The BeesofSpike Apiary is Snowbound

The winter freeze has finally arrived at the BeesofSpike Apiary.

After an extremely mild holiday period, which saw workers foraging on winter blossoms, the weather has taken on a more seasonal feel.

Initially, on the 17th of January, as the temperature dropped, there was the traditional 'light dusting' of snow.

The next day the light dusting became a slightly heavier dusting. 
There was more snow overnight and more the next morning. 
It was now just deep enough for LandofSpike to take the kids sledging. Just deep enough for him to mangle himself on the slopes and end up in A&E.

Then, on the 21st of January, as the snow kept falling and the temperatures continued to drop, it became, at least by London standards, proper snow.

Spike Acres looking a bit wintry. The hive is just visible through the screen

LandofSpike knew that, despite the freezing temperatures, his bees would more than likely be quite cosy, all clustered together, safe indoors.

But as the snow got deeper, he realised that a 7-10 cm covering of snow sitting on the bees' landing board would block the tiny winter entrance to the hive and they'd all be trapped inside.

Even a 2 cm covering of snow would have covered the entrance. It was obviously time for a bit of beekeeper intervention.

The Apiary. The Landing Board is covered in snow

However when LandofSpike got to the Apiary, intent on clearing their front path, he realised that his snow-shoveling skills were not needed.

The landing board, like everything else, was indeed covered in a thick layer of snow but the area around the entrance was completely snow-free and open for business.
This wasn't the work of the bees clearing the snow away with tiny shovels but was a result of the warmth of the hive radiating from the doorway and melting the snow in the immediate area.

The warmth from the hive keeps the entrance clear

As a first year beekeeper LandofSpike was initially amazed by this but, of course, he realised that it's actually just very logical primary level physics.

That aside, it is however a brilliant example of the natural world coming up with a simple and elegant solution to a possibly disastrous problem.

Again the beekeeper needs to do nothing apart from observe and learn. Honeybees have, of course, been dealing with snow just a tiny bit longer than LandofSpike has been dealing with being a beekeeper.

As the snowy days continued LandofSpike noticed that the numbers of dead bees in the space immediately outside the entrance gradually increased.

It wasn't enormous numbers but there was a definite build up of bodies.

Initially he thought that it might be fearless or foolhardy flyers unable to deal with the freezing conditions but it seems more likely that this was the work of mortuary bees clearing out dead bodies but being unable to get them any further than the front step because of the weather.

Just bung 'em on the front step guys, we'll get rid of 'em once it warms up

There are always casualties though.

Venturing out in these temperatures is a guarantee of more or less certain doom.

It's just too cold for a honeybee to function.

LandofSpike found this apian equivalent of Captain Oates lying perfectly frozen in the grounds of Spike Acres, alone in a pristine field of snow. It was only a metre from the hive.

"I am just going outside and may be some time."

Apart from these few winter observations there has been no sign of the bees.

Sensibly, they have been staying inside keeping toasty.

But the snow won't last forever.

And on the very next warm, dry day LandofSpike's next beekeepery task will be to get some fondant into the hive to supplement the bees' winter stores.

It's also an opportunity to take a quick look inside the box while the lid's off.

We'll also find out if that newly fashioned custom eke is any good.

A Thermometer for the Apiary

The BeesofSpike Apiary has a sparkly new min/max thermometer. 

It was installed in a sheltered spot on the western perimeter wall on the 19th of November and has now been in place for a month.

LandofSpike had previously been relying on the BBC's online, London-wide weather forecast for all his bee-related activities but had reached a point when this was no longer site-specific enough. 

Also, at times, it had proved to be a mite inaccurate. 

LandofSpike can recall for you a day in July when he was watching yet another biblically proportioned rainstorm turn the grounds of Spike Acres into a swamp. Simultaneously, on their website, the Beeb were defiantly claiming that the sun was, had been and would keep on, shining brightly.

This clearly wasn't good enough.

His legacy lives on

So after a bit of research, the most robust, accurate and bee-budget-friendly min/max thermometer was ordered and hove up at Spike Towers just in time for his birthday.

At this point thanks go out to the venerable and bee-friendly MumofSpike who funded the purchase.

It's billed as a greenhouse thermometer but does seem to function just as well in the great outdoors. 

Although just to be on the safe side LandofSpike has built it a little roof to keep the rain off.

Operation couldn't be simpler. 

The middle reading is the current temperature. 

Top and bottom are the maximum and minimum temperatures recorded since the reset button was last pressed. 

Maximum 14.1C, Current 13.9C, Minimum 13.7C... Simple. 

And it's been a great success.
The daily chart of maximum & minimum daytime and nighttime temperatures, when correlated with LandofSpike's general Apiary notes, make it easy to match bee activity with fluctuations in the weather.

As a consequence, The Apiary's autumn and winter thermometer-related highlights so far include these thrilling events:

   After a season-shifting cold snap starting on the 26th October (which arrived too early for the new device to record), the daytime temperature in The Apiary hovered, generally, between 11C and 14C. 
This still allowed plenty of foraging and a variety of different coloured pollens were seen being brought back to the hive. 
Despite the continued activity bee numbers were noticed to be steadily dwindling.

   The rain and cold of the 24th of November effectively ended any significant flights.
After that it didn't get back above 10C and was often well below that.
Around about now any interest in the top feeder seemed also to end.

By the 29th of November a nighttime dip below zero heralded two weeks of wintery weather and flying bees disappeared off the radar.

   As reported in the BeesofSpike post 'A Mild Winter's Day', a little warm spell on the 15th of December saw bees out and about for a little while but generally, the new Apiary Thermometer has so far recorded only seasonally cold temperatures.


Winter has set in at the BeesofSpike Apiary.

Get Thee Behind Me, Jet Stream

Somewhere the sun is shining, 

So, honey, don't you cry,

We'll find a silver lining,

The clouds will soon roll by. 

So sang Elsie Carlisle, vocalist for the rather excellent Ambrose and his Orchestra in 1935.

And now, seventy seven years later, the clouds are indeed about to roll by. 
And the place where the sun is about to shine is right above the BeesofSpike Apiary.

Yes indeed, the English summer is, eventually, almost here.
This is due to the Jet Stream finally shuffling back up into its customary, more northerly, position after having lingered too far south for far too long.

And happily, it's taking its appalling weather with it.

No more of this for a while

It has rained every day at the BeesofSpike Apiary since the bees arrived.

The Apiary's newly laid grass has more or less disappeared, and the yet-to-be-named Hive Number One stands glumly in a depressing sea of mud.

But all is about to change.

Today, Friday 20 July, apart from being Mrs LandofSpike's birthday (Many happy returns, of course) marks the end of the interminable Jet Stream-induced rainy season.

And about time too

Tomorrow, it will be sunny all day. 

And the forecast is set fair for as far into the future as LandofSpike's weather-predicting seaweeds can tell.

The BeesofSpike will like this.

It's at last a chance to get a concerted spell of foraging under their belts before they have to hunker down for their first winter at the Apiary.

A BeesofSpike forager finally out and about, collecting pollen from the privet hedge two gardens down

The Honeymoon's Over

LandofSpike's first seven days of beekeepery have not been the best of times for his lovely new Buckfast bees.

This post was meant to recount the transfer of his colony from the travel nuc to the main BeesofSpike hive.
The transfer was totally successful but unforeseen events mean that the report must wait a bit longer.

I find myself instead documenting a week of problems for the BeesofSpike. 

Problem Number 1: Appalling Weather for Bees

The weather has been atrocious over the last week.

Yesterday was the worst of the lot, it chucked it down all day. 

Just like today. 

It's still raining now, as I type.

In fact, it has tipped it down every day for the whole week. 

It was even raining when the BBC Weather Report was claiming that it was sunny.

And the forecast for next week looks just as bad.

And all the while that it's raining my workers are unable to forage.

This is bad news for a small colony of bees that are already into July and have got limited time to get themselves strong enough to survive the winter.

The bees need every bit of good weather they can get.

Although even in the rain we can see them trying their best.

In the meantime I've been leaving the varroa board in place.

The varroa board is the sliding removable tray at the very bottom of the hive that catches everything that would otherwise fall to the ground.

In this way I can monitor what's going on inside the hive by analysing what drops out of the hive.

And after a particularly heavy rainstorm i found... 

Problem Number 2: Rain Incursion

There was water on the varroa board.

That shouldn't be there.

Drat

Surely the hive wasn't leaking from above. 

It wasn't.
Therefore it could only be one of two things.

Or both of them.

a) the hive entrance is quite open at the front and it's possible rain could get in that way.

b) the tray protrudes from the back of the hive by approximately 3cm so rain can fall directly onto the rear of it.

So, to protect the back, I put a length of 2x1 across the width of the hive stand, just above the tray, to act as a little roof.

For the front, I put a couple of tiles under the back feet of the stand to tilt the hive forwards a bit. 
I now realise that setting it up meticulously spirit-level horizontal was a bit of a mistake.

Hopefully the slope will encourage sitting water to not drain into the hive.

On further advice from Beeguru1 I'm going to tilt it forward a bit more tomorrow. 

As much as 15* is fine so the bees will have to get used to being on a bit of a slope, although hopefully a slope is better than a puddle.

On further inspection of their varroa board, i noticed that along with some encouraging pollen and wax debris, a couple of legs, two wings, an antenna and other assorted detritus, that there seemed to be more varroa activity than i was expecting.

Problem Number 3: Varroa Mites

When varroa mites drop to the bottom of the hive they fall through the cunning wire mesh screen and get trapped on the oily surface of the varroa board.

Not nice

Yesterday, across the whole board, I counted approximately 15 mites.

I cleaned and reinserted the board and today, 24 hrs later, there were about 17 new ones.

And magnified, using the LandofSpike makeshift optical device. Really not nice

In addition, this morning, I found a bee on the landing board, struggling to walk and staggering in circles.

It had stunted wings and a varroa mite onboard its back. 

A BeesofSpike worker, fatally damaged, varroa mite on wing

Two ominous mite counts and that poor sad bee infested with that grisly little beast pointed to only one conclusion.

I consulted Beeguru1 and he confirmed that it looked like the colony had a varroa infestation and that we needed to get it treated double-quick.

It's therefore time to get some Apiguard into the hive.
I've got some on order but I need it now. That means a trip across town to the local(ish) Bee Supplies Shop on Monday morning so the fightback against varroa can start as soon as possible.

And so the honeymoon period's over rather sooner than I expected.

My poor bees most certainly arrived at the BeesofSpike Apiary with varroa already on board.

But hopefully, this is where their luck starts to change.

Seeing just that one horribly damaged and distressed bee really underlined for me the consequences of getting it wrong. I've now got a chance to put it right.

Every crisis can become an opportunity, a crisitunity, as Homer Simpson once said.

The more things that go wrong, the more I learn and the better and more capable a beekeeper I become.

Which would imply that after a first week of appalling weather, water incursion and a varroa infestation, if it continues at this rate, I'll soon be the most experienced and battle-hardened beekeeper in the country.

A Box for the Bees and a Day of Sunshine

Finally, some Sunshine... 

And over at Apiary Central this morning the honeybees are hard at it, foraging for all their worth.

It must be a big relief for them after being cooped up for the entirety of, what is surely, one of the rottenest Aprils on record.

Inside the hive, the last month has panned out something like this...

Worker 1:  "Is it still raining?"

Worker 2:  "I'll go and look."

Worker 2 trawls off to the entrance. A minute later she returns.

Worker 1: "Well?"

Worker 2: "It's still rainin' innit. And it's flippin'  baltic... I hates England."

Worker 1: "Fancy some fondant?"

Worker 2: "OK."

They trudge off to further deplete their stores.

Meanwhile, back at Spike Towers, there's been a bit of shilly-shallying on the choice of hive in which to home the bees.

LandofSpike had always assumed that some version of the vertical hive would be the automatic choice, but an excellently informative session about hive types with BeeGuru1 presented him with a seemingly infinite variety of hives to choose from.
As well as the practicalities of the kit, choice of hive is also guided by philosophy. Oh yes.
Your approach, be it Traditional, Modern or Bio-dynamic, will directly inform which hives will be the best fit for where your head's at.

LandofSpike will cover hive types and philosophies in a later post but for now the best way forward was to keep an open mind and decide what might best suit the particular needs of our first year with bees.

Surprisingly, LandofSpike found himself increasingly favouring a simple, rectangular horizontal hive. 

The Tanzanian Top Bar Hive to be precise.
It's, more or less, the modern day equivalent of a hollow log on legs with bees inside.

A lovely piece of Biodynamic-friendly kit which would look just grand in the grounds of Spike Towers and would, no doubt, give the bees a lot of pleasure.

Despite my initial preconceptions this was starting to look like a real contender.

However, some time later that day and after more consultation, it transpired that the Tanzanian Top Bar Hive isn't sold in the UK.

There are plenty of excellently detailed plans telling you how to build one though.

LandofSpike can certainly build a box but isn't sure that he should be building his own bee-specific box in his novice year.

There are enough unknowns without adding "Good-Intentioned-But-Not-Quite-Right-Hive" to the list.

So it's back to a vertical model and, at the moment, even though those Thermo Hives look tasty, it looks like LandofSpike might go for an EPS Langstroth.

A nice, off the peg, cheerfully budget-conscious Beebox.

It seems to have the seal of approval from BeekeeperJuniors1&2, although they also liked the Thermo Hives and the Top Bar with equal enthusiasm.

And it'll require a lick of paint. 

Just the thing to lure Mrs LandofSpike, the esteemed Colourist and Artist of Note, into the Land of Bees.

Inclement Weather at Apiary Central

LandofSpike checked out the bee activity at Apiary Central this afternoon.
Based on his 5 minutes of HiveWatch it looked like all flights had been cancelled for the day, as it was cloudy, a bit nippy and raining on and off.
Those bees aren't daft. After last week's unseasonally high temperatures of 23C, this little cold snap isn't really the best of weather for hungry workers who want to zip out and get at that springtime pollen.
And according to LandofSpike's collection of weather-predicting seaweeds, it's going to be lashing down with rain and hailing tomorrow.
Lovely. Wrap up warm little honey bees.

The Honey Bee doesn't like it when it hails