Tag Archives: beekeeping

Swarm Nine Safely Housed

Yesterday I boxed up the ninth swarm from my own colonies. This was a much smaller swarm, and was close to the hive from which I think the previous swarm came. The timing is about right too, with almost a week elapsing since the prime swarm came out. Having finished, I got a call to tell me that one of the colonies that I manage had swarmed.

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Scything and Swarm Eight

Today I had arranged to do some scything tuition, but had told Andy that I may have to pause to house a swarm. He picked up the peening pretty quickly, which was good, but by lateĀ  morning the sound of bees just kept getting louder. So I suited up, as did he, and we walked around the field looking for a swarm. There wasn’t one, but with thirteen colonies and a strong nectar flow, everywhere that you went sounded like a swarm.

I was pretty sure that at least one colony would go, so I did the rest of the session in my bee suit, and checked regularly. Again, no swarm. So we finished up, and I gave hime some lunch, and then, as he was interested in permaculture and Forest Gardening, I showed him around. On the way back down the hill, I saw some scout bees checking out the empty hive left strategically ready to use in the other field, and pointed them out, only to see more bees checking around the hive. No sooner had I said that there must be a swarm out, than I spotted a dark shadow on the far side of an apple tree, and had to say my goodbyes, and deal with the swarm. As I went back up the field, it was obvious that this was a big swarm, so I went and got my camera for a few pictures.

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Swarm Seven, and still more Questions

A late night preparing more hive equipment last night, has left me with an evening relatively free. So, with a bottle of red open, I wanted to share some pictures and thoughts about swarm seven of the season. I took three pictures of the queen of this swarm, but the intelligent autofocus of my camera was not intelligent enough to get those shots in focus, and after three of the ‘girls’ trying to sting my hands, I wasn’t going to risk taking my gloves off to focus the thing manually.

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Will 2011 be the busiest year ever at The Sustainable Smallholding?

If you have read my recent posts, you could be forgiven for thinking that all I’m doing at the moment is catching swarms. I did think that if ever I wrote an autobiography, this chapter would be entitled ‘Summers in a bee suit’, but I’m trying hard to keep up with all of the other chores that need doing. With no swarms for two days, and after a concerted effort to get ahead of the bees in terms of hive and frame assembly, I have actually managed to spend some time repotting, potting on, planting out, and thinking about the future.

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Do Swarms travel with a Spare Queen?

Yesterday I housed my sixth swarm of the season, and far from becoming routine, the process threw up a number of questions, including, do swarms travel with a spare queen? In the end, I think I can answer that, but at the time it was an interesting question to mull over, whilst observing the swarm taking up residence.

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