Winter Bees

A visit to the bee hive on a warm winter's day in December

My bees belong in a Skiffle Band

I caught them washboarding last night!  This is a mysterious activity they indulge in, and the best part is: no-one knows what it means, what it's for, or why they do it.  

Check out my video - at about 5min 20 seconds in, you'll see a whole lot of the girls doing it together.  

Margo's Bees Doing the Washboard Dance

Syncopated rhythm in Bee Minor!

Honey to Market

I cannot speak for anyone else; I can only speak from my own experience.  These are the things I have learned about marketing honey:

1.

Be wary of giving away free honey for the response may overwhelm you.  It will include everything from surprise to effusive thanks but above all, the assumption that what you are offering is merely a "sweetener" in expectation of future sales. 

Now, this may indeed be your strategy and I say, be prepared for a wave of orders to follow.   When you are giving out those gifts, even as a gentle form of bribery to colleagues, ask yourself "do I have enough stock for the business that is bound to follow?"

2.

Think outside the box.  Do not just do what everyone else has done before you - selling 1 lb jars of honey for a straight £4.  I do not believe this is a successful strategy any more and, what's more, I will tell you why.

- People, consumers, your customers have too much choice these days.  In earlier times, honey was the only sweet thing you could spread on your toast, or dip in your tea, or add to your chicken or salads.  Nowadays there is so much more to choose from - maple syrup, sweet chillis, jams, conserves, preserves, jellies and syrups.   Also, there are so many different kinds of other "toastie" toppings - peanut butters (crunchy, not-crunchy), Marmite (love it or loathe it), Vegemite and more. 

- No-one gets through an entire pound jar of honey anymore without it crystallising (which a lot of people, myself included in days of yore, incorrectly think means it's time to chuck it in the bin).  So, what people like to have on their shelf is a little taste of everything.

- Sell small.  Go 120 oz, or even 8 oz.  Firstly, you can sell these at a premium, instead of a pro-rated portion of £4 for a pound.  People love the novelty of little jars to keep.  And they will come back for more.  Particularly if they can proudly say, "look! I finished your honey".  In an age where people are learning the thrift of the post-throw-away age, it pleases them to actually finish something all up.

3.

While Chunk Honey is exotic and lovely and interesting and artisan, it confuses people.  It is not advisable over the product they all know, love and recognise: clear or set honey in a glass jar. 

It is also difficult to price (how can I justify £1 for an 8oz chunk of honey in the comb compared to blasted Sainsbury's selling a 1 lb jar at an excrutiatingly low £1.95.  How on earth can they justify that? It's outrageous!)

This has been my first season experimenting with the sale of honey in the comb, as Chunk Honey, and I am bemused by the number of friends, family and customers who proudly show me how they have decanted the honey from the comb into a jar.  Or chewed the honeycomb and made strange shapes out of the remaining wax.  Or asked me how to eat it.

4.

Labels, and names, are important.  Make your own, I urge you.  It's a gloriously creative process.  Easy to do.  Costs less, no matter what they tell you, than buying bog-standard ones in. 

I loved winding my way through the maze of Food Standards Regulations about labels.  You have to make sure no single flower can be identified in the pictures, unless of course your bees have foraged over a certain percentage on one single flower, like Lavender Honey from the fields of Grasse, in France. 

Your name and address has to be on there - which unnerves all Europeans, who freak out about the Data Protection Act and intrusions on their privacy.  Not I.  I carry my name and place proudly on that label.  Except of course, it's not Slough, it's "Upper Windsor", darling!  (Always confuses the postman, poor dear.) 

The size and weight must be in minimum 10-point print.  You could spend hours with a ruler and a magnifying glass, working that one out. 

Try now to think of an Expiry Date, when you consider that 5,000 year old honey was found in the tombs of the Ancient Egyptians - and considered to be still edible.  I have resisted the temptation, so far, of putting "Best Before: 7012 AD" on my labels. Haha!

 And people remember your honey, if it has a name.  And you sell your brand with more heart, because it has an identity.

First, I called my honey "Jack's Honey".  It saddened me beyond words that my dad, that irascible old codger, died just before he could have a taste from my first-ever honey harvest.  But nowadays, I will not market a sad thing.  This is a happy thing, my honey, and it will carry my name.  

"Margo's Honey" it is then.

When I'm away at work ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HjRGG9JGqzI

Hunger

I missed them too much.  I just missed them.  So I went and did something I could well regret later.  I paid money for them.  I don't mind the money; even though I couldn't really afford it.  And in truth, I didn't spend actual money, I used credit - which of course, in this day and age, is probably so much worse.

Never mind.  I find it astonishing how having bees back in our garden has lifted my mood.  The garden feels complete again.  A proper garden.  I spend time in it.  I harvest raspberries for jam.  I walk the length of it every evening just to sit for a while, watching their activity at the hive entrance.  There can be no more wonderful spiritual "food" than this - this retreat from the world; this still and solitary meditation on all things earthly and magical.

Lying under the entrance looking up at the hive

So now I will write down all the things I have been recording on my BeeBase online Hive Inspection Records.  I use them faithfully, but I'm finding the structure of it restrictive and limiting.

I brought the bees in on Saturday 9 June.  I did spend a moment wondering if I should use the 14x12 size hive, but I didn't - I went with the standard National.  (Now I am seriously regretting my decision, but more on that later).  I transferred 6 frames (six whole frames, I marvelled) from the nuc box to the National Brood box.  This, just at the very moment the bees literally chewed their way through the edges of the mesh hole in the nuc and started escaping.  I was really astonished; how the hell do they do it!?

The frames were rich with bees and brood (BIAS - brood in all stages - ie rice-grain just-laid eggs, 3-day plump and juicy fat larvae, capped-over brood pupating) but shockingly low on honey and pollen stores.  In fact there was none.  I did not see the Queen, but Queen-sign was all good, so I transferred everything over, placed a pint of feed above the crownboard hole, and left well alone for a week.  All signs at the entrance were good all week, with bees finding their entrance and full pollen baskets coming in all week.  I laughed to see that, once again, the bees have chosen a flight path exactly opposite to my own desires.  Typical contrary creatures!

One other thing I noticed - these bees were very, very calm.  Regardless of the fact that they'd just been confined in a small box for at least 2 days, on a truck travelling hundreds of miles (and very nearly confiscated by the coppers - what is this Special Relationship my bees always seem to have with the Old Bill!?), they were incredibly docile.  I was very impressed.  And relieved.

On Sunday 17 June, overcast but a warm 18 degrees, I opened the box and checked the hive.  They have been working hard to draw out the foundation on the 5 new frames I added to their original drawn 6.  In 7 days, they've drawn 6 more sides.  So we're up to 9 full frames now.  This Queen lays brood from side to side, edge to edge, up and down.  There is no food anywhere.  And the bees look hungry - heads down in comb, bums up.  Hungry.

So for the next 7 days I put a pint of feed out - every single day.  And they sucked up every last drop. If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes I wouldn't have believed it possible.

I had noticed, when the bees originally went into the box the week before, that they were "chaining" a lot.  Great loops of bees hanging together in delicate jewellery fashion, they clung together in the classic sign of wanting to sweat wax and mould honeycomb together.  So the sugar water mixture has been feeding to that need; the more feed, the more they've made comb.

And there was comb everywhere. They'd propolised the crownboard down - solidly.  They'd made wax above the crownboard through the spare hole, wild comb inside the crownboard, and - most startling to a new beekeeper - wild comb on the bottom of the National frames inside a National box.  Now these measurements are critical.  Surely if they're making honeycomb below the frames, there's no Bee Space left down there to work below?  What the hell are they doing?

Some imperative seems to be in operation; my impression is that these bees work with "top space", where before I've always worked with "bottom space" and all my boxes are geared to "bottom space".  How does that work?  These bees must represent generations that have been worked in the same fashion, over and over again, perhaps by a single beekeeper.  How intriguing.

So I checked each frame and the Queen is still laying like a trouper.  Edge to edge, side to side, top to bottom, with no space for food - most worrying!  There is BIAS but no Queen, but that's alright, I know she's there.

Ghost Bee - Nasanov Gland showing

I did something new today - I shook sugar all over the bees.  I didn't have the recommended icing sugar, so I used castor sugar.  A little cloud of white descended through the sieve over the bees, leaving a host of ghost-like creatures looking a wee bit disconcerted.  It was so beautiful to see!  This tactic is the new fashionable way to encourage bees to "groom" each other for the sweet sugar, thus dislodging the horrible varroa mites, which fall off, through the open mesh floor onto the ground, never to climb back up into the hive again, one hopes.

I took photos of the "ghost" bees, the whiteness clearly showing the Nasanov Gland working - that little gland on their bottoms that splits open to emanate a scented pheromone that communicates with other bees .... "come here, gather together girls, there is a threat, or a need to group .... something's up!"

I came again, this disruptive beekeeper, on Saturday 23 June.  Trustingly I wore only thin dishwashing gloves this time - these bees have been wonderfully good-natured all the time.  Naturally this time I got my first sting - but not on my hands.  It happened when I leaned forward and a bee got caught in the crease of my trousers, in my groin.  Not her fault, poor lass, she got pressed in and frightened, she stung me.  I hardly felt it through the fabric and was able to carry on regardless.  While one part of me mourned the unnecessary death of a single bee, another part rejoiced at the fact that I could take the hurt, and in knowing that it will help allay the arthritis pains I feel more often these days. 

This time, I saw the Queen.  What a moment!  She came rushing across the surface of the honeycomb.  She was not easy to spot because She was really fast, and She is not that big.  And She is lean - very lean.  But there She is, and She lays and lays and lays and does not stop laying.  There is BIAS everywhere, and NO FOOD.  They've filled up 10 of the 11 frames.  What's the matter with this lot!?  I thought bees were supposed to be the sensible ones.

See my new Alpha Queen?

I've decided not to feed them anymore.  I'm just encouraging them not to make and stockpile food, clearly.

Let's see what they do with that ...

A week later I came back (Saturday 30 June) and took the top off and - while removing the empty feeder - got stung twice.  So that's their opinion of me not feeding them.  I see.

They've filled up every frame with brood.  At last there is one (ONE) frame of honey.  I removed the dummy board and squeeeeeeeezed in a 12th frame of foundation.  Also I had a Super filled with old, battered and broken drawn comb on 10 Super frames.  I placed that on top, and had to remember to do it the right way round. 

This colony came with the frames stacked the "Cold Way" instead of the way I've always worked on the "Warm Way" with one frame parallel to the length of the entrance and thus covering all the others from the wind, thus keeping the hive "warm".  When I put the Super on, I suddenly thought "oops, not parallel to the entrance, Margo, right angles!"

A week later (on Saturday 7 July) I checked again and the girls had worked long and hard to rebuild the damaged honeycomb in the Super.  They had done a beautiful job.  All the comb is empty and I worried a bit because of course, the cells are large ones meant for Drones.  This Queen lays quite a significant percentage of Drone cells.  I would worry more if She laid no Worker Cells, but She does so I will not worry too much just yet.

I fed only once or twice through the week. 

When I lifted the Super off the Brood Box, I came face to face once more with the reason I hate the "Brood and a Half" configuration.  Inspecting over 20 frames makes them grumpy.  It would make me grumpy too.  It takes ages, it is very traumatic breaking comb everywhere, and it is risky.  When removing the Super who knows where that leaves the Queen!?  I don't like it, and I wish I hadn't done it this way.

The temptation is to transfer them into a 14 x 12 and make them work to start it all up again.  While this colony's work ethic is unbelievably powerful I'm loathe to take the risk.  Already it is late in the summer, and the weather has been shockingly poor.  This means that together we - me and the bees - must focus all our efforts on building their strength, reserves and infrastructure to survive the winter.  No setbacks allowed.

In the Super, on the restored comb, I spotted a Queen Cell.  But it was only a "Play Cup" - practice.  And there was nothing in it.  So I left it.

I came back to the hive last Sunday.  I removed the 12th Brood frame, filled with capped honey on one side, and replaced the Dummy Board.  Why did I do that?  Well, part of me doesn't want to squeeze and jolt my way into the hive, breaking out that extra-tight 12th frame every time. Another part is keen to taste the honey endeavours.  And yet another wants to force them up into the Super, fixing the comb and encouraging the Queen upstairs to lay.

I didn't need to worry though.  She has laid across all Super frames.  I gasped when I pulled out the 3rd frame - it was filled with Drone comb.  I don't like it. Why so much Drone comb this late in the year?  A concern.  Yet everywhere else there is Worker brood and, as I checked a large frame in the bottom Brood Box, I saw an entire frame emptied of babies and one or two bees being born.  There is nothing so magical as watching a little baby bee nibbling its way out of the capped cell and emerging, fluffy and staggering a little inelegantly into the world. 

Welcome, little bee!

There are thousands upon thousands of bees now.  I work my way somewhat nervously through clouds of agitated bees.  Still, they do not sting me.  21 frames are checked.  No Queen, but lots of Queen-sign.  No Queen Cells.  A little more honey is stored.  All appears to be righting itself.

So this time, I go back to the house and I open up my cupboard and I take out the new foundation.  It is Super foundation, and it is unwired.  I want to try making honey on the comb this time.  So I make up a new Super of 10 frames of this fragile new foundation, and I carry it down carefully to the bottom of the garden.

I gently slide on the plastic Queen Excluder and place the Honey Super above it.  Will the Queen be thin enough to squeeze up there?  Oh Lord, I hope not!

And because the bees have work to do and wax to make and honey to store, I feed them some more.

They're hungry.  Like me.

Bee Wisdom

A bee settling on a flower has stung a child.  And the child is afraid of bees and declares that bees exist to sting people.

A poet admires the bee sucking from the chalice of a flower and says it exists to suck the fragrance of flowers.

A beekeeper, seeing the bee collect pollen from flowers and carry it to the hive, says that it exists to gather honey.  Another beekeeper who has studied the life of the hive more closely says that the bee gathers pollen dust to feed the young bees and rear a queen, and that it exists to perpetuate its race.

A botanist notices that the bee flying with the pollen of a male flower to a pistil fertilises the latter, and sees in this the purpose of the bee's existence.  Another, observing the migration of plants, notices that the bee helps in this work, and may say that in this lies the purpose of the bee.

But the ultimate purpose of the bee is not exhausted by the first, the second, or any of the processes the human mind can discern.  The higher the human intellect rises in the discover of these purposes, the more obvious it becomes, that the ultimate purpose is beyond our comprehension.

Leo Tolstoy

War and Peace

Glum

On Friday, our house was burgled.

On Saturday, I checked the hive and found a rotted, soaked, smelly black clump of bee corpses. I think what happened was that, about 5 or 6 weeks ago, I got worried about the dropping temperature and wrapped a Space Blanket around the woodpecker cage, thinking that would add a layer of insulation. In effect, what I did was insulate the hive so well I didn't allow for sufficient ventilation and the inside of the hive developed condensation which soaked through the colony and effectively killed them.

What a tragic waste.

Today I am very glum.