Hon. Newsletter Editor:
Peter Edwards
E-mail: beekeepers@stratford-upon-avon.freeserve.co.uk

HONEY FOR SALE

There is a quantity of Association honey available for sale to members in 30lb buckets at a special price of £1.30 per lb.  If you would like to buy some, please contact David Titcomb (or me) as soon as possible.  First come, first served.  If there is any left over it will be put in barrels to be sent to the honey co-operative.
Peter Edwards

APIARY MEETING – 16 JULY

A small group met at Hampton Wood on a good day for inspecting the colonies.  David took the lead and starting with hive 1 found it queenless.  On previous meetings this colony had been regarded substandard for nativeness and temper so it was moved away and a nucleus, created 2 months ago from a good stock was moved on to the stand.  It was made up with drawn frames to make a full hive and should next year help improve the overall quality of the apiary.  However, in a setback to the breeding program 2 queens identified by the BIG group as having potential breeding qualities were gone from their hives. These queens had been clipped and marked with numbers 75 and 77.  An opinion raised was that maybe the smell of the glue had led the bees to reject both queens, although it is presumed the product had been thoroughly tested.  Kevin will however be keeping his numbering kit to his colonies until it has proven successful with his own queens in the future.  Eight full or part-filled supers were removed from the hives for extraction by David.

The majority of the group then adjourned to David's apiaries for a demonstration of the Queen rearing program being led by David and Peter.  (See 'Queen Rearing' below.)
Kevin Roles

QUEEN REARING

This has been a busy year for evaluation of colonies and queen rearing.  After careful analysis of the data collected when Sue and I evaluated our own colonies (see June newsletter), I decided that there were perhaps only 4 queens that could be considered good enough to classify as breeders; there may be some more, but they are too young to be able to judge for ‘swarminess’.  The BIG also evaluated the Association apiary and found another possible breeder.  The only other queen with proven good qualities was one owned by Terry which he obtained from Francis Ratnieks at Sheffield University.

Although other colonies have produced excellent crops this year – many giving over 100lbs – they have been rejected for a number of reasons, e.g. swarming every year, poor temper, tolerance of wax moth or susceptibility to chalk brood.

So far, we have raised three batches of queens: two from my selected queens and one from Terry’s ‘Ratnieks’ queen.

We had planned to raise more queens from the ‘Ratnieks’ queen, but it was superseded recently after 3 years good service – an excellent trait – so we have now raised cells from ‘daughter of Ratnieks’!  Our first attempt was made using David’s Jenter box.  For those who do not know this system: the queen is confined in a small box containing artificial comb; after she has laid up the cells she is released and the eggs allowed to hatch; one third of the cells have removable bases, or ‘plugs’, so that the larvae can be removed without the need for grafting; these plugs are then put into holders and inserted into queenless colonies overnight where the queen cells are started; these are then placed above an excluder in queenright colonies for finishing.

Jenter box with queen excluding cover. The queen is introduced through the removable central disc.

Queen on Jenter 'comb'.  Eggs can be seen in each cell. The dark brown cells are removable 'plugs'

Jenter cell system components, showing holder, plug and cell cups. These cells had been completed and had hatched.

Queen cells are mounted on bars and inserted into a queenless colony. Note the very large number of young bees to ensure good acceptance.

100% success! Not all were as good as this - 75% is considered very acceptable.

Some cells were put into Apidea mini-nucs in the mating apiary...

...and some were protected with hair rollers...

...and then put into standard 4 or 5 frame nucs.

We used David’s box first and the next day put the queen into my Jenter box to get two batches.  The boxes with the eggs were then transferred to holding colonies until they hatched.

After the meeting on 16 July, we took David’s box with the larvae, made up a queenless colony and inserted the cells.  However, this has not been successful and we do not really know why the colony failed to build the cells as expected.  The only reason that I can think of is that there was a second queen in the colony that we did not find, although there is now no brood, so it would have had to have been a supersedure that has not yet started to lay.

On 17 July, Sue and I made up cells from the larvae in our Jenter box and put these into three queenless colonies.  Two performed very badly, with only eight cells produced between them, but the other colony built twenty three fine cells.

All the queens are being mated in our apiary that has native bees from BIBBA (see December 2005 newsletter) or the Galtee group in Ireland (see March 2006 newsletter), so we hope that most matings will be with ‘good’ drones.  These new queens have been used to re-queen colonies in other apiaries, particularly at Snitterfield where I hope that we will be able to establish a good mating apiary next year, surrounded by around 60 colonies distributed over the fruit farm and all producing ‘good’ drones!  Well, that is the theory…

The next job will be to evaluate the results of all this work and select breeders for next year.  If all goes well, then we should be in a good position to get BIG members much more involved in hands-on queen rearing so that we can start spreading good quality genes further.
Peter Edwards

SUMMER BEE FAIR

A summer Bee Fair with trade stands, car boot sale and auction will be held on Saturday 5 August at Lawn Road Bee Farm, Ashleworth, Gloucester.  Free entry for beekeepers.

But… can I remind you that, whilst the majority of items on sale are probably fine, these auctions present a great opportunity for unscrupulous beekeepers to get rid of problem equipment; so the usual rules apply – never buy second hand drawn comb or frames and sterilise any boxes with a blowtorch before use.  Please do not bring back disease!

I am not sure if there will be bees for sale, but I would certainly not buy them at this time of year as they will now need feeding and might not survive the winter.
Peter Edwards

NATIONAL HONEY SHOW

To be held at the Royal Air Force Museum at Hendon, North London, on 19th - 21st October.  This is well worth a visit, both for the show and the museum.  To see the rows of wide ranging exhibits of such a high standard is a sight never to be forgotten.  For example, as well as the standard honey show classes, one class is for 24 jars of honey and another for a decorative display of honey products.  Also included is needlecraft, photographs, encaustic paintings, wax models and cakes.  Whilst at the show the opportunity can be taken to attend one of the lectures that are continuously being given.

For those wishing to enter any of the classes, I have copies of the schedule, and arrangements can be made to deliver products to the show.  Entry forms must be in by 20th September.

I also have schedules for the honey show at Birmingham's Gardeners' Weekend on 2nd and 3rd September for those who would like to enter.
Mike Osborne 

FONDANT

Do you need fondant?  If so, ring me very soon!
Peter Edwards