I do, I do, I Scoobie do
No sooner had I signed-up to the National Bee Unit’s, BeeBase, than I was rewarded for my enthusiasm by receiving a letter asking if I would like to participate in the “European Union Pilot Surveillance Programme for Honey Bee Health”. Crikey!
My apiary (of two colonies) was one of 200 apiaries (out of 32,000) from across England & Wales randomly selected from BeeBase and they were going to inspect my hives three times over a year, starting in August. In this programme, they are collecting baseline data on colony losses and honeybee health from across the EU. Not only did it sound very worthwhile it gave me some relief that whatever I did during June-August, at least a bee inspector would have a look and perhaps give me some pointers. It felt like some kind of insurance policy, so I immediately replied with an “I do, I do, I Scoobie do”.
The Bee Inspector
I wasn’t too worried about what the bee inspector would find. I was just really excited about what I could learn about my bees.
She came last week. Within minutes she was stroking the bumble bees in the lavendar at the bottom of the garden. Hmmmm. I would try and impress my wife and friends with similar displays of affection and try and convince them that I had a deep connection with bees. Whilst I would be sham, I was convinced the bee inspector knew her stuff.
When it came to inspecting the hive she asked where my smoker was. I haven’t used smoke for the last couple of months and as a result they have even been more friendly. She seemed OK with this but she wanted the smoker to hand just in case. We didn’t need it.
Bee Inspector studying my hives for the EU Pilot Programme
Diseases The Study Is Looking Out For
An EU Paper (link at bottom of page) explains ” The focus [of the pilot study] will be on the following main honeybee diseases and/or pathogens: varroosis (V. destructor), American (P. larvae) and European foulbrood (M. plutonius), nosemosis (N. apis, N. ceranae), chronic bee paralysis virus (CBPV) and the two viruses strongly linked with V. destructor (Deformed wing virus (DWV) and Acute bee paralysis virus (ABPV)). These are known to be present with relatively high prevalence and/or impact in Europe. Additionally, the two following notifiable pathogens will be also searched for: A. tumida and Tropilaelaps spp. (currently considered absent from Europe).”
Basically, this means the inspectors are looking for the baddies.
The Inspection
She started out by collecting some dying bees around the outside of the hive and put them in a sample jar with ethanol (I think it was ethanol). When she got into the hive, she took a couple of bees with Deformed Wing Virus (DWV) and put them in another sample jar. She put a couple of dodgy looking larvae into a jar. She also took a frame of bees, shook them into a washing bowl and put a couple of hundred of my workers into a fourth sample jar. She did this for both hives. See video below.
She looked for my Queen but could not find her but she could see eggs and larave in my first hive.
After the inspection we had a tea/coffee and she asked me a few questions. I told her about the history of swarming and high varroa counts.
Sample of honeybees
Good News & Bad News
Despite the dying bees and couple of bees with DWV, she declared the hives looked healthy based on a quick visual analysis. However, the bad news is that my hive that swarmed six weeks ago is Queenless and no sign of brood or eggs. She reassured me that this was common this year. She also let me know that her honey production was 60% down on last year and my three jars was not untypical. So as a result of having a Queenless hive she advised me to combine the two hives using the newspaper method.
So I will shortly be down to one colony … lets hope this one makes it through the challenges of autum and winter.
I will get the results of the tests in a few weeks time and will post the results.
Juggling priorities
So I need to reduce the varroa count, feed the bees AND combine the hives. Somehow I have to juggle the following:
- Four weeks of Apiguard treatment whilst it is still above 15C (I’ve done nearly 2 weeks now)
- Feed the bees before the end of September, but do not feed whilst treating with Apiguard
- Combine the two hives – I think I can do this when I want (any advice on optimal times to combine hives welcome)
Basically, I am keeping my fingers crossed that it remains warm until the end of September in order to achieve all the above.
Read More
- EU Guidelines for a pilot surveillance project on honeybee colony losses – More information on the European Union Pilot Surveillance Programme for Honey Bee Health
- Combining Hives = Less To Worry About – Read this post to find out what happened next
- Combining Hives – A how-to guide
- Varroa Management – A how-to guide
- Feeding Bees – A how-to guide
- Laying Workers Killed My Queen – Visit 2 of 3 for this EU Honeybee Surveillance Programme
- An Inspector Calls – Visit 3 of 3 for this EU study
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not finding the queen, then dumping a load in a bowl for removal, would make me a little worried
I was a little worried too. She reassured me this was unlikely. I’ll find out soon enough when I inspect the hive. I’ll let you know. Hopefully, she will have something to inspect next year 🙂
Often if October is warmish you can continue to feed syrup for a couple of weeks into October. Are there enough bees to overwinter them on a double brood box or will you reduce them down to a single brood box after combining?
Very interesting video, thanks!
Fingers crossed on the weather.
I will leave the bees on a single, standard brood box, my other one is a 14×12 … now that could get rather cold over winter with a lack of bees.
In that case, hopefully between the two hives you will have enough frames of stores to fill up the single brood box? So feeding will not be so critical. We have found this after combining two hives, but will still be doing an autumn feed as a couple of frames could do with more honey.
How long will they need to take the stores from the 14×12 and put in the standard National I am leaving them with. It probably amounts to half a frame of capped honey and quite a lot of unripe honey. I was thinking to take the 14×12 away after a week?
It depends on how diligent your bees are… we have been finding that they will take most of it down within a week, but getting them to move it all down has taken about 3-4 weeks. You can hurry the process along a bit by making lines through the capped honey with your hive tool, this encourages them to take it. Make sure you put an empty super box between the two boxes so that they think of the 14×12 box as outside their hive space.
How interesting! I look forward to hearing about what the next couple visits bring you information-wise.