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Charity Number : 1014600
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GBKA Registered
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Are You Doing This? Keep an eye open for swarming and be prepared to deal with it. There have
not been a great many swarms reported yet this year but they are probably
coming. Get extra supers ready for use. Go to the next apiary meeting and keep up to date. Remember to keep monitoring for varroa infection levels. Apiary
News The
May meeting was a total washout. We stood in the tractor shed and seriously
discussed things but didn’t look at the bees. Eric
will commence queen rearing at the June meting, so come to that and the future
manipulations will be explained and dates arranged. Comment. People are still going on about CCD and mobile phones.
It would appear that no reasonably controlled experiments have yet shown any
connection. The experts in US are still totally baffled about the cause. I would
like to reiterate what I feel about varroa. I have read many articles where
beekeepers have said that the incidence of varroa in a colony was low, but very
few describe how they have come to this conclusion. Although I am a staunch
supporter of monitoring mortality of varroa using insert boards under mesh
floors I know that the negative information they display can be totally
deceptive. The debris on a board is an indication of the strength and health of
a colony and a large varroa drop means a heavy infection, but that is as far as
you can take it. I think we are deceiving ourselves when we see a low drop and
conclude there is a low level of infestation. The biggest danger to our bees at the moment is
probably starvation. There has been such an excellent spring and the colonies
built up early at a time when they use a flow to build up numbers rather than
collect stores. But with the weather turning cold and wet at the time when there
are many bees and masses of brood to
be fed they will quickly use up any stores that they may have accumulated. I
have been through mine which have become very strong with the rape next to them,
and in some hives there is not a scrap of food in the brood box, they are using
the supers. So any colony with nothing in its supers could well be in trouble .
There is also the ‘June gap’ to contend with this month when the spring
flowers are over but the summer flowering flowers have not yet opened. It might
be an out dated problem now that everything flowers earlier, I saw the first
blackberry flower in May. However keep a watch on stores. There was a lovely photo on the cover of the May
edition of Bee Craft. Adrian Waring ‘Reading the Combs’ in a brood box the
outside of which was beautifully carved into lines of hieroglyphics by the
waxmoth. Even the gurus suffer from waxmoth. Bridget Basic Exam 4 members of the association took the basic exam on Saturday 2nd June at
Cefn Tilla. Pam was the examiner. Fortunately the weather was kind to them but
they had an interesting (and instructive?) time with swarms. MSWCC
in Book
by 15th July for 10% discount 79th
Programme Friday
31st August
Speaker/Activity
Venue 17.00-18.00
Registration, Tea, Coffee and Biscuits
Conference centre Foyer 18.00-18.15
Welcome and Introduction 18.15-19.00
'Finger on the Buzzer' Challenge
Hereford Room 19.00-20.00
Supper
Refectory 20.00-21.00
Beekeeping in the Developing World
Hereford Room
Dr Nicola Bradbear Saturday
1st September 08.15-
0900
Breakfast
Refectory 08.30
- 09.00
Registration for Day Visitors.
Conference centre Foyer
Staging of entries for Honey Show
Worcester Room 09.15-10.15
Wild bees and wasps
Celia Davis
Hereford Room
Judging of Honey Show by
Bernard Diaper
Worcester Room 10.30-11.00
Coffee 11.15-
12.15
Unlocking the past. The Archaeology of Pollen
Dr Katy Head Hereford Room 13.00-14.00
Lunch
Refectory 14.00-17.00
Practical Workshops:
Inspection for diseases
Dave Sutton
Outside
Sculpture in wax
Martin Buckle
Worcester Room
Visit The National Pollen and Aerobiology unit
Prof. Jean Emberlin
Pollen Microscopy
Dr Katie Head
Plastic Frames and other hive Equipment
B.J.Engineering 15.30
Afternoon Tea 17.00
Plenary session with panel of speakers
Judges feedback and Presentation of Prizes
Hereford Room 18.45-20.15
Dinner
Refectory 20.15 Entertainment
The Gilded Lilies Sunday
2" September 08-15-09.00
Breakfast
Refectory 08.45-09.00
Registration for Day Visitors
Conference centreFoyer
09.15
- 09.45
Non Denominational Service, Revd Robert Barlow
Hereford Room
10.00
- 1.1.00
Where the Bee flies-
Pollination Ecology Dr Juliet Osbome
Hereford Room
11.00-11.30
Coffee 11.30-
12.30
When you should Bee concerned about Pesticides Dr.Julian Little
Hereford Room 13.00-14.00
Lunch
Refectory 14.00
- 15.00
'Sniffer' bees-the work of Inscentinel Dr Rachel Carson
Hereford Room
15.00
- 15.30
Closing remarks and raffle draw 15.30
Tea, coffee and biscuits
—
Close of convention IN
AT THE DEEP END About the author: Martin Howells is one of the newer
members of the association and he has been on the Beginner’s course this year.
As always I am delighted when one of our beginners finds the time and energy
to make a contribution to the newsletter. I know that all the beginners
who are familiar with Martin will particularly enjoy
reading his thoughts on the subject of beekeeping, and I also think that
some of us established beekeepers who automatically perform the 5Q’s could do
with taking on board the 5P’s. Introduction As a
“NewBee” to the GBKA and Bee Keeping I thought I would document my first
impressions on undertaking the Bee Keepers Course and put into context what I
believe to be are three important concepts on the learning curve.
I also wish, of course, to express my gratitude to all those personnel,
bee keepers, family and friends, who have worked so hard in preparing the
material for the course and delivering the “goods” to the sharp end of 21
students; keeping us all fascinated and stimulated to learn more about this
craft of bee keeping. From all of us students on course thank you one and all
for a marvellous experience. My
Background To The Learning Process I
won’t bore you all with a long history of my Naval career, suffice to say that
as an Ex Royal Navy man of 28 years service I vividly recall the advice given by
a Chief Petty Officer to me, and the 31 New Entry Recruits of BenBow 35 Class,
of the Royal Navy, in August 1977, at HMS RALEIGH in Torpoint Cornwall.
The Chief Petty Officer’s name I can no longer remember, suffice to say
he was known only as “The Chief”; as in “He who must be obeyed, without
question or hesitation”; offered us all an explanation as to how we should
conduct ourselves if we wished to be successful in our naval careers.
The advice he gave us was shortened down to two syllables – they are
known as the 5P’s. They
stand for:-
PRIOR PREPARATION PREVENTS POOR PERFORMANCE I
have found the 5P’s to be a truism in life.
The effort expended in conducting the 5P’s has always proved worthwhile
in the results delivered at the end on the task. The
Present In
changing context from the past to the present, we the students, are finding out
that the theory from the classroom is being translated into practise in the
Apiary. Again the Apiary work
requires the use of the 5P’s. However,
we must now combine the 5P’s with the 5Q’s, the Five Questions.
I of course refer to page 102 of Ted Hooper’s book the “Guide to Bees
and Honey”, Fourth Edition, and to our own John Waller’s lecture notes of
the 27 February 2007 titled “Room, Queen, Growth, Abnormalities, Stores”:
the things to watch out for on every hive inspection.
These five questions “5Q’s” are the protocols around which we, the
bee keepers, “manage” in inverted commas, our bee colonies.
It is at this conjunction in our training that we, the beginners, start
learning, by putting theory into practise, under of course, the tutelage of John
Holden and to be added shortly, Brian Harris and Bridget Woodhead. There
is however, one more important item to note, that I believe is as important as
the 5P’s and 5Q’s; and that is the 3R’s.
The 3R’s are:-
READ THE BEES, RIGHT THE
BEES, RECORD THE BEES. 1.
Read the Bees -
Read and understand the behaviour of individual bees and also the
behaviour of the colony in context to the answers to your 5Q’s. 2.
Right the Bees
-
Make Right any anomalies you find in your colony and it’s behaviour, if
it is in your power to do so. Right
bees for the right job – honey production. 3.
Record the Bees -
Make detailed and accurate records of your findings on inspection of your
bees in order that appropriate actions can be taken and documented so that
follow up actions can be initiated if prudent to do so at a later inspection. The
3R’s came to me at our second practical session at the Apiary with John Holden
mentioning the Hive Card. The more I
thought about the Hive Card the more I pondered its uses.
Thinking about the bees like this and not recalling any theory notes, I
wonder, am I on the way to bee enlightenment?
I wonder if the 5P’s, the 5Q’s and 3R’s will be of help to anyone
else? The mix of the “Old Sea
Dog” and the “New Concepts” certainly has helped me come to terms with the
aims and objectives of bee keeping. Fair
Winds and Martin
Howells Lieutenant Commander Royal Na
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