Bee Sustainable

Bee Sustainable Sustainable: ensuring the welfare of the bees sits first and foremost in our beekeeping practice.

27/08/2026

The Borage has been cut and the season is coming to an end - but here, in the foreground, you can see that the harvester missed the smaller plants, which struggled with the lack of rain! Thus, the bees still have a small supply to keep them going. The busyness around the hive, is once again young adult bees starting their orientation flights - a reminder that the colony has no time off and will now be preparing for winter.

02/08/2026

I have cleaned up the honey extractor and sieves, and now allowing them to dry in the sun - but something is missing!

Where are the wasps?

Usually at this time of year, they would try to grab some honey from the supers as I take them off the hives, or try to get into the summerhouse where I extract and even the cleaned up equipment would be inundated with wasps looking for the tiniest drop - but whilst this was the case just two weeks ago - today, none at all!

Have you noticed that there seems less at the moment and when you do see them, do they seem smaller than usual?

This is actually being investigated by University College London, who are looking at the impact of the strange Spring temperatures and the current heatwave on numbers and their size.
Wasps sit at the top of the invertebrate food chain and whilst our cream teas are likely to be more relaxed, any impact on their numbers is likely to have an impact on our eco system!

31/07/2026

Having some hives on the edge of a Borage field has its advantages, but I was surprised last week when a gentleman wandered into the field from a nearby Cricket match to ask me what the crop was and then started face timing me answering the questions with his family in India! This was strange enough, but when I said that I really needed to add some boxes to the hives, he followed me up to the hives whilst I did so and continued to video me! Needless to say, one of us was in a full bee suite....but fortunately, my bees are far too busy foraging the Borage to worry about stinging anyone.

29/07/2026

Requeening:
This was an artificial swarm completed back in the Spring which produced a new queen that was quickly superseded. The colony has since failed to requeen itself successfully.
As the colony was hopelessly queenless, rather then introduce a frame of brood and give them another chance, I decided to add another queen to the colony. The new queen is in the cage, suspended between two frames. At first the colony cannot get to her, so that they can get used to her pheromones. This is two days later - and you can see that whilst the bees are all over the small cage, they are calm and clearly have accepted her. The next stage is to break off a tab at the end of the cage so that they can eat through a blob of fondant and release her. See the comments for the result.

18/07/2026

Wasps start to become annoying to all of us at this time of year as nests start to break up and adult worker wasps become interested in anything sugary.
This colony was moved into this hive from its smaller 'nuc' box a week or so ago. I could see the wasps were interested,.straight away, so reduced down the entrance, taped up any tiny gaps and strapped down the hive to pull the boxes together.
If you watch until the end, you will see that there was a battle, with dead bees and wasps on the ground in front of the hive.(the dead wasps stand out clearly). Fortunately, the wasps did not win and over-take the hive - but the bees are still on their guard at the entrance.

Another swarm, this one taken late at night, so consequently I had to scoop up a few in the morning who I must have miss...
10/07/2026

Another swarm, this one taken late at night, so consequently I had to scoop up a few in the morning who I must have missed in the darkness.
Also this week two more calls for advice about bees in chimneys!
Remember, swarming is a two stage process. Beekeepers can pick up the swarm from the intermediate 'bivoak', like the one in the picture. Once it flies again it is heading to a final destination. This may be a hole in a tree - their natural habitat, but may also be into a chimney or brickwork. This will almost certainly be an expensive job for the homeowners, so please, if you see one of these Bivouacs, call a beekeeper immediately.
https://www.bbka.org.uk/pages/category/swarm-removal?srsltid=AfmBOooDqsuIqPAN-yYnkamap-LmELMDmkqhvOoW65c83OkkKADU3pPG

01/07/2026

Had a look at the swarm collected last week. As you can see the queen is laying well and all but one frame of foundation has been pulled out. The presence of older larvae in a week, shows me that it was a prime swarm - albeit quite a small one. A prime swarm is the first to leave a hive and has the original mated queen. Need to pop up today to add another box onto the nuc.

26/06/2026

Scout bees( the oldest bees in the colony), looking for a new nest site. This is a small 'nuc' hive which I have on the edge of my property, which is set up to receive a swarm if they decide they want it for a new home.
Scout bees will start to look for a new home before the swarm emits from a hive. The decision of which to go to, is usually finalised when the swarm gathers on a branch (Bivouac) and is chosen 'democratically' by the scout bees - essentially they will start with maybe a dozen options and narrow it down to the final choice - so whilst these bees are having a look in this box, whether or not a swarm arrives - I cannot tell!
What is also interesting is that normally the scout bees are out and about in the middle of the day - this was taken at 9pm....these scout bees have some sense!

24/06/2026

I don't get called out to many swarms, but with the weather this week so warm, I knew it was only a matter of time.
Swarming is a two stage process, where the swarm leaves a hive and collects together whilst they finalise their new nest site. This is often on a branch and is called a bivouac. ( See a photo in the comment) I was able to climb a few rungs of a ladder and shake the bivouac into a nuc box and add some frames with wax for them to start building comb. This video shows the bees settling into the box. As long as the queen was shaken into the box, the other bees will join them. A few hours later - the bees had settled and I took them to their new location (also in comments) where I will let them settle and then keep an eye on their health before taking them to an apiary. The health of a swarm is initially unknown, so it is always a good idea to keep it in quarantine and treat as needed as the colony begins to grow.

14/06/2026

Supersedure: This is when a honeybee colony feels that the queen is failing and needs to be replaced. A 'perfect supersedure' is when the colony produces a new queen, but waits for it to start laying before 'getting rid' of the old queen. (A reminder that the insect world is often rather cut-throat). The queen you see in the video has not mated - she is the daughter. Her mother is still laying well and the two of them have been in the colony for at least two months.
Of course, if you look at the video carefully, you will see why there is no chance of her being able to mate - she has no wings! (There is a virus called 'deformed wing virus', but here, they are not deformed - just missing. I can only presume it is some sort of genetic deformity!)
By now, she will probably be laying unfertilised eggs (which produce drones / male bees) and this may be why they have not 'got rid' of her! Perhaps they will in time, but for now, I just monitor this very productive colony to see what transpires.

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