, that’s almost a tonne!

The reason that beehives aren’t the size of warehouses to accommodate all this honey is that it is being continually used up by the bees as fuel, primarily to keep the brood warm. So at any given time there may only be between 10 and 20kg of honey in the hive.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 32 Getting additional help Courses Omlet offer good beekeeping courses, from taster sessions to complete courses, and if you would like more information please visit the courses page. Many local beekeeping associations run beekeeping courses as well which cover the basics of good beekeeping. Many of the courses are over subscribed and it is often hard to get a place so you will need to book early.

British Beekeepers’ Association If you are thinking of starting to keep bees, we highly recommend that you join your local Beekeeping Association. The BBKA is a charity made up of over 63 local associations and has over 15,000 members. They are very helpful in getting new beekeepers started. What do you get for joining?

Lectures and Bee Books Most associations have a wide range of lectures covering all manner of beekeeping topics. They run throughout the year and cover interesting topics such a hive management to disease control. Most associations also have a really good book library which you can use free of charge.

Insurance You will get public liability insurance for all beekeeping activities and also product insurance. Product insurance covers you in the unlikely event that your bees catch American Foulbrood (a rare disease). In this unfortunate situation your hive would have to be destroyed by a Bee Inspector and the insurance should cover the cost of a new hive for you.

Friendly Advice Last but not least - the beekeeping associations are full of like minded friendly people. You can get advice about your hives, find someone with bees to spare and make friends. To find out more visit www.britishbee.org.uk.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 33 Bee glossary Cell - The hexagonal wax compartment in the comb. Amazingly these Beekeeping is full of lots of new words... here is a useful summary. start round but by the tension in the comb change into hexagons. Bees use these cells to store honey, pollen or raise bees. Alarm pheromone - This alerts guard bees to potential threats to the colony. It is produced by worker bees. Chalkbrood - A fungal disease which affects bee larvae. If left untreated the larvae turn into hard, chalkymummies. Abdomen - The third section of a bee’s body. It contains the stomach, honey stomach, intestines, sting and reproductive organs. Chilled brood - If the brood become too cold it the immature bees (including larvae and eggs) can die. This is often cause by the hive being opened on a Acarapis woodi - The tracheal mites (different from the varoa mite). It cold day. lives in the tracheal (throat) and affects their breathing. Cluster - A mass of bees which huddle together. These are commonly Aldehydes - An organic compound that contribute to the flavour and seen in winter when the bees try to keep warm or in a swarm hanging aroma of the honey. If you heat your honey, these will released reducing from a tree. the flavour of the honey. Colony - A working group of bees which would include a queen, worker Anthers - Part of the stamen of a plant that contains pollen. and drones.

Bacillus larvae - The bacteria that cause American Foulbrood. Comb - A group of cells.

Bee bread - A mixture of pollen, yeast and honey, which when mixed Crystallisation - This natural process occurs when the honey turns from and fermented creates delicious bee food. It is stored in the combs and liquid to solid creating granulate. You can make the honey liquid again fed to larvae. but heating it slowly.

Bee blower - Rather like an industrial cool hair dryer - a bee blower is Drawn comb - The processing of building comb is called ‘drawing’. Once used to blow bees off supers of honey. the comb is completely built it is called “drawn comb”.

Bee brush - A soft brush used to remove bees from a comb. Can be Drifting - Sometimes bees loose their location and enter another hive. artificial or you could use a goose feather. If you choose a goose feather This might occur if you keep two hives next door to one another and it you can should choose a left- or right-handed feather to give a better is a slightly windy day. brushing action. If you are harvesting, you should clear bees from the honey boxes using a bee escape rather than a brush. Drone - The male bee. The main role of the drone is to fertilise the queen, although this will only happen once in her life. Bee escape - A one way valve or exit which the bees can go through. Extractor - A device which removes honey from the comb. This normally BS - British Standard. involves spinning the comb around.

Bee space - Spaces smaller than this will be filled with propolis, larger Flight path - The area and direction that the bees take when leaving the than this will be filled with comb. The magic space is 6-8mm. This allows hive. It is best to keep this area clear. bees to pass without them building anything in the way. The discovery of this led to moveable frame hives. Foulbrood - A bacterial disease which affect bees, causing the brood to become brown and sticky. See the bee health section for more Bee veil - Protective cloth of wire netting which stops a beekeeper’s information on this disease. head and neck from being stung. Foundation - A thin sheet of wax that is the ‘foundation’ on which the Bees wax - Wax that is secreted by special glands on the underside of bee build honey comb. Normally foundation is embossed with lots of the bees. hexagons - to encourage the bees to start building.

Blending - Like making a fine whiskey, mixing various varieties of honey Frame - This is a rectangle of either plastic or wood in which comb will be can make something better than the sum of the parts, typically improving built by the bee. It allows the beekeeper to move the comb around and flavour and colour. was invented by Langstroth in 1852.

Breeding stock - The brood (i.e. eggs and larvae) from a good colony Frame wire - Wire used to reinforce frames to keep the foundation from from which queens will be reared. moving or sagging in the frame.

Brood - The area comb that has developing bees in its cells (i.e eggs Guard bee - Worker bees that guard the hive entrance from predators and larvae). (including bee from other colonies or wasps).

Brood chamber - The part of the hive where the brood is based. Generally Hive - A bee’s home. this is at the bottom of most modern hives. Hive tool - A multifunctional tool used by a beekeeper to open and clean Brood pheromone - A pheromone produced by the brood which tells the their hives. house bees to provide food, and for foragers to collect food. Honey flow - A term used to describe the collection of nectar (to make Buckfast hybrid - A hybrid bee developed the famous monk - Brother honey) by the bees (e.g. There weather is good and there is good honey Adam at Buckfast Abbey in England. The breed is regarded as calm, flow at the moment). disease resistant and easy to manage. Honey stomach - The stomach the bees use for carrying nectar, honey Burr comb - Comb which has over grown the frame (ignoring the and water. It is in the abdomen. beespace) and linked to the hive body. Honeycomb - Comb which has been filled with lots of lovely honey. Capped brood - As the larvae cells develop they are capped with wax allowing them to spin cocoons and turn into pupae and eventually Larvae - The stage when an egg undergoes metamorphosis into a bee. a bee. Marked queen - A beekeeper typically will attempt to find the queen Castes - A term which describes the three types of adult bees in a colony while tending to their bees. To help speed this process up many - drones, workers and the queen. beekeepers mark their queen with a light colour dot.

Omlet Beekeeping Guide Page 36 Mead - A delicious wine made from honey. It is highly recommend that Supercedure - The process of replacing an existing queen with a new you are patient and leave your mead for at least 10 years to mature. one. This is natural process - but can be induced artificially.

Nectar - A sugar-rich liquid secreted by plants. It is derived from the Surplus honey - If a colony is successfully it will produce more honey than Latin word nectar which means “drink of the gods”. The bees collect the it can use for its own stores. This surplus honey can then be collected for nectar and turn it into honey. the beekeepers own use.

Nucleus hive - Often called a Nuc, it is a small colony from which a full Swarm - A group of bees that have decided to move hive. colony will group. Typically, this will be a group of bees living on 4-5 frames of brood. Winter cluster - A cluster of bees that huddle together to keep warm.

Nurse Bee - An immature whose role in the hive is to feed Worker bee - A female bee which cannot lay eggs. The vast majority of the larvae. bees in the hive are workers. The worker bees keep the hive running smoothly (feeding, cleaning, searching and gather nectar and pollen for Observation hive - A small hive normally made from glass which allows the hive). the colony to be observed.

Pheromone - A chemical signal which triggers a response in other bees. For example, if the colonies are attacked they release an alarm pheromone which alerts other bees to the danger. By using a smoker the beekeepers disrupts this pheromone signal and keeps the bees calm.

Piping - A sound made by a queen which normally preceding her emerging from her cell.

Pollen - A fine powder product by the male of the plant. It fertilises other plant and also provides and valuable source of protein for the bees.

Pollen trap - A device which is placed on the entrance of the hive and rubs the pollen from the legs of the incoming bees. The beekeeper can use this to collect pollen.

Porter bee escape - A type of bee escape based on two thin metal leaf springs.

Propolis - A resinous substance that bees collect from trees and plants. It is used by the bees to seal up cracks (reducing movement or vibration). Sometimes it is used to mummify something within the hive that they cannot throw out - such as a mouse.

Pupa - The final stage of a bee within its cell.

Queen - A mated female. Normally, there will be only one queen within a hive. Unlike a worker bee, she has fully developed ovaries and can lay eggs which can develop into other queens, workers or drones.

Queen cell - A largest peanut like cell which is design to rear a queen. It normally hangs vertically and is about 2 centimetres in length.

Queen excluder - A metal or plastic crate which is large enough for worker bees to climb through but through which the queen cannot fit. It is normally used to stop the queen from entering and laying eggs in the comb used for honey.

Queen right - A queen right colony is a colony that has a queen.

Requeen - To introduce a new queen to an existing queenless colony.

Robbing - The stealing of honey from a weak colony by other bees on insects.

Royal jelly - A food produced by the young worker bees. Royal jelly is fed to all of the larvae in the colony however, if a queen is being reared then she is fed purely royal jelly.

Sacbrood - A viral disease which affect the larvae.

Scout bee - A worker bee who looks out for sources of pollen, nectar, water or a new site for the colony.

Skep - A traditional simple beehive made from straw. It resembles and upturn waster basket.

Smoker - A box with bellows in which a wide variety of materials are burnt to product cool thick smoke. The smoke is used to hide the pheromone signals produced by the bees allowing the beekeeper to easily access the hive.

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