Allotments 4 All
Produce => Kept Animals => Topic started by: emmy1978 on January 15, 2007, 11:05:32
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Although I am brand new to lottie life and my lottie needs lots of work to even have one little bed this year, I have found out we are allowed bees on our site. I would really love this as my grandparents neighbours kept bees and their honey was just superb. Does anyone have any experience of beekeeping, what are thoughts on it and how would I go about getting them (lie in wait by flowers and beenap them)
I saw Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall programme where beeman ( official title) ???caught him a swarm and delivered them, is this the usual way? Ideas on cost etc. Thanks!! :)
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Hi emmy,
Yes, there's a few of us beekeepers on A4A, as you might have guessed. ;D
I looked up your local association of beekeepers on the BBKA website: there's one in Bournemouth.
BOURNEMOUTH & DISTRICT
Mrs Angela Flint, Flat 18 Portadene, 6 Portarlington Road, Bournemouth, BH4 8BT 01202-469310
If they're anything like our lot, they'll running courses for beginners. Like many associations, we do our beginners' course at the start of the season (Feb/March) so that by the time everyone's finished, it's mild enough to bring them to the association apiary to look at some real bees in action.
Re getting your own bees. Your local association may do what ours does: collect swarms as a public service (many BKAs work with their local councils) and then pass them on to beginner beekeepers. That's the way most peeps start.
Beware, though: bees are addictive.
And you probably wouldn't really want them on a lottie plot which you're cultivating (you'll end up disturbing each other ;))
So you might need to sign up for another plot, or see if you can organise a little place for a couple of hives in some out-of-the-way corner of your site.
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Excellent, thanks. Wouldn't consider getting for good few years but you know how we all love to plan and dream...! will see about signing up for the course though, just out of interest and to see if it's definately for me. Love to see bees on my diddy patio, think they are amazing. Hate wasps though-evil.
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Probably best to get the lottie straightened out before you take on another new project. But if a course is running, why not trot along? Ours costs something like £35-£40.
Now you have an allotment, you'll probably revise your view of wasps a bit. They're actually very useful predators. All through spring and summer they clean up loads of veg-munching bugs. So it's a good thing to try to live and let live if you can. :)
(BTW, I'm talking about wasps on the lottie/ around the garden, not about sharing your home with a nest!)
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I love all natures beasties really! :)
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It's the wrong time of year to get bees, but the right time to start getting ready. If you're reasonably quick you can get a hive cheap in Thornes' winter sale at https://secure.thorne.co.uk/cgi-bin/cgiwrap/millhouse/thorne/shop/shania . Otherwise you may be able to get one second hand from the local Association if you're lucky. There are probably meetings to go to at this time of year, and do get reading.
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Good point about the reading, Robert...
If you want something fascinating and bee-related but which won't canter right over what you'll learn on a beginner's bee course, I can heartily recommend Hattie Eliss's "Sweetness and Light".
This wonderful book was written for general readers rather than experts, but has lots of fascinating stuff for experienced beekeepers too.
And at least it'll give you a change from the allotment books you're probably digging through. ;)
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The big problem to be aware of is varroa mites, which spread viruses that kill bees. They're becoming immune to what has been the main treatment, so avoid using Apistan as a solution. There have been a lot of hive losses around Birmingham over the last year, probably due to the resistant mites, and the result was my bees got overwhelmed by mites from other peoples' collapsing hives. I've lost one colony, and I'm just hoping it's going to be the last!
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Thanks for all your advice peeps. This is not something I'm planning on doing in the very near future and will want my lottie well established before I consider adding bees to it!! It's just that I was reading through my contract and spotted bees are permitted and thought oooooh how good would that be! Sounds a lot more complicated than I first thought but I love to plot and plan so I will check out running of courses and the sweetness and light book.
Thanks again :-*
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Hi Emmy,you could have a day at the Lincoln District bka auction of live Bees and equipment on March 31st. at the County Showground,Scampton,Lincoln.
Bees and the Hive they are in made up to £120 last year, with people coming from all over the country to buy. Everything you could need to set up in Beekeeping can be bought there, and at a fraction of the cost of new.Most years you can buy a National Hive for £30 or less as an example. It's not a bad idea to set off with some reasonably priced second hand stuff untill your sure you and Bees get along with each other!
It might also be prudent to ask your fellow Allotment holders views regarding you keeping Bees nearby as a few stings can soon upset the Applecart. ;)
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Thanks for the info B - I would love some bees. Dad used to keep them when we were children, I've been saying that I WILL get some but have not got around to it yet. If I pluck up courage and go - have never bought anything at an auction before - I will need some advice on transporting them
thanks again :)
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You'll need a closed up hive or nuc box (depending on the size of the colony) with lots of ventilation. The procedure is very well known, so if you get involved with the local Association they'll be able to advise.
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Thanks - I will let you know if I get organised to get myself there and have the courage to buy some :o
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Flossie, as Robert says, varroa has had a huge effect on the way beekeepers have to work. Your local beekeepers' association is the best place to start -- even if you know loads about beekeeping because of your dad. Things have got so much more difficult in the past 10 years, since varroa mites were first brought here -- and continue to do so. :(
One problem with buying bees at an auction is that you might inadvertently buy a colony with varroa that's resistant to pyrethroid treatments (sometihng like the beekeepers' version of MRSA) -- and move resistant mites into an area of the country that hasn't got them.
Your local association will almost certainly be able to set you up with a swarm later on, or recommend good people to buy bees from if you want to get an early start this season.
You can find your nearest bunch of beekeepers here -- it's a nice time of year to make contact, too, as no one will be frantically dealing with bees/honey etc :)
http://www.bbka.org.uk/members.php
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thanks for that :)
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Resistant mites aren't necessarily a problem. They're only resistant to one type of treatment, fluvalinate (a synthetic pyrethroid), which is the active ingredient in Apistan and Bayvarol. Don't use them; use Apiguard, which is thymol-based, or oxalic acid.
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Sooner or later, all beekeepers in mainland Britain will have to live with pyrethroid resistance. :(
Meanwhile, beekeepers who live in areas still free of pyrethroid resistant mites would not thank anyone for moving colonies with resistant mites into their area. Particularly since many have been reporting problems regarding the efficacy of Apiguard as a treatment, and that oxalic acid is a product that isn't authorised in the UK for use as a veterinary medicine.
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Apiguard works fine as long as you use it properly (I wouldn't recommend anyone to treat 'by rote' as this is how people get caught off guard by resistance). Oxalic is widely used and well-understood; it shouldn't be dismissed because there's nobody to pay the considerable cost of getting it licensed. That approach is a dead end because you end up with nothing acceptable except Apistan, which no longer works across large areas of the country.
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Robert, I'm not quarrelling -- we're on the same side ;D
My main points are:
1. Beekeeping is now more complex than it was in those lovely pre-varroa years, so it's a good idea for someone starting out to enlist the help and support of their local beekeeping association.
2. It's not a good idea (for all sorts of reasons) to move untested bees into a new area. That's not me on a soap-box -- it's the current advice from the Bee Unit at the Central Science Lab.
http://beebase.csl.gov.uk/public/BeeDiseases/resistanceAdvice.cfm
Incidentally, I'm wholeheartedly in favour of using oxalic acid. However, the fact that it's not authorised in the UK as a bee medicine (and therefore isn't legal to use as one here) is still likely to cause complications and bureaucratic grief. Goodness knows, we have enough to think about already regarding food and labelling laws, cosmetic certification and trading standards! ::)
The Apiguard problems were mentioned in this month's Beecraft. I have no personal experience of them. Your point about not treating 'by rote' is exactly the sort of reason why new beekeepers are so much better off with the support of experienced beekeepers rather than going it alone.
On a much more cheerful topic, did you see this amazing bit of bee magic? An exhibit of filled honeycomb shown at the National Honey Show!
(http://i126.photobucket.com/albums/p103/triffidspix/84122f77.jpg)
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I've heard about a lot of problems with Apiguard, and they seem to boil down to misuse. The thymol evaporates, so the process is temperature-dependent to some degree; the solution is to use it in either May or September, which gives you a period when it should be neither too cold to vaporise it nor so hot that it all vaporises at once and drives the bees out of the hive.
Any patience I ever had wirth 'rote' treatments evaporated this year. A lot of hives have been lost locally (the Association lost its entire apiary) and I strongly suspect that this was down to resistance, which wasn't far away last year. My hives got flooded with mites as a result, I lost one, and I'm seriously worried about the rest.
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Wow! To be totally honest I had no idea (foolishly) bee-keeping was so complicated. I thought they were quite self sufficient little beasties!! It hasn't put me off, but certainly a lot to think about. As I say, for me it's not a short term goal, but something I'd definately like in the future.
What is the varroa mite and where did it come from? Sounds quite nasty.
I'd definately do things through my local bee-keeping assoc, always good to have the local support, and thanks Bombus for the tip about Lincoln show. Have rellys up there and always good to combine visit with ulterior motive!!!
On topic of running things past lottie neighbours, don't think anything I will do in next few years will please any of them. Already been told I won't cope with lottie and being mum to my kids, not to grow any foriegn rubbish (???) that I won't
be able to grow organically (didn't say owt about it, this was just volunteered!!! Never mind, will win them all over with my dedication and charm!! ::)
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Bees normally are 'self sufficient little beasties'. :)
The trouble with varroa is it's an imported parasite. It was first found in Britain in 1992, since when it's pretty much killed off all our wild honeybee colonies.
Its natural host is the Asian honeybee, with which it coexists because varroa mites can only reproduce in drone cells of this species. This means that it never threatens the health of the whole colony, as there are far fewer drones (male bees) than workers and they are only present for part of the year.
Unfortunately, varroa can reproduce in worker cells of the European honeybee. This means that infestations are bigger and last through the whole brood-rearing season, from early spring to late autum: this can easily cause the collapse of a colony. In addition, varroa leaves European honeybees much more susceptible to a raft of nasty viruses (a bit like us after we've had a cold and then get two or three infections on the back of it :()
For lots more info: http://www.defra.gov.uk/hort/Bees/Varroa/index.htm
and (with pictures) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varroa_destructor
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The good news is that honeybees do have the potential to develop immunity to varroa. Actually getting there is quite a problem, and beekeepers don't help by preserving susceptible strains. The best thing for the bees, now we've introduced the horrible things, would be to leave them totally alone. 99.99% would die out, and the few remaining colonies would repopulate the country with fully resistant bees.
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Yes it does sound a lot more complicated than when Dad and I kept bees ???
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Yes it does sound a lot more complicated than when Dad and I kept bees ???
;) It's only complicated when things go wrong. Mostly it still comes down to 'bees make honey; beekeeper steals honey'. ;D
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;) It's only complicated when things go wrong. Mostly it still comes down to 'bees make honey; beekeeper steals honey'. ;D
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Gosh that sounds really evil, but guess that's about right!! Poor little bees!
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You use a hive design which gets them to store far more than a 'natural' colony would, then only take the excess. Honey inside the broodbox is strictly for the bees, and is never touched by sensible beekeepers!
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Glad to know they still get some...the balance is restored and I am happy again!
So impressed -I have to say you guys really know your stuff.
This is brill place to find things out as you get all sides of the topic covered- very interesting. Much more so than saying to some-one "oh I've always wanted bees" and them going "ooh, bees sting" or something equally as inane!
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I had a quick look at mine yesterday; both surviving colonies are alive. In a couple of months, assuming they still have viable queens, they'll be starting to build up again for the new season.
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Just noticed this one and would like to ask something if it is not too late. I have had a soft spot for bees for a great many years and often dreamed of having them .I would love to learn about them and have a go. My big concern putting them on the lottie is the worry of vandalism,it is one thing having my pumpkins smashed or a cauli stolen but does anyone have any experience of damage with regard to the bees please. Thank you JeannineXX
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Hi Jeannine, It's not just allotments where vandalism happens to hives, I have had Hives pushed over several times now. It's just a sign of the times I'm afraid. One one occasion the hive had been on it's side for 3 days before i found it. I just put everything back in its place and the Bees just went about their buissnes. All just part of the fun i guess
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Hives which are anywhere visible are always vulnerable to idiots. The best way to avoid it is to keep them out of sight, but that isn't always possible.
One old book suggests having a nasty-tempered colony near the enrance to any apiary, but that wouldn't be a good plan with close neighbours. It could easily end up affecting the tempers of the other colonies as well.
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Thank you for the answers, I will think on it, we would probably treat them like pets and get all upset if anything happened to them. I got really interested many years ago when I was in Oregon, there was gift shop that had something rigged up in the wall. from outside there was just a small entrance but from inside the shop one could see the whole interior of the hive as the part of the hive wall inside was glass ,it was so fascinating I stood there for ages and watched them. XX Jeannine
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Dont know if you read the national papers last week but this may be of interest to you:
Apparently, due to the hot summers there is a strain of wasp coming to this country that kills bees. It is in Europe already. Dont know much else about it as I only read the headline, then noticed your thread this evening.
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Those are Asian hornets, which are real horrors. Apparently they don't cope with frost very well, so hopefully they won't get established here.
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Although I am brand new to lottie life and my lottie needs lots of work to even have one little bed this year, I have found out we are allowed bees on our site. I would really love this as my grandparents neighbours kept bees and their honey was just superb. Does anyone have any experience of beekeeping, what are thoughts on it and how would I go about getting them (lie in wait by flowers and beenap them)
I saw Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall programme where beeman ( official title) ???caught him a swarm and delivered them, is this the usual way? Ideas on cost etc. Thanks!! :)
;D Hi Emmy,what a great idea to keep bees on a allotment plot site.
May you and yours and what you grow live long and happy. John. J.R.P.
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It's only complicated when things go wrong. Mostly it still comes down to 'bees make honey; beekeeper steals honey'.
Gosh that sounds really evil, but guess that's about right!! Poor little bees!
:-[ Emmy, so sorry: should have said: 'beekeeper steals excess honey'. We leave a min of 40lb of honey for them over winter, which serves not only as food but as thermal insulation. Bees don't have a 'stop' button that says 'we've got enough honey stored here'. They just keep bringing in nectar as long as it's there and they can reach it; as Robert says, we just keep adding more room for them to process and store it in!
*not an evil beekeeper, honest :)*
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I just have to ask, do you tell you secrets to your bees? XX Jeannine
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No, but when the owner does, you're supposed to go and knock on each hive, and tell them the bad news, and who the new owner is. Otherwise they desert the hive, or that's what tradition says anyway. They're supposed to turn up to the funeral as well. I did actually hear of a beekeeper's funeral a couple of years ago which was interrupted by the arrival of a swarm.
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I just have to ask, do you tell you secrets to your bees? XX Jeannine
What!? Sounds great. I've never heard of this, would one of you explain!
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I just have to ask, do you tell you secrets to your bees? XX Jeannine
What!? Sounds great. I've never heard of this, would one of you explain!
According to tradition, beekeepers are supposed to tell the bees any important (family-type) news. Especially, as Robert says, if their beekeeper dies. One of the old boys in our local association died a couple of years ago and we did go and tie a piece of black ribbon to each of his hives, till after the funeral. We didn't do it thinking that the bees would leave otherwise; we did it because he would have appreciated it, and it felt like the right way of showing our respects.
The bee story I like best is out-of-season now. But if you put your ear to a hive late on Christmas Eve, you're supposed to hear the bees humming carols.
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There are all sorts of traditions around beekeeping; it's supposed to be unlucky to pay money for a swarm, for instance.
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Sorry guys, only just caught up. That's so brilliant. I love these tales and traditions. I agree Triffid, it's the perfect way of showing your respect and it's no doubt what he would have liked. I love the idea of telling them news and secrets. I've always liked bees. Never been scared of them and love to watch them loving my lavender and buzzing round the garden with pollen all over them like messy children! ;D ;D ;D
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Emmy, what a lovely vision! They were all in the courgette flowers last year, till they looked like flying orange furballs.
And right now they're bringing in pollen-basketloads of some dense grey pollen. Normally I see them with snowdrop (another bright orange) and willow (yellow) at this time of year, but this time they've clearly found something new.
Unless they're playing at being mason bees and it's cement! ;)
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Yep, building themselves a little bee bank or small block of flats. :D
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Hi Triffid, Did you track down the source of the Grey pollen? I cannot think of any at this time of year and would be interested.
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I intend to spend some time with my daughter on her farm high on a hill in Yorkshire. If it comes about that I get the chance to spend even more time there, is a hill in Yorkshire a good place for hives?
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What's the local flora like? If it's an intensively farmed area, probably not. If it's a hill farming area, it would probably be fine if you put them somewhere sheltered. if it's barren moorland, it might be good for the heather, but there might be little at other times of year. We really need to know more.
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Heather, grass, trees and a few farm gardens in the area. That's really about it. Nearest town is 4 miles away.
Is it still possible?
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Probably; try it and see. Are there any willows anywhere near the place? That would be a big help in spring.
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Will check the area out better at end March.