The Breeze Hill Bees.
The season is already drawing to a close, we have harvested 45Lb this year ,the best yet putting this 10Lb burst on the month of sunshine we had at the start of the season in May time.
The " girls" continue to amaze us when you consider that each  summer worker bee lives about six weeks and collects about a tea spoonful in that time! This is not mentioned pollen for the grubs, and Persepolis to seal up any draughty bits in their hive!
One diversion I had was when the contractors who are building the new houses off Nior way asked me to remove a wild swarm as their  geologist could check if a badger set was live or not.
I could not remove the bees they were, I think in an old dead tree. so I provided him with a suit and protection with my smoker that I used to keep the bees away , as it turned out the set ( that was abandoned) was just off their flight line so they were not in least but interested in what was going on!
But back to our Apiary that  hasn't been without its problems we went into last winter with six colonies, lost one through the winter ( unknown causes). Of the five survivors two swarmed both of which we caught  ,one we kept and the the other we gave to  a new keeper in the county ,bringing us back to six.
Subsequently two have lost their Queens ,both where re queened  from queens donated from our bee keeping colleges then  one of those failed !
This was really too late to try again  to re queen as there are very few drones later in the year ,thus we had no choice but to amalgamate the remaining bees with one of the other "queen right" colonies. So we  are  back down to four!
In the process of harvesting our honey we discovered that for the first time in our eight seasons the wax moth had got into some stored honey awaiting spinning This was a lucky find and I must be more vigilant in the future. The moths grubs can if left undiscovered completely wreck the wax frames with the resulting collapse of the colony.
So to bring things up to date, the bees are being fed with artificial food so we can be happy they have enough for the coming winter, and I am just about to give them all the remaining colonies their  annual dose of Varroa treatment .
So they should be pretty well set until I think about mouse and woodpecker guards and winter insulation as the year wears on.

I will write again soon.  Freddie  ( fastfreddie577@gmail.com)

                                                         Early Spring in the Apiary

Looking back at my last post  from Breeze Hill  in 2018 it was as you recall a year of the "Beast from the East and then If I remember correctly about five weeks with out rain, as result we lost all our bees from our out apiary in Irchester  ( The Corner Field) and very low production  from our remaining colonies in Breeze Hill.  This was mainly due to no rain and the plants producing very little nectar for the girls  to forage on.
But as we begin our  eight  season of bee keeping with our sole Apiary at Breeze Hill the early spring signs are good . All three Colonies have come through the winter, I had fed them at the end of last year  and again both after Christmas and again at the end of February with Apicandi  a synthetic food that contains all the essential vitamins and  food supplements to give the bees a kick start for the new season.
The first hive I inspected ,the "Jane" colony was in the process of producing a new queen, how do I know this? Well the girls make "play cups" to start with , a sign they are thinking of doing something!
As it was early season there was very little  chance they were going to swarm so it  looked like the old queen was not preforming very well!
A new queen is created by the colony, who know they need one and feed selected grubs extra nutrias food stuffs (  often refereed to as "Royal  Jelly"). The chosen grub then develops several more chromosomes and becomes a queen.
True to  form several of these play cups had been taken down ( bees very  often do this) but two had been charged  and one sealed meaning a new queen had been produced she was now entombed to  pupate.
She will be the first of the two to emerge, she will sting the other through its cell wall to be come the new queen in about eighteen days time!  (she may  also live along side the old queen  for a while). 
Then the new "Queen Jane" will fly to get mated with drone bees ( males) that are just waiting to get a whiff of her and mate  ( Pheromones play a very important function in a bee colony).
A successful mating will result in the drone dying ( presumably with a smile on his face)  and the queen becoming fertile, this may well happen a dozen or more times! the more she has a successful encounter with a male the longer she will remain fertile  ( two to three years).

As for the other two hives ( Matilda and Bodica) both had eggs, grubs and sealed brood showing that all was well.
I will write again before the season gets going proper, but in case you have not seen it I recently posted about different types of bees and bee swarms that you may or have seen.  Freddie.



OUR FIRST BEE CALL OF 2019, yes folks it's that time again. As many of you know we are local bee keepers, on the council list and Northampton Bee Keepers Association.
There are lots of Bumble bee types, typically the queen has come out of hibernation, finds somewhere she can lay her eggs. This might be a bird box, or up under your eves or air brick. The first you probably notice as the youngsters emerge, fledge and start flying about This is when we get the call!
There is little to be done I'm afraid! Bees are not aggressive,
There will seem to be a lot, but in due course they will disperse as they mature and go out in the world to pollinate our crops and plants.
But there is only one type of honey bee! These are generally kept by bee keepers. But around late April ,through to june some colonies will swarm. This a natural way of procreation of species. Seeing a swarm in the air or arriving on your property can be very alarming! But the bees are well fed and only interested in keeping with the old migrating Queen, DON'T PANIC! They are not in anyway aggressive, they are simply waiting for scouts to come back with a DesRes!
You can call the council, call me 07895 088 401. Or wait for them to leave, they will when they are ready.
But we can usually collect them , it's a free service, hive them or give them to a new keeper ,