Hi all, this is a whistle stop visit to top up the feeders, check varroa drop, wasp activity and overall hive health. Stung by a grumpy sky raisin.
00:06
Welcome back to a Beekeepers Diary podcast. It's a week later and it's very autumnal today. um
00:20
It's overcast, the ground is damp, got my wellies on and the bees are not flying very actively. They're mainly clustered out the front of the hive. Hanging out looking for wasps trying to get into the hive. It's very quiet here. So I've just done a few basic tasks. I've monitored the entrance for a little bit just to see what the wasps are up to. There's none getting in. em
00:51
There's the odd, just seen one wasp jump on a bee that was in the entrance. They're sort of picking off the odd bee here and there, but they're not getting in. There's a nice little battalion of bees around the entrance protecting it. I've just reduced the size of the entrance to a couple of inches, which they're all clustered round, you know, shoulder to shoulder. So the wasps won't stand a chance of getting in. So they're just skulking around, being opportunistic.
01:19
So that's good, pulled out the Varroa tray, a bit of condensation on the tray so I'm noting that because I don't want the box to become damp over winter but I've got to leave that in for one more week and then the Varroa treatment comes out next week. So this is the final week of Varroa treatment now. I did heft the hive, felt the weight of the hive and it is...
01:48
not very heavy yet so I'm going to continue feeding. I can see a hornet flying around in front of me circling, a European hornet that is, I can see the colouration is horneted off in a different direction. That's good. um Yeah so I've fared another four or five liters of two to one ratio sugar to water thick syrup.
02:18
into the hive which is sort of half one the tray the feeding trays in two halves so it's fully one half is full the other half is about three quarters so so far they've had four they've had ten kilos of feed so far and it still feels quite light so I'm gonna keep doing that we bring more nets we can completely fill it up both sides it's just started raining so
02:49
Yep, just a quick visit today. em Everything is as I would expect. Bees are still going out foraging, but in very much reduced numbers I can see them. It's quite nice when the bees know where to go. They come out of the hive at top speed and just zoom off to where they're going instead of aimlessly zooming about. It's quite nice when they've got purpose in their flight. em So there's that, yeah.
03:19
I'll be back next week to do some more feeding.
03:26
There was a few bees that had managed to get into the feeder which was empty. So I tried instead of drowning them, there was a few that took a swim in the syrup so I've pulled all those out and put them on the entrance board to be licked clean by their mates. And one decided to stick me in the hand so I've got a nice trophy for my visit today.
03:51
Thanks bees, thanks very much. So yeah, have a good week.
03:59
there's no train strikes next week like last week that was not fun and yeah catch you all next week yeah I'll put a few I took a little bit of video today so that'll be on beekeepers diary podcast on Instagram and I'll put some on there if you fancy looking at it ah yeah have a good one see you later