Sunday 16 June 2013

Bee Wrangling Pt 2

Well as Boyd called us (me) bee wranglers here we go ...
Today we were just about to set off on our weekly bike ride to cappuccino land , when Monique called Mike into the back garden and again we had another swarm starting , this 1 week after the last!
Zoom in for bees !

Well they decided not to bother our neighbours thankfully but swarmed in our hedge then settled on hanging from a dogwood .  

We went for our bike ride (cappuccino ) and then Mike was detailed to collect the swarm ably assisted by Monique with a camera from a distance ( Mike suit zip had stuck so used Monique's)

So we phoned Tim who was coming over to collect them and pass them on to their new beekeeper.
As you can see the only box we had suitable was Mike Guitar amp box so lets hope it doesn't need to go back!
So Tim has the bees now and its up to some one else to continue this story board.
So the Vox pop (sorry) will continue hopefully , but we do have some questions. Are we unlucky to get a swarm a week later ? We did think this was a virgin queen flight at first but not the case , what are we likely to get next?

All the best

M&M




5 comments:

  1. Your bee's are certainly keeping you on your toes, lets hope they don't deplete your hive to much, it can happen.

    Just for info what you will be getting are cast's these will have a virgin queen and all the bee's able to fly when she decides she does not want to stay in your hive. They are normally much smaller than the primary swarm.

    This may continue until all your queen cells have hatched out. If you want to stop it you will have to go thru and destroy all but one queen cell.

    At least at this time of year the cast's should survive and indeed flourish.

    Dave

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    Replies
    1. Thanks Dave

      have checked could only find 2 queen cells and they were empty so hopefully that'll be that for now - the bees are building stocks up again , the queen cells were on the outer comb so lets hope that is it !

      M&M

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  2. The boys bee's have also just thrown off a cast (I missed all the primary swarms). I actually saw them emerge and drift across the field into a tree. Collection was interesting, they were a long way up and it took 3 attempts to get them to stay in the box. In the end I chopped the branch off and put the whole thing in a Pete sized hive.

    I intend to try and take this to future talks to have on show. Should be fun.

    Dave

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  3. Drat! I'm missing out on all the fun. Far too hot here to even think of bees at the moment. Did see several hundred on some ornamental planting from the luxury of my AC truck whilst waiting at traffic lights the other day though, so they must be around.

    M&M Good Luck with it all and keep up the good work.

    Boyd x

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