Hotham Family Apiary

Having six colonies is a lot of work BUT it is paying off in a big way. We harvested our first honey on June 3rd from three colonies and we had a yield of 50kg. I was blown away with how much honey we got from a pretty dry spring. Then, we harvested a second and final time on June 30th from all six colonies and had a yield of 80kg. A very good honey year. I am sure I could harvest more but there are a few reasons why I will not. First, I want to leave honey in the colonies that was stored in the brood chambers under the queen excluder. It wasn't the case in all the hives but in two colonies the bees stored a ton of honey in the second brood chamber. Maybe I gave them the brood chamber too late or the honey chamber too early or both, I don't know. In any case, I estimate around 25kgs of honey was "lost" because of it. The upside, I may not have to feed those bees winter food and also, what will I do with an extra 25kgs of honey?! Second, I want to start hive hygien...

We haven't had enough rain yet this spring which is having some serious affects on nature. The bees are bringing in nectar, but I honestly don't know where they are finding it! Since the beginning of April, the weather has been warm and dry, which is uncommon for central Europe in the spring. Water is scarce, so the bees are trying to get it wherever possible. We even observed some bees trying to get moisture from my mother-in-law's freshly watered vegetable garden. My in-laws have a water container about 150 meters north of the bee house, and that is where the bees have been collecting water. My father-in-law placed a few pieces of old board in the water for the bees to float on, but now it seems there are too many bees congregating there.  I suggested that they place a water container to the south of the bee house and to also empty the water container where the bees have been collecting water. Once the bees have found a constant and stable source of water, they w...

The weather the last two weeks has caused the flora to explode. With that, there is an over abundance of nectar, and the bees are working hard to collect as much as possible. I gave all of the colonies a honey super and am now waiting and observing their development. One colony is overflowing with bees and they probably will need a second brood chamber by the weekend. The same colony as mentioned above also displayed some aggressive behaviour which I will need to keep an eye on. I was stung three times by the same colony and I certainly do not want to have bees that like to sting. On the other hand, I will observe them, as they are by far the strongest colony and have already made great progress drawing out comb. Replacing the queen would be a possibility to mitigate the aggressive behaviour, but I'll only do that if absolutely necessary. The weather this week is cooler, but still favourable for the honey flow and for bee reproduction and flight. Things are pointing in the right ...

My last post was July 2017. Oops! I am still in the beekeeping business and it looks like we have a good start to the 2018 season. It is sometimes hard to find the motivation to update the blog especially during the offseason. All six of our colonies survived the winter and were left relatively unscathedfrom varroa destructor. I was diligent enough to be sure to treat the colonies against the mites. In winter the bees received two oxalcilic treatments that rendered them nearly mite free. I have also begun to give each colony a drone frame to jump start the culling of infected drone brood. My plan is to make 1 or 2 nucs sometime after the first honey harvest. I will write about that when the time comes. Hopefully I will stay on top of the blog this season.

It's been a while since I have had time to write blog entries. We have a huge construction site behind our house and it is taking up all my free time. Anyway, today, I took the time to check in on my colonies and my nucs. Things are looking good all around. I will need to harvest the last round of honey next week and soon thereafter begin with formic acid treatments on the full colonies, but I'll save that for a future entry. The nucs have all been placed in their own hive bodies. As you may recall, I started on May 21st by placing three frames from colonies one, two, and three into a single hive body separated by two separation boards. The separation boards are just pieces of wood cut out to fit exactly in the hive body without letting bees pass into the space behind it. The boards are often times used to shrink the amount of space the bees have in the hive, in case a colony is weak in numbers and needs time to develop. The nucs were then placed in my neighbors backyard, due...

Yesterday, June 11 2017, we harvested 75 lbs (34 kg) of honey from three colonies. This is an excellent yield, considering I started 2017 without having any bees at all! There was a bit more honey in colonies 2 and 3 compared to colony 1. We even left a little bit more honey in the hive of colony one just to be sure that they will be fine in the current honey dearth. The next big phase is moving the nucs into new hives. Next Sunday I plan to treat the three nucs for varroa mites using a lactic acid solution. Each nuc colony should have a laying queen by that time. Once the treatment is done, I will wait one more week and then I can move them from the nuc box into regular hive bodies. After that, I will begin monitoring varroa mite populations and will react accordingly.

On Friday June, 2nd I took a look under the covers of my colonies to try to get a feel for how far along the honey production was. All three colonies have some completely capped honey while there is still a lot of uncapped honey as well. I took my refractometer along and measured some of the uncapped honey. All samples were under 19.5%. Basically, the honey is dry enough for harvest, as the capped honey probably has a lower water percentage. I decided to wait one more week (this coming weekend) before harvesting. Today is the day where my three nucs should have their queens hatching. 16 days have passed since I created the nucs. The queens will emerge, and after a few days they will venture out on their mating flights. Ten days from now, I will treat the nucs with lactic acid solution to kill off any mites that they may have. Another seven days after that, I will move them into a more permanent home. On a side note: I was pleased to discover that along the edge of a neighboring woo...