Time is Up!

Some products were removed from your basket.

uk-flag GBP (£)
Wishlist
0

Your Basket

Your cart is empty

For expert advice contact us on

+44 (0) 1673 858 555 or sales@thorne.co.uk

Beekeepers News - January 2022 - Issue 64

Beekeepers News - January 2022 - Issue 64

The January 2022 edition of our newsletter

 

December Roundup

We would like to start by wishing you all a Happy New Year! We welcomed the New Year in with a brilliant start to our Winter Sale. Don’t worry if you have yet to shop though, the Winter Sale will be running through to the end of January.

SHOP WINTER SALE

We have got some dates in the diary for 2022 already and are hoping we will be able to look forward to a little more normality and seeing some of your faces! Check out the Upcoming Events section at the end of the newsletter.

 
 

Special Offer

 
oxybee logo
 

We are continuing with 10% off Oxybee throughout January.

Have your bees got varroa? Not sure what to treat them with? Try Oxybee, the easy-to-use oxalic acid treatment from Véto-pharma. With many years of experience in developing cutting edge treatments for honeybees, Véto-pharma has produced Oxybee with the busy beekeeper in mind.

Exterior paint

This treatment comes with just one pre-measured bottle of oxalic acid dihydrate and two sachets of sucrose, which when mixed together, is ready to be trickled onto the bees. It really could not be easier! Oxybee is most effective during broodless periods which makes it the ideal winter varroa treatment.

One major advantage of Oxybee over other oxalic acid-based treatments, however, is its shelf life. It can be stored for 24 months in the original packaging and for up to 12 months in the fridge once the solution has been made up, which means it can be used later in the season if needed.

 
SHOP HERE
 
 

Equipment Focus

Smoker Boxes

Exterior paint

If you are wondering what to spend your Christmas money on, or just fancy treating yourself, our smoker boxes are perfect! These heavy-duty boxes will safely transport your smoker before and after inspections.

  • Tight fitting lid with secure fastening clasp
  • Sturdy carrying handle
  • Sealing strip around the lid to ensure no smoke escapes the box
  • Powder coated galvanised steel

We also offer a smoker and toolbox, that includes all the above, but also includes internal box for small pieces of kit, four handy spaces for hive tools and room for larger pieces of equipment, such as bee brush, frame rest etc.

The standard smoker box costs £48 and the smoker and toolbox costs £56, follow the links below to shop!

 
Exterior paint
 
STANDARD SMOKER BOX
Exterior paint
 
SMOKER AND TOOLBOX

If you need any more convincing, make sure you check out this review from the wonderful Gruffydd at Gwenyn Gruffydd. He looks at both smoker boxes we sell and tells us what he thinks of them. Click the video to watch the full review on YouTube.

Exterior paint
 
 

Ask The Expert

Backfilling – an early swarming indicator

An interesting article by John White from West Berkshire.  More information can be found in the book “Swarm Management with Checkerboarding”

SHOP HERE

As we move towards spring one of the primary concerns, we have is the upcoming swarm season. Some of us view this with excitement. Many I suspect with some trepidation. When we think about swarming indicators what we usually are looking for are queen cells to indicate the colony is preparing to swarm.

For the last three years, a small group of us in West Berkshire have been experimenting with a swarm prevention technique (Checkerboarding) which originated with an American beekeeper, Walter Wright. One of his observations was a phenomenon he called backfilling.

Backfilling occurs once a colony has committed to swarm. The colony has an in-built requirement to preserve the life of the parent colony and they do this by reducing down the volume of the brood nest. Once the new queen begins laying, the number of available cells is significantly reduced (by about 50%). This reduction is essential if the remaining bees are to be able to support the newly laid eggs with reduced foragers and stores and tends to happen from the top of the brood nest downwards. The bees usually use nectar (but sometimes will use pollen) to achieve this.

Exterior paint

When we go into a hive there is always a lot going on and it is easy to overlook some of the colony’s activities. It is hard to spot something new that you may not be aware of. I willingly admit I did not notice this in my first 9 years of beekeeping! Once you see (the backfilling) for the first time you will notice it, know what to look for and perhaps will look for it each time.

Therefore, the first noticeable sign of swarm preparation is this reduction in the brood volume by filling with nectar or pollen and it happens two weeks prior to queen cell formation. It serves as an early indicator that the colony is making preparations to swarm and is well worth looking out for.

If you have any queries on this, I am contactable at: smallcell@hotmail.com

 
 

Beekeeping Blog

December

bee fondant

Happy New Year! Last year was another difficult one for everyone so this year we have our fingers crossed we can get back to some kind of normality. As we cross the border into the new year, we really start thinking in terms of the busy season starting in just a few weeks. For some reason at Christmas, the start of the active season seems so far away and yet now, just a few days later, it seems imminent! And so, the panic sets in…

This time of year is mostly just making sure the bees are ok. We don’t do a lot apart from treat with oxalic acid and make sure all the hive parts are still intact. Obviously, food stores are a priority so any colony that looks hungry gets fed. Ideally, the bees are all hunkered down into a tight cluster but what we have seen a bit of this year is colonies that are loosely clustered, meaning they are consuming slightly more food than usual. This is normally due to the mild weather and so we are still hoping for some prolonged cold temperatures to keep them inside the hive, warm, safe, and well rested so they can make it until we come out of winter. We don’t want the bees to exhaust themselves and not survive until spring. You can see from the photos that the bees are clustering but not in that, ‘Oooh are there even any bees in here? Oh yes, they are all tight inside the frames, so I didn’t see them’ kind of way! Not bad though.

oxybee product

We will also wait for some prolonged cold weather to appear before treating for varroa because oxalic acid treatment is most effective when the colony is broodless. With mild weather (for the majority) so far here in the heart of Lincolnshire, it is unlikely that any of the colonies are completely broodless and it just seems a pointless task to treat before the outcome looks favourable.

Roofs take a battering over the autumn and winter period, particularly when it has been wet and damp so we have been double checking for leaks under the roof that may drip inside the hive. The last thing we need is for bees to suffer and dwindle because of a simple hive part failure.

Another crucial but very simple task we have been carrying out is to make sure the hive entrances are clear. Even at this time of year, bees need to be able to get in and out of the hive, particularly for cleansing flights, because this helps to prevent disease spreading inside the hive and also keeps the area ventilated. So, any dead bees blocking the entrance are removed from the hive.

Hopefully for the rest of this month we will be able to keep the bees safe and fed and continue to organise ourselves for the season ahead!

 
 

Book Review

‘Honey Bee Medicine For the Veterinary Practitioner’

 
‘Honey Bee Medicine For the Veterinary Practitioner’

Editors: Terry Ryan Kane and Cynthia M Faux. 30+ contributors.
Buy: Here

1st Edition. Published by Wiley-Blackwell, 2021. ISBN: 978-1119583370. 225 x 285 mm, 386 pages. Hardback. £133 from www.northernbeebooks.co.uk.

 

This book is collated by two very eminent American veterinarians or veterinary surgeons in UK parlance. Although it is directed towards the veterinary profession, this book will appeal to a much wider audience of biologists, ecologists, environmentalists, and beekeepers interested in pests and diseases.

Vet schools in Eastern Europe traditionally taught apiculture as there is a large beekeeping industry there. Bees have missed the veterinary curriculum in vet schools in US and Western Europe for a long time. The tide is changing, and more and more colleges are adding bee lectures.

Treatment of bees with antibiotics and other drugs was not under veterinary control .US Beekeepers in many states were prophylactically dosing bees to prevent Foulbrood diseases with antibiotics bought over the counter in agricultural merchants. In 2017, however, the Veterinary Feed Directive, VFD, was introduced. This meant that beekeepers had to obtain a prescription or VFD from a veterinarian to acquire antibiotics to treat their bees. This is in line with “One Health”, a collaboration between medics, vets, dentists, and pharmacists to attempt to reduce antimicrobial resistance to antibiotics. American veterinarians require a reference book that gives them information on bees and how to approach disease problems in colonies and apiaries. This book achieves this and is an excellent start for vets to understand bees.

The list or contributors is a who’s who of bee science in the USA. The first chapter is written by Tom Seeley and Robin Radcliffe and covers much about the research on Varroa mites. Tom Seeley is one of the foremost bee scientists in the world. This gives a rundown of the history of Varroa and the evolution of change as beekeepers tackled how to manage the pest. They follow this up with possible lines which may lead to a solution for the bees to live with this pest and its load of destructive viruses. Robin Radcliffe continues in the following chapter to show how honeybees can help themselves.

Randy Oliver describes the role of the Queen in the hive with numerous ways in which queens influence the reproduction in the colony. The chapter is full of practical tips and applications that the beekeeper can follow and illustrated with numerous excellent photographs. These ideas give the veterinarian a background knowledge too consider queen problems and possible solutions.

Other chapters cover bee strains and their history in the US and a good introduction to other species of bees. There is a general look at anatomy and physiology along with an excellent account of pharmacology and pharmacology principles in bees. A table showing toxic interactions with chemical combinations is large and daunting. This is relevant to the toxic synergy found with many agrochemicals other than insecticides. Kaisie Raymann introduces the honeybee microbiome which will have considerable importance to the understanding of bee and colony health. Reed Johnston is a leading toxicologist and outlines the methods of ascertaining the toxic effects on honeybees.

The diseases section is covered very well with all the main pathogens being described including some less common ones. The sections on Varroa and the Foulbroods are very well described and include all little facts about these pests and diseases. One reason for why AFB spore which germinate into the vegetative form in the gut lumen, can only cause infection and septicaemia up to 56 hours in the larva. Each pathogen is dealt with very thoroughly and follows a scheme that is common in vet textbooks in approaches to diseases in other animals.

This change gives the US Veterinary profession the opportunity to have some input into the disease problem that is there as a result of the huge migratory beekeeping industry and the monoculture in so many agricultural crops. This is a major problem for the honeybee industry in the US and also the problems pertaining to bumblebees, solitary bees, and other pollinators.

A section of this book is given over to explaining the new legislation and how the vet should approach a bee colony and an apiary and bee yard. The format is in keeping with how a vet would approach a clinical case in farm or companion animals. This approach will be very useful to any beekeeper who wishes to systematically appraise disease in his/her bee colonies.

This is an easy book to read and use as a reference despite the large number of contributors. The photographs, diagrams, tables, and illustrations are excellent throughout. The US veterinary profession is breaking into the world of bees and this, I hope, is the first of many textbooks for the profession on bee science and disease. It gives a very good grounding on many bee subjects and the reader can easily move on to other detailed books. There is plenty here not only for the vets, but for bee scientists, entomologists, and beekeepers.

Is there any drawback? Well one, which is the same for most veterinary textbooks and that is the cost… £133. The price, however, did not curtail sales with the first print run selling out in days.

I would highly recommend this book. I congratulate Terry Ryan Kane and Cynthia Faux for bringing together such a memorable text

Review by Dr John Hill MVB MRCVS, President British Bee Veterinary Association.

 
 

Bees for Development

 
bfd logo

We are delighted to report that our seasonal fundraiser, the Big Give Christmas Challenge reached and exceeded our £110,000 target. This will support our work in Ethiopia at a time when civil unrest is adding to life's challenges. Happily, the latest harvest season in Amhara, Ethiopia has been a very good one for beekeepers, showing that, whatever the circumstances, beekeeping is a resilient livelihood option.

We would like to thank all of you who have kindly supported Bees for Development in one way or another over the last year.

We appreciate that it is likely to be a challenging new year ahead for many people: those we work with in the poorest nations, and for many of our supporters here too, we send you our best greetings.

 
 

National Honey Show

 

Two lectures from the 2021 National Honey Show, ‘Reading a Hive’ by Kirsten Traynor and 'Achieving a Sustainable System of Bee Improvement' by Jo Widdicombe are now available to view on The National Honey Show YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/NationalHoneyShowUK/videos

These will be released on the first Friday of each month at 5.15pm, the next, ‘Man made breeding and selection vs natural reproduction and selection’ by Torben Schiffer on Friday, 4th February.

By ‘subscribing’, for which there is no cost, to favourite YouTube channels you’ll receive instant updates whenever new content appears. So, you’ll be among the first to hear about any bonus video postings such as the ‘how to’ videos The National Honey Show is planning.  The first in the series, Peter, and Christine Matthews’ demonstration video on preparing cut comb and chunk honey is already available on our YouTube Channel.

We hope you will enjoy the videos and look forward to seeing you at next year’s show: 27 to 29 October 2022 at Sandown Park Racecourse, Esher, Surrey, UK.

 
 

Upcoming Events

 

  • 26th March - Cymdeithas Gwenynwyr Cymru/Welsh Beekeepers' Association’s Annual Convention
  • 8th April – BBKA Spring Convention
  • 12th & 13th August – Thornes of Scotland Sale Day
  • 3rd September – Thornes of Windsor Sale Day
  • 17th September – Thornes of Stockbridge Sale Day
  • 24th September – Thornes of Devon Sale Day
  • 8th October – Rand Sale and Open Day
  • 27th 29th October – The National Honey Show

 

 
 
                                                           

Share this article

Recommended Articles

Beekeepers News - March - Issue 90 Beekeepers News - March - Issue 90
Beekeepers News - February - Issue 89 Beekeepers News - February - Issue 89
Beekeepers News - January - Issue 88 Beekeepers News - January - Issue 88
By continuing to browse this website you agree to our use of cookies Accept