This month has been a dreary one! You wouldn’t know we had such a hot summer here with all the sodden ground! You can see from these pictures that it is not ideal beekeeping weather (or really ideal weather for anything!). It is really wet under foot in the apiaries thanks to all the rain we have had recently but you have to look on the bright side and think that the bees at least have something to drink.

We have checked the English feeders we use on the hives to make sure that they had taken all the syrup we gave them before our trip away last month. They were all empty and as the bees have started to cluster, we placed fondant over the hole in the centre of the crownboard so that they don’t have far to go to get some food. Over the other hole we placed the now empty feeder upside down, just in case the bees feel inclined to clean it out.

With heavy winds probable, we have started to strap up the hives to stop hive parts being blown across the apiary (which has happened before!). This time of year, we find it is always really damp and so we have checked under the roofs and on top of the crownboards to make sure there is no moisture building up there. So far so good, but with the bees doing less and less inside the hive, it is important to keep an eye on dampness as this is more likely to harm the bees than cold.

Next month we will be keeping an eye on stores, feeding when necessary and also considering an oxalic acid treatment.