May has been a much better month for us here in Lincolnshire, with long hot days allowing the bees to get out and forage on locally available sources such as oil seed rape. We have been out early in the mornings to allow for the hot weather, as working in the full heat of the day with a bee suit on is never enjoyable!

As the colonies have expanded, the bees have needed more space. Some are now on three brood bodies! These are colonies that have not yet shown any signs of swarming but we will be keeping our eyes peeled, ready to split these large colonies when the time is right.

Some colonies, as is right at this time of year, have shown signs of wanting to swarm by creating queen cells. These have been managed by way of artificial swarm to make the bees think they have already swarmed.  In doing so, we hope not to lose any colonies.

The picture below shows one of our hives with three brood bodies. We added foundation to the top one to gives the bees more space and by the same day the week after, the whole brood body had been drawn out and filled with honey! We then had to swap this box again and, in the commotion, the bees all started to pour out the front. They hung around there for a while but when they realized we had given them more space, they quickly made their return inside.

The photo below at the beginning of this blog was taken as we did a colony inspection and found more species than we bargained for!

All in all, May has been a good month for our beekeeping; the colonies have expanded and, as always, given us little challenges along the way, which is all part of the fun. Over the next month, our two main priorities will be to continue keeping an eye on colonies that may be wanting to swarm and also to make sure, during the June Gap where there may be little to forage on, that our bees are well fed.