A Year on a Honey Farm: April : 33


now. It was not feasible to close the site and remove everything, so a friend suggested an electric fence similar to those used to keep in sheep, poultry and other small animals.


After a visit to the local farming supply store and a bill for £250 (the cost of said fence), I felt I was now in a position to protect my hives of bees and, in the process, teach Mr Brock a valuable lesson. So far it seems that the fence has had the desired effect as no more mating nuclei have been destroyed. I am hopeful that Mr Brock and I can once again live alongside each other in harmony.


A Day Out Last week I made the long


journey to Gloucester to visit Maisemore Apiaries to collect 2000 new frames and 2000 sheets of wax foundation which, hopefully, will see us through the majority of this year. We also collected 200 pairs of castellated spacers to fit into 100 new National supers and 100 new Commercial supers that we have made. We use ten- slot castellations in our Nationals and 11-slot in the Commercials. I have used Maisemore for a few years now and have to say I find them very supportive and


April 2015 Vol 97 No 4


The electric fence energiser and battery are hidden in an empty hive helpful.


While we were there we also took a look at their new six-frame polystyrene National nucleus hive which they have introduced this year. It is different from most others as it has a Miller-type feeder above it rather than a feeder being incorporated within the main body of the box. We liked the design and have ordered an initial 40 and will trial them over the coming season with a view to purchasing another 60 during the summer.


April Inspections


As the weather improves with the advent of spring, there is increasing activity within the colonies and we have noticed an increase in pollen going


back to the hives. So, on a suitably warm day we will take the opportunity to carry out a first inspection. We will not go through every single frame but just establish that the queen is laying and there is brood in all stages. A good idea of food stores and amounts of pollen present can be gleaned by viewing a few frames. Once we know that there are good quantities of brood and food we quietly shut the hive and leave the bees to it. We do not need to see the queen on these initial inspections; all we need to see is the evidence that she is there and laying well. If on these first inspections we find colonies that have no brood, we need to assess if there is any benefit uniting them with another colony.


I am always wary about uniting a hive of bees that has no brood, because I do not know how old the bees are within this colony. If the queen has died during the winter, then these bees left in the hive could have emerged in the autumn the previous year and so, by this time, will be old and of little use to another colony. If the queen, however, has died in recent weeks and there is still capped brood, then there will be a significant number of younger


Checking supers while the bees are on oilseed rape


bees within the colony and so these would be a useful addition to the amalgamated colony. Any colony that is queenless and has no brood will be left for nature to take its course. There is no point investing time and money into a colony that will struggle and almost definitely perish during the course of the spring. I can recall times in my youth when I did everything I could to support such colonies, by installing a new queen and feeding with both pollen and syrup. But by the time this new queen started to lay and her initial eggs were about to hatch, which would have taken on average three to four weeks, the majority of the original bees would have perished and so no advantage would have been gained.


Now I have to be more ruthless with my decisions governing time and money as this is a living, not a hobby.


Preparations for Oilseed Rape


Oilseed rape is not a popular


crop for a lot of beekeepers as the honey that is produced will crystallise and go solid within a few weeks of extraction, or can be a nightmare to harvest from the frames if it has already granulated within the comb. I, on the other hand, look forward to the oilseed rape every year as this is the first plentiful resource for the bees to gather significant quantities of both pollen and nectar early in the year. With large amounts of pollen and nectar entering the hive, when the bees are able to forage on this crop, the colony and queen will be in full brood- rearing mode. This is important for me and I will support the bees in any way that I can to enable the bees to take full


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