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

THE WEATHER (MAINLY)!!!

I had planned to write: ‘This spring may be remembered as being better for beekeepers’ backs than for their back pockets’ – and it certainly looked that way until a week or so ago.  Things are looking better now, although it seems unlikely that many apiaries will have a very good spring crop.

April marked the completion of 25 years of beekeeping for me and I must say that I do not remember a worse spring.  Since early February we seem to have had endless cold and/or windy and/or damp days, although the total rainfall has not amounted to a great deal.  As a result, colonies and crops have both suffered.  The three warm days at the beginning of May may have done the bees some good (perhaps even saving some colonies) – but their effect on crops was disastrous, bringing them suddenly into flower – only to be hit by the frosts around the 9^th to the 14^th of the month.  In the garden, our plum blossom was completely destroyed and many of the new leaves on the apple tree were damaged and have since been blown off the tree.  Leaves and fruit were ruined on a fig tree and gooseberries dropped due to the cold and dry conditions.

I usually complete my first inspections of colonies by the end of March or early April, but the constant poor weather delayed completion of this work until 25 May.  These inspections are a vital part of the year’s work and are thorough.  I inspect all the brood for health, assess stores, assess the queen’s performance, rearrange boxes so that the colonies have enough supers (well, that was not too onerous!) and find all the queens, clipping and marking any that may have been superseded during the latter half of the previous year.  It was particularly satisfying to find every queen (around 140 of them) on the first inspection – with no failures, except in about 5 colonies which had already swarmed.  Some of these had hatches and in each case the virgins were found.

So, you may ask, why go to all this effort of finding queens?  The answer is that it makes life easier later when the colonies are very much larger.  If colonies need to be split to make an artificial swarm then it is a relatively simple task if the queen is marked.  Also, clipped queens cannot depart with a swarm, so even if inspections overrun the 10 day routine, perhaps due to bad weather, the queen may be lost – but not a swarm.

Marking is also useful in identifying potential breeder queens; for example, today I opened a colony early in the morning when the air was quite cool and the hive was in the shade.  The bees were quiet on the combs with no aggression, they were uniformly black (I need to test them for native characteristics), they had 3 full supers of honey, the queen was marked red (2003) and there was no sign of queen cells.  This is a potential breeder in my book!  But more on breeding next month…

This will probably be another of those difficult years for extracting the spring crop – if you have one to extract.  Rape has been in flower for a long time, having been held back by the weather, and the honey that was gathered during those few early warm days will have started to granulate.  This seeds the honey collected later, causing the whole crop to set solid.  At one time, there was almost a natural break at the end of the winter rape when the crop could be taken, but now we have some winter rape that has gone over completely in some fields and others still with a considerable amount of flower left.  Hawthorn seems to have gone over very quickly without yielding much.  Large areas of winter beans were in full flower a couple of weeks ago – even though the plants were no more than six inches high and spring rape is now starting to flower.

We must be mad to keep bees!
Peter Edwards

 WHERE WERE YOU ALL?

Despite my best efforts to encourage you all to attend, I was - once again - the only Stratford member at the Central Association Meeting held at the Falcon Hotel in November.

Unfortunately, a prior engagement prevented my attending the Friday evening lecture on bumblebees by Ted Benton; I hope this will be published in due course so that I can read it.

·         Dr Robert Paxton has always been a good speaker and his two lectures were both excellent.  He is now based at Queen's University in Belfast and engaged in a large project to map the bees of Ireland.  His slides showing some of the countryside where he is involved in field work turned many of us green with envy.

·         Teresa Santillan-Galicia, a Mexican student working with Brenda Ball at Rothamsted Research, charmed everyone with her account of both her work here and of beekeeping in Mexico.  Giving the lecture was no mean feat for someone struggling to learn English - and with the boss chairing the session!

·         Mike Brown gave his usual competent account of current work at the NBU but, although questioned about the proposed funding cuts, could not stray far from the party line.  Clearly, in common with others running similar departments, he could make good use of more funding.

·         Dr Gavin Ramsay from the Scottish Crop Research Institute described work on pollinators and gene flow.  This was particularly relevant to GM crops and showed conclusively that GM pollen can travel very large distances from the crop site - in one extreme example, it was detected at a distance of 26 miles!

·         Albert Knight, from BIBBA, made a compelling case for the promotion and protection of our native black bee, Apis mellifera mellifera.  The lecture was very relevant, as several members of our Association are now trying to improve the quality of our local bees and this is a subject dear to my own heart.  One of the main problems that we have faced has been finding good genetic material from which to breed - bees in this area are very mixed in quality - and I know of very few that have all the right qualities (i.e. good temper, non-swarming, highly productive, thrifty, good overwintering).  However, in conversation with Albert after the lecture I learned that BIBBA members can get access to top quality genetic material - free - by taking 50 cells to the East Midlands apiary at Nottingham for grafting.  The cells can then be brought home for finishing.  Of course, the queens from these cells will be mated locally, so workers and queens produced by them may only be 50% pure, but drones will be 100% pure A.m.m.  This is designed to give a real kick-start to a breeding programme.  I have been preparing the necessary equipment over the past weeks and will be collecting grafts in a couple of weeks.  I also have Albert's permission to publish material from his lecture, so I will cover some of his main points next month, together with an update on my queen rearing.
Peter Edwards

BEWARE PARADICHLOROBENZENE (PDB)

Many beekeepers are still using PDB to control wax moths - despite the fact that we have known for some time that it can taint supers and honey and is known to be carcinogenic.  It was, therefore, unsurprising to find this article published in 'Kathimerini' (Greece's International English Language Newspaper) for 5 April 2005:

 "...fallout grew from the latest health scare that involves tainted honey. Development Ministry inspectors started overseeing the removal from shops of local honey brands found to contain high levels of parabichlorobenzene (sic)— a chemical used by beekeepers to kill off a kind of moth that attacks hives during storage. A total of 21 brands have been found to be over the limit. All tainted products are expected to have been recalled by tomorrow."

Of course, there is absolutely no need to use chemicals to control wax moth.  Extracted supers can be stored wet or, better, left over colonies until the first frosts when they can be stored safely.  Wax moths can also be deterred by storing supers in a staggered pile - they dislike light - and by storing outdoors where it is cold (but beware mice and rats!).
Peter Edwards

SUMMER WALK AND BARBEQUE

Denis Keyte has arranged another of his popular walks for 9 July, based on  Mike Osborne's house, where there is adequate parking space.  This is on the A46 about half way from the A3400 roundabout to Snitterfield on the left (look out for illegal honey-for-sale sign).  There will be a charge of £5 each for the food. Weather permitting the walk will take us over the Welcombe Hills, across the Golf course and back through Snitterfield Fruit Farm, a distance of about 3 miles.  Those not wanting to walk can sit in the garden or look at the bees.  Please let Mike or Moira know if you are coming so that we can make sure that there is enough food. 
Mike Osborne

MEMBERSHIP MATTERS

I am very pleased to be able, for the first time, to extend a very warm welcome to five new members: Mrs Deborah Williams from Armscote; Mr Colin James from Dorsington; Mrs Ginny Crow from Snitterfield; Mrs Cathy Kimberley from Blackhill and Mr Jonathan Leybourne from Kineton.  We wish you all full supers.
Peter Edwards

THAT CHINESE HONEY WILL NOT GO AWAY!

I see from the November 'Bee Culture' (Yes - November - I am on the circulation list for the Bee Farmers Association and it often takes several months for foreign magazines to get here!), that more of the chloramphenicol tainted Chinese honey was imported into the EU, despite all the bans.  Apparently a Chinese exporter 'self-certificated' the honey as being OK.  Words sometimes fail me!
Peter Edwards

WANTED

One of our members is looking for a settling/bottling tank of around 70lbs capacity, preferably in stainless steel.  If you have one spare, please let me know and I will pass on details.
Peter Edwards