Apiary Diary: Lumo Cycling Jersey

Diary Entry:
4:30pm, 19C, a bit windy and overcast.

I've just been down to the apiary and the guys were pretty active.
Lots of comings and goings.
Unusually though, they seemed bothered by my presence.
I got buzzed and made to feel pretty unwelcome.
This wasn't at all normal so I decided to let them get on with it and moved away.

I wasn't sure why they were behaving like this; they weren't usually this defensive.
Then I looked at myself.
I was wearing lumo cycling gear and, having just cycled 20 miles, wasn't smelling particularly neutral.

Sweaty lumo-clad cyclists probably shouldn't wander into the Apiary and stand in the bees' flightpath

So I replaced the shirt with something bland and got a bit clean.
Unsurprisingly, when I then went into the apiary the guys totally ignored me.
I was no longer a sweaty, CO2-emitting lumo predator but had morphed back into a friendly bee-neutral beekeeper.

It's always good to be reminded of basic principles and to not take your bees for granted.

The Empire Strikes Back... Apiguard vs Varroa

The previous episode of BeesofSpike ended with a pretty sorry colony of bees blighted by a rather nasty infestation of the varroa destructor parasite.

A new BeesofSpike worker afflicted with varroa

Varroa can very quickly destroy a colony so LandofSpike needed to start medicating his bees straight away.

The batch of Apiguard that he had ordered online was not due to arrive till the next week, which would be too late.

However, one emergency trip to the not-so-local Bee Supplies Shop across town later, and this was no longer a problem. 

So before he set to work dosing the hive with his newly purchased bee medicine, there was just time to find out about Apiguard.
What is it and what does it do?

Varroa Destructor does not like this

Apiguard is a shallow tray of thymol in a slow-release gel which is placed in the hive.

It's the thymol which is the active ingredient. 
It kills the varroa mites.

A treatment period runs for 6 weeks and uses 2 trays of the stuff.

The first tray is left in for 2 weeks. 
It is then replaced with a second tray which is left in for a further 2-4 weeks.

The bees themselves distribute the thymol around the hive. They see it as something which should be removed and whilst the house cleaning workers are busying themselves cleaning it away their activities distribute it to every part of the hive, and therefore to every varroa mite.

The distribution happens more efficiently in warmer temperatures as the thymol sublimes more quickly and is easier for the workers to detect.

The varroa particularly dislike the thymol vapour.

Housekeeper bee cleaning away thymol. Vapour can be seen disabling varroa

Varroa, at the moment, has no resistance to thymol.

Some strains of varroa have already developed resistance to some pyrethroid varroa treatments but the non-specific effects of thymol on the varroa mean that it's likely to continue to be an effective deterrent for the foreseeable.

Currently, Thymol is LandofSpike's favourite chemical

Before the treatment, LandofSpike removed, cleaned, oiled and replaced the varroa board.

the varroa count was 67 individual mites across the whole board which amounts to 33.5 per day over the two day period.

This is way too many.

Waaaaay too many varroa

Inserting the Apiguard was pretty simple.

LandofSpike and BKJ1 suited up, fired up the smoker (not particularly brilliantly this time, must work on our technique) and smoked the entrance.

The roof and top feeder were removed and the brood box smoked.

BKJ1 tests his smoker

There was time for a quick inspection to reveal that, although still small and beleaguered by rain and varroa, the colony was making new honey and pollen stores. Also, the queen, although not spotted this time, was laying new brood.

The Apiguard pack was opened so that all but one corner of the foil was removed and the lid was folded back. The open tray was then laid on top of frames 4, 5 & 6, above the most active part of colony.

Opened Apiguard tray laid on top of broodbox frames

A super was placed on top of the brood box with the corresponding super frames removed to make space for the Apiguard tray.

The queen excluder was left out out for the time being.

The reasons for this were:

a) to give the bees clear access to the Apiguard tray, the QE may have acted as a barrier.

b) to give the bees unchecked access to the top feeder if they needed to use it.

c) it was decided that there would be little risk of the queen starting to lay in the super frames as there was as yet no comb on them, just foundation.

The entrance reducer was fitted partly to stop too much of the thymol vapour escaping that way and also simply because our small colony didn't really need that big a front door in this grim weather.

I'm sure this door used to be bigger...

The base of the hive should really be shut during treatment to trap the thymol vapour inside but that isn't an easy option with the EPS hive so, with the varroa mesh screwed in place, the varroa board approximates a partial seal.

With the thymol installed, the roof and top feeder were replaced on top of the new super and the hive secured with its strap.
Mission accomplished.

As a little schoolroom addendum to our in-the-field account, here's a little extra theory.

Instead of using a super to make space for the Apiguard, LandofSpike could have used an eke.

An eke is simply a shallow, and hollow, 4 sided box, the same dimensions as the hive, which fits above the brood box and acts as a spacer so that the tray of Apiguard can sit on top of the frames in the newly formed space between the frame tops and the queen excluder or the super.

Without an eke to make the space, well, there's just no space.

An eke is so-called because with it you can 'eke out' extra space

LandofSpike now knows that one of the drawbacks of the EPS beebox is that it doesn't have a designed-in option of fitting ekes into its system.

Which is a bit pants.

However, this becomes an opportunity for LandofSpike to put his legendary carpentry skills into practise and supplement his EPS hive with a custom built, homemade wooden eke.

It'll be ready for winter when we'll again need that space above the brood box to house a big lump (that's a technical term) of fondant.

So with everyone now up to speed on ekes, even though we haven't got one yet, and a big blob of thymol sublimating nicely on top of the frames we can rest assured that the housekeeper bees are just starting to distribute the stuff around the hive. 
Best of all the varroa are just starting to get a nice big dose.

You can run but you can't hide, my pretties...

Not All Bees are Created Equal... Honeybee Castes

Today the Land of Bees transports you back a few weeks to early April and it's a return to school at Apiary Central with BeeGuru1.

It's 9*C and looking like rain. The lesson is held outdoors.

LandofSpike is now starting to doubt the wisdom of wearing just a tshirt.

Well, it had been really very warm the day before...

However, he is from the East Coast and therefore dead 'ard. Learning about Bee Castes will keep him warm...
So here we go with a quick introduction to the Caste System of the Honeybee with some bite-size facts which, hopefully, aren't too wide of the mark.

Honeybee Society is highly structured and meticulously organised. It follows a strict Caste System in which there are 3 distinct types of bee:

The Queen

The Worker 

and The Drone

The Queen is a fertile female. She lays eggs.

That's her job. Up to 2000 a day. All the bees in the colony develop from her eggs.

The hive centres around the one Queen. As long as she's still laying. If the Queen weakens or dies the colony can replace her with a newly reared Queen. A part of the Beekeeper's job is to control the changeover of the Queen.

Lifespan: 15 days to emerge from egg. Mature for mating after 20 days. Can live 3-4 years.

The Queen is an Egg-Laying Machine

The Workers are females from a fertilized egg but are themselves infertile. 

They do all the graft and the jobs that the individual Workers undertake within the colony change as they get older.

They forage for pollen and nectar, gather water and propolis, tidy and maintain the hive, regulate the hive's temperature, care for the brood and feed the Queen & the larvae. 

It is the Workers who make the hexagonal honeycomb from wax that they secrete.

They use these cells as chambers in which to rear the brood and as stores for their precious stocks of honey and pollen.

Workers make up 95% of the colony and are all sisters.

Lifespan: 21 days to emerge from egg. Can live for up to 36 days. Over-wintering Workers can live for 6 months.

Out all day foraging then has to come home and look after the kids

The Drones, who are stingless, are fertile males from an unfertilized egg. Their function is to fertilize the new Queens. They do not forage nor do they do any housework. In fact by the end of the summer, once they're no more use and are just lazing around on the sofa watching Sky Sports, the Workers have had enough and boot them out of the hive to die. 

Lifespan: 24 days to emerge from egg. Mature for mating after 37 days. Can live up to 59 days.

The drone has similar life skills to the human male

So, Honeybee Society is pretty nailed down. It works because every bee knows it's place and is hot-wired to carry out its pre-destined task with unerring devotion.

It doesn't take much of a leap of imagination to see the colony as the organism and the individual bees as composite parts of the whole.

It's possible to see it as a bit Orwellian, and Huxley, in a fatalistic mood, would recognise the predetermination of the individuals. 

But bees ain't humans so everything works just fine.

There the lesson ends, but before we leave BeeGuru1 and our alfresco learning zone at Apiary Central there's a short Q&A session with a small prize for the student with the most correct answers.

LandofSpike was hoping the prize might be a jacket.

The Land of Bees Schoolroom... A Bit of Latin

Today, the Land of Bees will be taking us back to school.

This will be happening pretty regularly so stop moaning and settle down.

While LandofSpike understands that it's not totally necessary to know which Suborder or Phylum bees belong to when you're tucking into some bread & honey, knowing a bit about which branch of the Tree of Life our bees have built their nests on is no bad thing.

So sit up straight and pay attention at the back of the class, it's time for a bit of Latin.

Our subject is the European Honeybee, Apis mellifera.

Apis is Latin for Bee.

Mellifera can be split into melli meaning honey and ferre meaning to carry.

So Apis mellifera is the Honey-Carrying Bee. 

Easy peasy.

Every organism has its place in the Hierarchy of Biological Classification, bees being no exception.

Our handy chart will guide us through the Classification of the European Honeybee with, hopefully, a minimum of glaring errors.

Those creatures at the bottom of the Classification are just a few subspecies of Apis mellifera, but they're the important ones for beekeepers.

In our next visit to the Land of Bees Schoolroom, LandofSpike will be casting his gaze over these fellers and seeing why beekeepers need to know all about them.