News from Down Under

[max2]

In 46 yeasr of beekeeping i feed bees just one winter.
I make sure that i leave plenty of honey to see the girls through winter.

This is a short article on feeding ( from the US)

https://www.beeculture.com/off-the-wahl-beekeeping-8/

[max2]

I wrote somewhere about keeping honey liquid.

I just came across an article by Prof Collison which is able to give a fuller and more accurate picture he says: " Honey crystallization is most rapid at temperatures between 10 to 15 C.
At temperatures below 10C the crystallization process is slowed  down."

This does not necessarily match my experience but I trust his more scientific  data.

He goes on" Honey resists crystallization best at a higher temperatures more than 25C"

I think the key word here  is " resists" .
With raw honey, honey which has not been micro filtered we would always have plenty of seed crystals to aid the process.

(Hamden 2010) mentions that at 40 C the crystals dissolve.
As we all know, honey quality would deteriorate above this temperature.

The process of crystallization  by heating to 40C is well known and documented.

People have been experimenting with ultrasound treatment of honey to decrystallize as this would affect the rheological properties of honey.

few of us would have a set up to use such a method.
I think I stick to heating to not more then 40C

[max2]

Another few rainy days.
Well, it is Sunday, a day of rest
We had a great market yesterday and a chace to catch up with a number of beekeepers.
A number report that they have supers full of honey and we don't know what is flowering?
Our valley is blessed with a lot of forest and tall trees. At times it is very difficult to see what is actually flowering.

[max2]

This is the time when beekeepers in this part of the world switch from bees to gardens....and other hobbys.
After a few of weeks of decent weather the garden has recovered with a lot TLC.
Our cattle are starting to drop their calves too.

A good time to do some fencing and weedcontrol.
It is also the time of our Agricultural show.

[max2]

I entered some honey, wax, comb honey, nuts and some veg in the Maleny Show.
We got 4 x First, 2 x second and 6 x third.
I was pleased to get a First for my Comb Honey.

The same bloke got quite a few firsts for his honey.
I'm never quite sure how they judge it here at the Ag Show in Maleny.
I just take a jar and put it aside when I do some bottling.
I'm using Flint Jars ( which I believe are made from recycled glass) and they don't show up the honey as well as "new" jars

[max2]

We had a nice stretch of great weather here. I'm irrigation at the moment.
The temperature went as high as 27C in the middle of the day - very mild for mid winter.
The bees have been very busy.
One close neighbour told me that he took some honey off - not something i do in mid winter.
He noticed a lot of condensation. I don't have a simple explanation for this.

The cattle are doing fine. The winter pastures love this weather.
Some rain is a possibility for next week - pretty perfect.

Honey sales  are great - sold 120kg just yesterday.

June/July is generally my slow time, not this year.
The garden is going great guns - even sold some veg.

We still have some Pecan nuts left but they are going fast.

The Ginger infused honey is selling well and i better make some more.

[max2]

I went to one of my yards to do the mowing.
While I was there I lifted a few lids and a few honey supers.
All hives have made it through winter ( assuming, winter is gone). Good to see.
Mind you, the bees may know better.

One hive is weak but may make it  as they still have some honey and quite a nice ( but very small) brood cluster. The queen is very small. I will requeen this one ASAP.

There is plenty of " winter Honey"  in the hives I checked. Not as much new honey as I hoped. The Blue Gums are not flowering as well there as they do here. Clover has just started to flower. I doubt that I can take any honey off from this yard for another few weeks. Better safe than sorry.
I assume splits will have to wait too.

Very few SHB.

No drones and only a few drone cells.

I will check my home yard during the week to see how the bees are doing here.
I will do a couple of  varroa checks here as well.

[NigelP]

The queen is very small. I will requeen this one ASAP.

Why?
I have several small queens, some outlay my larger ones.
I judge them by what they do, not what size they are.
In UK you often get hives that are behind others in spring, they usually catch up fast.

[max2]

Nigel,
she looks poorly mated.
Most of my genetics ( all in this yard) is " Jo Horner" ( Google Jo Horner bees) and this queen is not up to standard.
As is, this hive will not deliver honey as expected and i will pinch her as soon as the conditions are right to breed some new queens.

[max2]

I checked on a number of hives yesterday. Not a perfect day for it but the bees were well behaved.In recent days we could smell honey coming in - the Blue Gum is flowering and the Clover is just starting. Paulownias are also flowering, the Deep yellow Wood is budding as are the Jaboticabas.A few sunny days ahead - so they say.
All the 30 hives are alive.Some are stronger than others.There is plenty of old honey in the hives. Some hives have eaten the honey they had stored in the lids, other lids are full of honey.Huge numbers of SHB in some hives - watch out for them. One hive had a corner black with SHB. It is nice to see the traps are working and the bees are chasing them.Very few drones - maybe two to 3 per brood frame ( each side) and only small numbers of drone brood.Some lovely brood patterns  - plenty of young brood.
Why the difference between this yard and Cookes Rd?I suspect that Cookes Rd had more frost than us here.I do know that the fog lingers longer in Cookes Rd - meaning the bees have a much shorter working day.The Blue Gum seems to flower more around us here than at Cookes too.Any other ideas?Maybe Cooks Rd is just 14 days behind?
Is winter done?It was 25C here yesterday and also warm today.The forecast for next week is for quite sunny and warm weather.

[max2]

We have been busy the last few days.We took about 500kg of honey off ( 80 kg from a friend's hives) This is mostly winterhoney but the Clover and Blue Gum are also contributing.It is an early start to the season.We don't feed our bees for winter at all - we simply leave enough honey in Autumn for the bees to make it through the cold part of the year.I may have lost one hive - she may still make it and I have one hive with a dud queen.I made the first 5 splits.There have been swarms around and I want to open up the brood nest a bit more.In some of the hives there is more honey in the brood nest than I would like. I hope by taking honey off this will ease the issue.I do a varroa check as I open the hives - all good so far. We keep hoping.The SHB seemed to have slowed down. They had me worried. Going into Spring/Summer with a large population of SHB is not fun.
With more warm weather predicted for the next weekend, it is a good idea to have plenty of frames with foundation and supers ready - just in case.

[max2]

There is a good flow on here.
We have taken about 600kg of honey off.
It looks like we did not lose any hives over winter - a positive.
A couple of hives had the queen move into the honey super. All had steel queen excluders. I think we will switch to plastic or flat SS ones.
I'm trying the SS ones as an experiment as we would have to use them when we have to use Oxalic Acid.
I checked a number of hives and it looks like the hives we took honey off about 3 weeks ago are pretty well fully capped.
This will be a lighter honey as Clover is flowering nicely.
I plan to make the first comb honey of the season. The conditions look right.
I need a n extended period of good weather with a flow to make nice combs.
SHB: numbers seem to varii a lot. Some have large populations, some near nil. Can't work this one out. It is not really a sun/shade issue this time.
We had a number of swarms. Most were simply too high up for an old fellow to catch them.
One would simply not stay - I have generally been very successful in catching swarms.
The predictions for the next few months are for above average rain and lower temperatures.
We don't want the rain like last summer.

A lot of plants are flowering or budding.
outlook is positive.

[Ben Framed]

> All had steel queen excluders. I think we will switch to plastic or flat SS ones.

Have you tried the plastic QE before?

> This will be a lighter honey as Clover is flowering nicely.

My favorite!

> SHB: numbers seem to varii a lot. Some have large populations, some near nil. Can't work this one out. It is not really a sun/shade issue this time.

Max what is your go to method for protecting your hives from SHB?

> We had a number of swarms. Most were simply too high up for an old fellow to catch them.

I don?t like to loose hives like that. But it happens. I use a bee vac with a pool pole attached for retrieving how to reach hives when feasible. Robo told us of using PVC pipe attached together for this purpose on a bee vac topic a few years ago. 

> The predictions for the next few months are for above average rain and lower temperatures.
We don't want the rain like last summer.

Good news!

> A lot of plants are flowering or budding.
outlook is positive.

Excellent! Thanks for the interesting update.

Phillip

[Michael Bush]

The punched plastic ones are about as bad as the punched metal ones.  Terrible.  The round plastic ones are ok but don't stand up to sunlight and are hard to clean when they get messy.  You can use sunlight or a torch on the metal ones.  I like the wood bound excluders painted red, because I don't forget to remove them for winter.

[max2]

The punched plastic ones are about as bad as the punched metal ones.  Terrible.  The round plastic ones are ok but don't stand up to sunlight and are hard to clean when they get messy.  You can use sunlight or a torch on the metal ones.  I like the wood bound excluders painted red, because I don't forget to remove them for winter.

Hi Michael,
I don't think we can get the wood bound ones here.
I generally use the round plastic type. They are not exposed to the sun.
If they get bad enough clogged I dispose of them. Cleaning them is near impossible. I get a hundred at a time and they are cheap. I generally avoid anything plastic.
I will see how the bees like the punched SS type.
I have a customer and he has been using these for years with no issue

[max2]

Old foundation = smaller bees

Honey bees are holometabolous insects.
We know that within 6 days, from larvae the size will increase by 1500 times - amazing!

What surprised me was the effect on bee size and honey production, the size of queens ...pretty well everything is affected negatively as combs age.

I have been pretty consistent in changing foundations on a regular sequence on hives with 1/2 supers but less so with FD supers, simply due to my lack of muscle as I age.
Time to do more

Read this:file:///C:/Users/max/Downloads/Old%20Comb%20(September%202024%20BC).pdf

[Michael Bush]

I use smaller foundation and natural comb (which is smaller) to control the Varroa mites.  I see no difference in production with smaller vs larger bees.  I see a dramatic difference in Varroa production.  Also the smaller bees build up faster in the spring as there are more cells in the same space and the gestation cycle is 19 days instead of 21.

[max2]

Hi Michael,
the research begs to differ.
I'm not sure if the article  link worked?
Just Google " Old Comb by Kris Fricke" and the research will come up

[NigelP]

Research also differs on small cells and varroa control with bees of European origin. Paper by Thomas Seeley.
https://www.beelistener.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/152-Small-cell-comb.pdf

[max2]

Thanks for the link.

Going back to "old comb"

Research shows ( comparing new comb vs 4 year old comb): with 4 year old comb: 15% less honey, 19.7% less pollen and 24% smaller population.They also noted that the honey was not as nice.Bees were smaller ( 32%)Queens also ( 28%)...less royal jelly.Multiple references are quoted.To me, the evidence is clear.I have been making up more frames and have started to replace  more frames each time I take honey off - this is the best time for me with less need to lift supers.