Guilfordbeekeepers.org

The queen is laying, so this morning, I caught her and marked her green. Later today, I'm taking a swarm nuc with queen to another beekeeper. My plan is to let the remaining bees in that swarm experience queenlessness from this morning until early evening and then newspaper combine the strange swarm...

As good a guess as any. She is walking around on the frame and an occasional forager is coming back with pollen, so I may wind up with a really small colony to play with.

I watched the arrival of a swarm at one of my bait hives around 1:15pm Saturday. I heard it first, then saw the small cloud of bees arrive. They seemed disorganized and did not fan like new arrivals usually do. I looked in on them after they had settled in. There are less than a medium frame of bees...

It sounds like your hive swarmed and is in the process of requeening. A nice round opening on the bottom of a queen cell is where a queen chewed her way out and emerged. I have little luck trying to find virgin queens-small, fast, and shy. When I know a hive has swarmed, I tend to leave it alone for...

Vandals_IMG_1018.jpg The hives at the Arboretum continue to be a fun challenge. The over wintered hive seems to be recovering from PMS after an early OAV treatment and boosting the population from other hives. The new package has successfully replaced the original queen. When I came to check on the...

POSTPONED DUE TO WEATHER Our May monthly meeting will be a picnic/field day held at the Old Prison Farm. The date is May 5th. We will eat around 5:00pm, but feel free to show up anytime after 3:00pm to visit with fellow beekeepers, view the observation hive, and perhaps tour a nucleus colony of bee...

I'm not sure about these bees. They picked a poor afternoon to swarm and a not so good place to cluster.

I have had 2 swarms at the house this morning. The first came out of an over wintered nuc that got ahead of me. Despite my best efforts, they went about 60 feet high in an oak tree. I can see them and wish them well. Not long after this, the "long hive" swarmed again. These did go to the s...

I came home from the Arboretum yesterday afternoon to see a small swarm about 15 feet up in a dogwood over my driveway. I used a capture bag on an extension pole to get them down. It is more likely from one of my hives than a swarm from the outside pausing before moving into one of my bait hives. I ...

Picked up what I estimate to be a 5lb swarm this afternoon. The folks who had me get the "long hive" called about a swarm near that location in a pine tree. I cut a few branches and shook the bulk of the bees into my swarm bucket. Most came to the bucket after that and I belted them into t...

I hope to get the bait hive up this week, but in the mean time, I have discovered that the tulip poplar is a good place to spray Swarm Commander. I have had 2 swarms go to this tree and vacuuming them was easy--an unexpected benefit.

I came home yesterday afternoon and saw a large number of bees on the front of one of my stronger hives. I suspected they attempted a swarm while I was away and that the queen did not go. It was too late to try and find her in the hive. This morning when I was locating a queen in another hive to mar...

Rick Coor, NCSBA President From:president@ncbeekeepers.org To:robertjjacobs@aol.com Sat, Mar 30 at 6:32 AM Dear Robert, I am pleased to inform you of the following NCSBA operations presented to the members of the NCSBA. The Summer Meeting Get ready our three-day beekeeping conference over in Pinehur...

The long hive swarmed this afternoon. I sprayed Swarm Commander on the tulip poplar "pole" behind it and the bees gathered there. It made it easy to vacuum the bees and I now have them in a medium with a queen includer on the front.

Not heavy, but scouting has started again at my bait hives at the house.

Olav Rueppell, former biology professor at UNC-G and teacher at the GCBA beginner beekeeping course appears on a podcast to present on how science works and new findings about targets for varroa feeding depending on developmental stages of the honey bee.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NmA5UbT2ZQk

Long Hive_IMG_0980.jpg I got a call last week from an asphalt/paving company near PTI about bees that had located in forms that were due to be cycled out. I went to the site, made plans to cut the bees out there, and made a call to Wally with a couple of questions. As usual, he had a better idea. T...

Sounds like your plan is as good as any I have seen. You're keeping the remaining workers from that hive in a productive situation and lessening swarm probabilities. I had what I presumed was a laying worker colony several years ago. It may have been a drone layer, but I'm not sure. Whatever was mak...

I got a call from High Point around 5:00pm about a swarm on the ground near High Point University. I gave the caller 3 names from the list and she called me back to let me know that no one answered. I gave her 3 more names and told her to call me if no one answered and I would try and collect it. Sh...

Down to just 1 or 2 bees at the bait hive. I had hoped for an easy swarm catch; the season is still young.