Tales from
the Corner Field Apiary
Autumn
The
season as you will recall has not been a very good one and we
finished up with just 22Lb of Honey , about half our normal amount.
Now
the misty mornings and condensation on the windows tell me autumn
has really arrived. In the Apiary you also will remember in my last
blog that I was preparing for the equinox anyway and I am pleased
to say that with the exception of Queen Matilda's colony the three
other colonies ( Anne, Victoria and Elizabeth) are all in fine fettle
with between eight to nine frames of packed bees. Matilda is a worry
because she has only about six, the minimum that that a colony needs
to survive to coming winter as winter deaths will further deplete the
colony , possible to a point where it would no longer be viable come
the spring.
I
have just finished treating them for the Varroa Destructor a common
and now an endemic parasite in all UK mainland colonies with a
chemical called Appiguard.
The
female Varroa does here dastardly deed by laying her eggs in a cell
when an egg has pupated into a grub and just before its big sisters
seal it with wax for the final stages of pupation into a juvenile
bee. Thus the Varroa feed on the grub and the bee is born with it
attached, feeding on its “blood” and very often infecting the bee
with viruses that can cause deformations such as one wing or the
inability to feed its self. Clearly if the Varroa is not kept in
check. In time the colony would become unviable and collapse.
The
other rather sad sign the last time I visited was the Drone bees (
males) being denied entry and some being physically thrown out of the
hive. The male bee has a country gentle mans life, he only purpose in
life is to finds a virgin queen and mates with her. If he does then
he dies a happy chappy!. If he does not then his summer is spend
being welcome in any hive, and not having to any duties that the
females have to do. But come the Autumn he is just another mouth to
feed and he is unceremoniously ejected, and starves and dies!
On
that happy note I will write again soon . Freddie
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