Tuesday, 15 April 2014

Ready for summer 2014!

My last post was back in July last year and as you can imagine a lot has happened since then. Firstly we have had another new addition to the family - a beautiful baby girl <3 I even managed to squeeze into my suit right up until the end!
beekeeping whilst pregnant

The nucleus grew well last year despite the late start. I fed syrup to help them along and they had the opportunity to forage on ivy in October so by Autumn I was fairly confident that they had plenty of stores for winter.

a willing helper
a good patch of brood
returning to the hive after foraging on the ivy
I had fondant on standby just in case and that went on in January. We have had a very mild winter and some colonies have kept brood overwinter therefore using up more stores than usual. Varroa mites have also had the opportunity to breed throughout winter. Just when I thought things were ok!

a fondant heart for valentines day

This week I have visited the hive and started getting everything ready for this summer.  I've added the supers over the 10 brood frames, very excited to have supers on at last!

a young beekeeper
a hive of activity




















The varroa drop is higher than I expected and I will be treating the hive next week for the first time.



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