The Importance of Managing Grassland for Bumble Bees

I have received the following flyer from Marc Carlton who many of you will remember from the excellent Bumble Bee Box Building day we ran last December.

These talks by Dr Pippa Raynor of the Bumble Bee Conservation Trust take place near Monmouth and, just over the river at Shirenewton, a village just outside Chepstow.  Too late to organise a YABeeP trip but if, like me, you wish to attend please make your own arrangements.

Chop & Crop

Dear All,

Really sorry but both Naomi and I missed your last meeting (17th July 2010) having both thought it was a different weekend. Feel really apologetic because we were going to talk about our stressful 'chop and crop' TBH transfer and our huge gratitude to Robin and Ali who took time to visit us soon after and offered wonderfully positive support and made us both feel very much better!

Since then I have also transferred a nucleus of bees on standard frames into one of 'Nick's feral hives' in Devon and this was a piece of cake in comparison, which confirms why we had the particular difficulties we had with the first transfer.

Basically the first nucleus arrived on standard sized frames made of 4 x solid bars of wood, nailed securely with long small headed nails at each corner. The wires holding the foundation into the frame zig zagged across the foundation from side to side and were secured to the side bars of the frame - there were no attachments of this wire to either the top or bottom bars. The wooden bars were tougher to 'crop' and the heavy duty nails and their length meant we just couldn't get the frame peices apart easily. It was also more complicated because we had to cut the wires up each side of the comb as well as trying to separate the comb along these edges. As soon as the supporting bottom bar was detached the comb simply fell off the top bar, this happenend every time no matter how careful we tried to be. We did eventually manage to salvage a couple of frames by just shortening the side bars and putting the frame with these still attached into the TBH. The combs were well built out and full with either honey and/or brood and we weren't convinced that we could have successfully sewed them onto a top bar so we simply lodged them as straight as possible into the hive in the correct order and left the bees to it.

We were really 'traumatised' by the whole event. There was running honey everywhere, we smashed more bees than should have been necessary and also lost brood cells. There was honey literally pouring and then dripping out of the bottom of the hive for 3 whole days. The bees had only one entrance open and didn't appear to suffer from robbing but how this didn't happen i don't know!! We had trapped and kept the queen secure throughout the whole transfer so we assumed she should be ok after her release into the hive and within 2 days bees were coming and going with pollen so we hoped all was ok. Amazingly, within 4 days the bees had begun to build new comb along the empty top bars down towards the old slumped combs and quickly began emptying the damaged comb cells and transferring contents out of the hive or up into new stores (presumably). Now about 3 weeks later all seems as well as could be expected. The bees have joined some of the old brood comb to the new comb from the top bars and have then been able to eat under the old comb so it's no longer sitting on the base of the hive and/or against the side walls of the hive. They have have now built on 9 of the top bars and apart from the area of brace comb onto the original, the new combs are straight and appear seperate. We have managed to remove some empty original comb and wires which had been emptied and was no longer being used but are going to leave the 'mess' of brace comb to sort out in the autumn or next spring.

The second nucleus from 'Easybees' in Glos. arrived on the traditional frames of shaped soft wood with a split bottom bar. The frame was stapled together with lightweight staples and the wires zig zagged from top to bottom through the foundation and were only securely attached to the top bar. The combs were less well built out and not so full of honey and/or brood so probably not such good value but it did make the transfer easier. The bottom and side bars were simple to 'chop and crop' and pull apart, there were no wires to cut through as the 'bottom corner crops' fell outside the wired area (the feral boxes are wider at the base than the TBH) and the original top bars fitted neatly into the rebates of the hive. The comb remained intact and securely wired to the top bar and therefore transferred easily without any breakages. An easy and relatively painless transfer with only a small loss of comb and a few bees. They are apparently flying well to and fro but I haven't seen them since the transfer 10 days ago.

Hope this is helpful, we don't intend to buy further nuclei and it wasn't the way we really intended to start but for future reference, if nuclei are being considered, I would stringly encourage purchasers for TBHs to check in advance that the frames are wired from top to bottom and only secured with panel pins/ staples. I personally wouldn't attempt a transfer on side wired frames again!

The second Bristol Sustainable Bee Group meeting is this coming Saturday 31st July 11-1pm in Bishopston where everyone else will have a chance to see what a mess the transfer was and how amazingly the bees have coped!! All welcome from Bristol and Yatton and apologies again for missing the last Yatton meeting.

Best wishes

Jo and Naomi

I've a problem what should I do?

As the so say 'leader' of our group I often get asked about issues and problems someone has with their bees despite the fact that I always start our meetings by explaining that I'm a relatively new beekeeper and am certainly no bee expert.

Happy bees

Luckily we now have a few far more experienced bee people in our group and are well connected to 'experts' to call on. We can also use the internet forums like Biobees (my personal favourite for sustainable beekeeping) to seek views and advice.

Using our group's resources will often give us a clear answer and strategy of what to do. However, sometime it's not so clear or we find that there is a wide range of, often differing, views and opinions. This is especially true when seeking views on internet forums where respondents can come from a wide range of different climate and cultural backgrounds or are at a different stage along their path to sustainable beekeeping - always bear this in mind when seeking forum opinions.

So many opinions, what do I do? 

When I'm in doubt about what to do with bees because of a wide range of conflicting opinions my own philosophy as a sustainable beekeeper is to first ask myself what would the bees do in the wild?  If I can answer this then I facilitate them to do just that.

If you can't answer that question then I would suggest that you leave them alone or at least choose the least interference option, they know far more about bees than we humans ever will so they are far better equipped to sort any situations out. I really believe that, athough our intentions may well be good, the more we interfere the worse we make it for them. This 'leave alone' principle can be very hard for us to do for, as humans, we cannot help but think we must help, we have answers - human nature makes it difficult to trust others, especially when the others are only insects, despite the fact that they have had 40 million years of evolution to learn the ropes! 

Exposed colony in Bristol center

Ask yourself what's the worst that can happen? 

It probably won't happen, but they could die off - but should we see this as a failure? I think not. We have to accept that in the wild, as in captivity, colonies do sometimes die out quite naturally; maybe this is nature saying that their genetics or some other aspect was not good enough - the survival of the fittest at work. I believe that the best lesson we can then learn is to accept this as nature being nature and doing what she knows best.

The alternative is to interfere ourselves and do what we think is right. They can still die off because what we did was either not correct or it added further stress to already stressed bees. If they die following our interference then their death certainly is our fault for interfering.

The Advantages of Sustainable Beekeeping
To me one of the advantages of sustainable beekeeping is that we don't have to heavily invest, both in time and money, in our craft with expensive hives, weekly inspections and all the beekeeping paraphernalia that goes with more conventional methods. After all, if you've invested heavily then you're under huge pressure to interfere to try and guarantee your 'crop' and recover some of your investment. It's far easier for us to sit back and see nature take control.

I hope this helps, please forgive the ramblings of an old man!

Robin - June 2010

15-May-2010 Meeting Note

Yet another glorious day for our meeting - just as well as with at least 29 people, and I don't think everyone signed the contacts sheet, we'd have struggled to get everybody indoors! Yet again many thanks for those who brought biscuits and Joyce for the baking - yummy!!!

Our speakers in full flow

Yet again we were able to welcome some new members from both near and far.

Just as we were about to start we had a visitor from the next village to report a swarm so there was more even reason to keep the meeting short! We had already re-jigged the agenda as it was felt that to do a round-Robin of introductions would take far too long with the numbers present so instead members were asked to give an exceptions report on their colonies, additions, deaths, strange happenings, etc. - we'll probably stick to this format in future as a shorter business meeting allows more time for informal networking after.

Future events
None of interest were known - a quiet time on the sustainable beekeeping front, I guess everybody's busy chasing swarms.

Event Feedback

hTBH autopsy

Safe Land for Bees event - A brief report back was given on this successful day held in Bristol on 11th April. For those who would like to hear Barrie Trower talk on microwave communication he will be appearing in Glastonbury this summer. Similarly Carlo Montesanti's from The Global Bee Project will be talking at Cadbury Garden & Leisure. When dates are known I'll circulate them to members. As a result of this YABeeP we have now hooked up with The Global Bee Project as Carlo is interested in getting groups like ours established around the country and thinks we can assist - I'll be seeing him on Monday so can report back to the next meeting.

The Kingsdown/Cotham Bee Group Launch - YABeeP was invited to talk on bees at this launch and several members went. Nick Miller had suggested that if there was sufficient demand then he would extend the group from his Spanish style feral bee boxes to include those interested in top bar hive hives along the lines of YABeeP. It would be linked with the Bristol Slow Food. Nick is currently away in Spain but will hopefully arrange something when he returns.

Gareth starts with a hug

The Global Bee Project - Robin caught up with this Stroud based group that are doing tremendous things to promote bees. We have agreed to meet with Carlo Montesanti next week to discuss how we can support them particularly in spreading the word about setting up a network of local groups like YABeeP. Given their work YABeeP members are encouraged to join them, become Bee Guardians and post what you are individually doing on their website.

Monthly Features
Monitoring for Varroa & Nosema

Nick Delaney gave a short talk on this subject. Nick has kindly let us have his notes which, as it is an important area which we wish to refer back to, has been posted separately here. Many thanks Nick.

Gareth also contributed by outlining his own essential oils Varroa treatment and a simplistic method for identifying when mite numbers become a problem which is posted here.

Inspecting a horizontal Top Bar Hive

Once the business proceedings had ended our guest, Gareth John, gave us a practical demonstration on this subject starting with an autopsy on a recently deceased horizontal Top Bar Hive (hTBH) which had been dwindling since the winter with no new bees, then moving on to inspect a living hive. Because of the large numbers the group split and Nick kindly took some of our number next door to inspect his hives. 

Wot's going on 'ere then?

The 'dead' hive still had around 20 bees in the colony and interestingly one of these turned out to be the queen - well spotted Ali! There was no disease or excessive varroa seen so it was surmised that she had not started laying post winter hence the colony die off. Luckily, Simon J had a queeenless hive so he took her hoping that a new strong colony would kick-start her into laying - keep us posted Simon.

An inspection of the live hTBH was carried out by Gareth John. The hive has central entrances and natureal wool carpeting as a cover over the top bars, below the roof. The warmth of the bees could be felt through the top bars once the carpet had been removed and this suggested that the colony had expanded leftwards from the hive's central entrance. The left hand followed board (which has provision for a jar feeder) was removed. The first two bars contained open stores of nectar/honey. Following this were 8 bars well filled with a mix of pollen, sealed and unsealed brood and eggs (which were pointed out to interested group members). Very little drone brood was present. No queen cells were found. Attachments between the sides of the combs and the hive wall were carefully cut using a sharp blade, cutting in an upwards direction before each bar was carefully lifted out. There was very little cross combing between the top bars.

YABeeP members all thank Gareth and his wife for travelling down from Oxfordshire to give us this excellent demonstration and pass on his considerable hTBH experience - we hope to see them at other meetings.

Other Business

Hive Building Workshop - 22nd May

Given we have now entered the busy period swarming period and the small numbers wanting to build it was agreed that this fixture would be dropped. Those wishing to build hives needing and needing help are to contact Robin and we will either arrange a couple of evenings or one to one sessions. A further workshop will probably be arranged for later in the year.

Bristol Group

Lazy queen goes to new home 

Given the growth of YABeeP and the numbers attending from Bristol it was felt that we need to do something to 'help along' a stand-alone Bristol group. Both Nick Miller's Kingsdown/Cotham group and Safe Land for Bees could be the catalyst plus we have been informed by Phil Chandler of Biobees that some who attended one of his recent hTBH courses also plan to start a group so we really need a YABeeP Bristol Champion to possibly arrange a meeting and help move this along. If anyone feels up for the challenge please contact Robin asap.

Raising Funds

Whilst YABeeP wishes to stay a free and open group without the ties of formal membership, committees and constitutions we do need to raise some funds to cover the increasing costs of swarm collection and a few other bits and pieces. 

A merry throng

Following some discussion it was agreed that with immediate effect we would charge members who receive bees via YABeeP as follows. £25 for a colony of honeybees (swarm or split) and £10 for a nest of bumbles. Swarm catchers acn also claim a mileage allowance of £0.50 per mile. 

Bumble bees

Members with empty bumble boxes wishing to have a rescued nest need to get their empty box, clearly marked with their name, to Robin. Bees will then be allocated on a first-come-first-served basis as we rescue nests - see Bumble Rescue Programme link.

Next Meeting

The next meeting is Saturday 19th June and this will end with a lunch time American BBQ so if you are saying for food please bring something to contribute - all YABeeP members and hanger's on are invited.

Thymol and Tea Tree String Varroa Treatment

by Gareth John


At our 15th May 2010 YABeeP meeting our guest speaker Gareth John explained the Thymol and Tea Tree String varroa treatment and inspection regime he has developed that is showing considerable success and iIt was agreed that he would share this with us.


This has been discussed on a thread on the Natural Beekeeping Network (Biobees) which you can read here. However, for those of you who don't use internet forums Gareth has produced the main recipe and methodology which is shown here. This also includes a simple way of calculating when mite drop levels become a problem:

Thymol and Tea Tree String Treatment
Recipe

• 10g of thymol crystals 
• 10 drops of tea tree oil 
• Olive oil, say 25 ml 
• Sunflower oil, say 50 ml 
• One or two pieces of bees wax (walnut sized) 
• Two or three teaspoons of fine sugar (icing sugar) 
• Thirty 50mm (2 inch) lengths undyed garden string (eg. hemp) 

The only things I measure accurately are the thymol and tea tree.

Method

Gently warm the oil and beeswax until the beeswax just dissolves and then add the thymol crystals. Stir to dissolve these. (They smell strongly, so do not touch them with your hands.) Cool and add the tea tree (it will evaporate if the mix is too hot). Then add the sugar and stir. The mix will turn lumpy and sticky at this stage. The consistency should be that of soft butter. Place the pieces of string in the mix and coat them thoroughly. Use enough string to soak up all the mix.

This makes about enough to treat 3 hives once each with 10 strings apiece. Make up a fresh recipe for each treatment as I suspect that the thymol breaks down over time. The treatment is most effective when the bees are active and the weather warm. The dosage rate is about 1/4 that of commercially available thymol treatments and much more effective in my experience.

To apply, move the top bars apart enough to push a piece of string down between each leaving a short length of the string just proud of the bar. When the bars are closed up, these little tails will be visible so you will know which bars are 'stringed' and which not. The string, being sticky, will catch on the face of the comb. That's fine. Do this for each of the brood bars .

Over time the bees will chew at the string and throw bits out of the hive entrance or push chewed pieces through the mesh floor. Such research as I have seen suggests that thymol does not persist in the combs but, to be sure, I do not apply the treatment when a honey flow is in progress if I intend to harvest the honey and I remove any remaining strings.

Mite Counts
Sticky boards can be cut from the sides of plastic milk containers or similar and smeared with vaseline. They do not have to cover the whole hive floor, just a good portion of the brood area. Leave the boards on for 2 or 3 days and then count the mites.

Calculate the daily drop. The monitoring regime that I use is to count at intervals through the season. For example count for a 7 day period in mid March, then again for 7 days in mid April. This will give a baseline idea of the mite load following the winter. Then count for two or three days once a month thereafter through to October or November.

Calculating problem drop rates
Daily mite fall will gradually increase through the season, from 2 or 3 a day in March and April, peaking in September or October at maybe 10 a day, before falling away sharply in October or November. As a rule of thumb, the daily natural fall will be roughly the same as the number of the month in the year - so March 3, April 4 etc. What you are looking for is a sudden and dramatic increase in natural mite fall. What I typically see is daily fall in single figures for quite a while followed by a count that is in the high teens, or 20's or 30's or even higher. (My record so far is 4 a day followed by 80 a day 3 weeks later!). It's that spike that says the mites are reproducing faster than the bees can control their numbers. That is the time to apply the treatment! If no spike occurs, the bees are coping.

During treatment the mite fall can reach a daily figure into the low 100's, which then falls off and should return to something approaching single figures, although this is not always the case. For example, the level may stabilise somewhere in the teens. That's fine as long as the count remains at that level and does not start to spike again. If the numbers do not fall, or seem to be spiking again, I apply a second string treatment. Typically I find a round of treatment in the spring holds things under control until somewhere after the honey flow when a second round of treatment is sometimes needed. Bees that have originated from feral stock are likely to show a better tolerance of varroa mites than those from hives that have been routinely treated. The aim of the regime described here is not to eradicate the mites, or even to reduce their numbers to very low levels. It is to help the bees when things gets beyond them but, otherwise, to leave them to manage things in their own way.
_______________________________________
2012 UPDATE
Gareth, the author of this treatment regime, has this year decided that he will no longer use thymol in his hives explaining:
"Over several seasons I experienced considerable problems with queen failures - hives had great difficulty getting queens mated and, when they did, often superseded them in a few weeks. It would have been easy to say 'oh, it's those nasty neonicotinoids' but, at the same time, I became aware of anecdotal suggestions that thymol might be implicated. A research paper was then published showing that thymol activates the same genes in honeybees as certain toxins and 'hard' varroa treatments. Whilst none of this proves low doses of thymol to be definitely harmful, my inclination was to keep it out of my hives to see if this improved matters. My queen mating success this year has been the best I have seen for a long time, around 80%, I'd say. Of course, this might have nothing to do with thymol - other factors might be responsible - but for the time being I am continuing to pursue a non-treatment, let the bees find the way, regime."
To see the source and subsequent discussion follow this thread on the Natural Beekeeping Network.