ECBKA NEWSLETTER March

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1 ECBKA NEWSLETTER March I hope that everyone has seen a bit of bee activity recently. For a short period one day last week all 6 of my hives (I only keep 4 colonies but you know how it is) were out in force. I had previously only seen the odd bee from one or two of them. This is the time not to take your eye off the ball and Frank, as always, has some useful advice in his eagerly awaited seasonal notes. I hope that everyone who attended Andrew Martin's talk on bumblebees last month enjoyed it. I found it very informative and it filled a lot of gaps in my bumblebee knowledge. It was good to meet some visitors from the Carmarthen BKA too. Within the next few weeks we will be holding a sale of good quality, second hand equipment, all in excellent condition. The items came to us from a member who has now given up keeping bees. Members will be notified of the date and arrangements once they have been finalised. As it proved successful last year we will again be holding a plant sale at our May meeting so if you are sowing seeds put in a few extra and bring along some plants to sell. I had a good crop of tomatoes and some butternut squashes from plants that I bought last year. I did tentatively enquire at the AGM if there was anyone who wanted to edit the newsletter. I am quite happy to do it but think that members might like to hear from someone other than me a change is as good as a rest, variety is the spice of life etc. I wasn't bowled over in the stampede so I take that as a 'no'. However, if any of you would like to guest edit just one edition please have a go, I promise you won't be committing yourself to anything more. Finally, thank you to Bridget, Gillian, John and Frank who came to the rescue of my empty folder and have sent contributions to this newsletter. Dates Monday 9 th, 16 th, 23 rd, 30 th 7.30pm Beginners' Course Thursday 12 th March 8.00pm Queen Rearing and Stock Selection with Ceri Morgan Tuesday 31 st March 7.30pm Committee meeting Saturday 11 th April Pre emptive and Reactive Swarm Control and the Anglesea Nucleus Project with Wally Shaw and Jenny Shaw Thursday 14 th May 8.00pm Planting for Pollinators with Lyndsey Maiden plus Plant Sale Saturday 4 th July Visit to Tropical Forest Products, Aberystwyth (suppliers of honey & beeswax, have a look at You will see that the April meeting has been moved to a Saturday. We are delighted to have Wally and Jenny Shaw coming along to talk to us and you will be notified of

2 the arrangements once they are finalised. Jenny is the current chair of the WBKA and Wally is the WBKA Technical Officer. You will all have received Wally's two excellent booklets Simple Methods of Making Increase and An Apiary Guide to Swarm Control with recent editions of The Welsh Beekeeper which should give you an idea of the quality of their talks. Bee..ginners The last week of February marked the first of the Beekeeping for Beginners sessions run on behalf of the Association. This is the third year that Margaret has led the course having taken over from Alan who introduced so many of us to keeping bees. The course goes from strength to strength. This year eighteen places were filled without the need for advertising. Personal recommendation of the course and the interest shown by the general public at the shows has been enough to provide an excellent nucleus of budding beekeepers. It seems more and more people are interested in taking up the hobby of beekeeping but Margaret's introduction included the cautionary advice that keeping bees is not for everyone and that if, at the end of the course, someone decided that they didn't have the time or commitment to take on the responsibility of their own hive then it is better to have found out now than 12 months down the line after potentially significant expenditure and frustration. Having covered some general background to bees everyone was invited to draw one. Despite initial anxiety at the quality of their art work this activity resulted in lots of laughter and made the following discussion as to the conformation of the bee really significant. If you have never tried it have a go. This year existing members of the association were encouraged to come along to help meet and greet the new group of beginners and this proved very successful. Everyone had the chance to ask questions, chat about the apiary, and get to know a few names and faces. As a perennial beginner I had a great time and am optimistic that some of those who came along for the first time on Monday will become active and enthusiastic members of our association. Bridget A honeybee colony is equivalent not only to a vertebrate, but in fact to a mammal because it possesses many of the characteristics of a mammal. Jurgen tautz (the buzz about bees)

3 It is often said that you never stop learning about bees. I certainly learnt something from this article that John Burgess sent and I suspect many of you will too. It is from the UC Apiaries Newsletter (UC = University of California) and it is from the Kids' Corner! Kids Corner: How do honey bees collect nectar? Usually after about three weeks of life as a house bee, all healthy honey bees in a normal, healthy colony become foragers. They start every morning by going out into the world looking for the best sources of sugary nectar and protein-rich pollen. Some of them even collect water. Now, I m sure you ve seen these friendly ladies just buzzing along visiting flowers in your back yard. By the way, just a reminder, forager bees will not attack unless they feel threatened so just make sure you don t bother them and you should be fine (and tell your friends too!). But have you ever closely watched a forager honey bee collect nectar from the flowers? Honey bees are very small so you know it wasn t easy to figure out how they do it. But the scientists did it anyway. Shaoze Yan and colleagues from Tsinghua University in China used a special camera to film and observe forager honey bees in action. Turns out honey bees can make a sort of a straw through which they stick out their hairy tongues (glossa) to collect nectar. Amazing! Elizabeth Preston (writing for Discover Magazine) describes it like this: When the bee s tongue extends, the hairs snap outward. First those at the base of the tongue stand on end, then the middle hairs, and finally the ones on the tip. Then they flatten again as the bee withdraws its tongue, slurping up the sweet nectar caught in its bristles. It reminds me of doing the wave at a sporting event, but without sitting back down right away. The nectar then goes into a special carrying pouch called a honey stomach or a crop. And there you have it! The bee is now ready to take the nectar back to her hive where it will be turned into the delicious honey we all love to enjoy. And remember, as Eric Mussen likes to point out, honey is not actually bee vomit as it never goes through a digestion (breakdown) process in the digestive tract of a honey bee.

4 Thank you to Gillian Birdsall for sending the following recipe. I've never actually been to a MacDonalds & didn't know that their chips had a style of their own. MacDonald Style Chips Take some large potatoes, peel and make long thin chips from them. (You could use a mandolin or V slice to achieve a good uniformed, slim chip.) Put the chips into a bowl of water and rinse off the excess starch. In a large bowl get some boiling water and add 2Tbls sugar and 1Tbls Honey. Stir until dissolved. Place the chips into the sugar water solution and soak for 10 minutes. Take out the chips and dry them in a clean T Towel or kitchen paper roll. Put the chips into the freezer for 20 minutes. Fry the chips in hot oil for about 2 minutes, and remove them from the pan and let them cool. (You could freeze these and use another time.) Leave on a plate for 10 minutes Return the chips to the hot oil and cook for 7 minutes or until slightly golden brown. Shake on salt. I have been contacted by Ann Andrews who lives at Llanddeusant. She has 4 national hives for sale Each hive has 2 supers and a solid floor. She is asking for 150 ono per hive. If you are interested Ann can be contacted directly on

5 March Seasonal Notes 2015 Maybe we ll have some unseasonably warm weather in March like last year, but most probably it won t be warm enough to open any hives. Taking out frames is best left until April, at 15C or over. I ve been round my hives and oiled them with a mix of 2 x boiled linseed oil to 1 x turpentine, it makes me feel good and helps weather proof the hives as well. Inspection of the inserts showed a small mite drop from the oxalic vaporising treatment and a good sprinkling of cappings etc, meaning healthy activity above. I ve also cut back last year s excessive undergrowth around the hives and tidied up the apiaries. No losses so far, but I did do some rigorous uniting last autumn, due to a few queens failing to mate in the latter half of the season. Inside the hive, the queen should be laying now and the brood nest expanding, this will be confirmed by seeing pollen going in. Sources are limited to snowdrops, daffodils, primroses and celandines just now but, when dandelions and willow appear, there will be nectar coming in as well. Bear in mind that, as the colony expands, winter stores are being consumed at a faster rate. This is the time when colonies may be lost to starvation. Keep hefting your hives to ensure that there is enough weight of stores present. This is easier if you have more than one hive as a comparison can be made. As a rule of thumb, it should be an effort to lift either side. You can also have a quick look for stores in the comb under the crown board, but this is a less reliable method than hefting. In this cold weather I don t bother with a veil for a quick look, I m not meant to be here to get you into bad habits but bees don t tend to be too aggressive early in the year. If the hive feels light you can still feed fondant wrapped in plastic, with a hole cut out, put over the feed hole, and an eke around it. Failing this, a moist bag of sugar can be used. As the weather warms up, syrup will be taken down, especially from a contact feeder. This should be medium strength, 1 kg sugar/1litre water, and will stimulate build up of the colony. Make sure they have enough stores until a good nectar flow takes over. If you are concerned about nosema, 1% Vita feed gold can be added to this syrup. Bear in mind that, if you feed syrup excessively, there won t be enough room in the brood box for the queen to lay in. I still have supplies of ambrosia and have been feeding that in a contact feeder to a couple of light hives. This is early and goes against the rules slightly but they have taken it down well and I look forward to seeing how they are in a month s time. I am still checking that the entrance is clear of dead bees. This can be done with a small torch and the entrance block briefly removed to poke out any dead bees with a twig. There will be some, so don t be too alarmed unless there are heaps of them. I haven t had any woodpecker damage this winter but have done in the past, they can cause a lot of damage to a brood box so I m pleased not to have had a visit.

6 When you do carry out the first inspection of the season, it s a good idea to replace the overwintered floors with a clean one, so have a spare ready so that you can clean and swap as you go along. You will also require some spare brood frames (with comb or foundation) to replace those rough ones that you put to the outside last autumn, before they come back into service. Frames of foundation are more likely to be drawn out if you put them adjacent to the brood nest and make sure that the colony has the resources to draw out comb, ie they may well need a stimulative feed to do this. I like to clean up brace comb in the hive, and mark and clip my queens on the first inspection as well, but we ll get on to that next time. Frank Gellatly francis.gellatly@apha.gsi.gov.uk 2015 Committee Margaret Watson (chair) Doug Taylor (secretary) Huw Jones (treasurer) Jen Dancey (programme secretary) John Dray Frank Gellatly Keith Hall committee@ec-bka.com