Re-queening a defensive colony

In the summer of 2020, led by Louise, Peter, Denise, Fiona and I went to Swanmore to deal with the defensive colony we moved from West End. Several allotment holders and passers-by had reported being stung at distance and the colony was also highly defensive during inspections.

Having moved the hive to Swanmore, we decided to find and kill the queen allowing the colony to raise a new one. The genetic attributes passed on by the queen influence the whole colony’s characteristics including productivity, frugality with stores, resistance to disease, swarming behaviour and gentleness. it’s hoped that by removing the queen, the colony will raise a new one with a more favourable temperament.

Louise arrived at Swanmore well prepared. She was wearing two suits, three pairs of gloves and had even decided against her usual wellies which have holes in the back! I filmed (some of) our adventures on my mobile phone. We had planned to make the first of a series of ‘how to’ videos for the website.

Unfortunately, the resulting film, despite its obvious comedic value, is not as useful as a teaching aid as we’d originally hoped. I decided not to wear full protective clothing, or gloves, as I needed to work the camera.

“How likely is it” I thought “that I’ll get stung when all I’m doing is filming?” Big mistake! Part way through, I had to abandon the others in order to get properly attired which meant I missed several of the key moments. Also, I wasn’t working the camera properly which resulted in several inexplicable close-ups; sorry Louise!

To make sense of the video, I have added these notes.

Here is a summary of the honey labelling regulations. For more detailed information, go to the website of Hampshire County Council. https://www.hants.gov.uk/business/tradingstandards/businessadvice/food/foodlabelling/labellinghoney

• The word Honey is required

• The weight must be on the label. It is a legal requirement to display the metric weight in a font at least 4mm high. If you decide to show the Imperial weight as well, the metric weight must be more prominent and it goes without saying, you must ensure your jar contains at least the stated weight!

• You can specify the area where the honey is produced, for example, Hampshire

• You can specify the type of honey. For example, Blossom, Heather, Borage. You must be able to prove the honey is at least 75% of the named type

• If you are selling honey, you must have your name and address on the label. It does not need to be complete but you should be traceable from the information provided

• If you are selling honey through a third party, you must have a lot number and keep a record of who you supplied it to.

• You must have a best before date on the jar. We suggest five years from now

• You must have a country of origin on the jar. Adding the country to the end of your address is not acceptable

Detailed information can be found at https://www.food.gov.uk/search?keywords=honey&fax=

In addition to the above (and this is not a requirement), you may wish to consider a granulation statement. This could be added to a label on the back of the jar. Here’s an example:

This honey was produced in (insert) Hampshire by bees working on local, flowers, trees and crops. This pure honey may granulate (become solid) in cooler conditions. You don’t have to keep honey in the fridge. Granulation is in fact the best proof of a honey’s purity. Honey can be returned to its original state by loosing the lid and standing the jar in a bowl of hot water. To microwave in short bursts, remove the lid, select low power and stir regularly.

Your membership of Meridian gives you automatic membership of the Hampshire Beekeepers’ Association and the British Beekeepers’ Association. Our members are also protected by insurance provided by Bee Disease Insurance Limited.

• Membership of Meridian Beekeepers’ Association, includes regular Apiary meetings, Mentoring, Equipment loan, Knowledgebase, Introduction to beekeeping courses, social events and activities.

• Membership of Hampshire Beekeepers’ Association Hampshire Beekeepers’ administer the British Beekeepers’ Association’s education and examination programme for Hampshire and run events and seminars in our area. Hampshire Beekeepers’
  

• Membership of the British Beekeepers’ Association includes their excellent monthly magazine, national conventions and events. BBKA

• Bee Disease Insurance Limited provides public liability and insurance for the replacement of beekeeping equipment should it have to be destroyed due to an incidence of a notifiable disease, such as European or American Foul Brood. Q&A

To register for this course, please contact Louise Evans on 07434 952900. (text only) Email: louisewithbees@gmail.com or read on for more information and feedback from past participants.

Would thoroughly recommend the course. Fantastic balance of theory and practical application, hands-on work and supporting stories! So knowledgeable and just so informative. Thank you!

January 2023

You will be amazed at what you learn. An expert insight into keeping bees

January 2023

A good overview of beekeeping- informative, simple and enjoyable! Thank you Louise and Denise.

January 2023

My partner and I found the course absolutely fascinating. We learned new things every week and our excitement and enthusiasm for bee-keeping have grown exponentially. Highly recommend!

January 2023

First class in every way. Very good value.

January 2023

Great course! Really stimulating. I liked that Louise doesn’t talk down to you and her passion really shines through. Excellent!

January 2023

The practical session was magical, coming to the meadow in Swanmore.

June 2022 after the practical day

We honestly are delighted to have picked such a lovely caring group to be taught by. Thank you for enriching our lives so we can help with conservation.

June 2021 after the practical day

I really enjoyed the hive inspection, it was great, we saw all stages of the colony, even the queen! And also the eggs which seem to be quite hard to see, they’re soo titchy! The bees were very amenable with so many novices handling them!

June 2021 after the practical day

I had read many books and seen numerous videos but the course really brought home lots of things I had been mistaken about.

March 2021

Being complete novices, we found it all very interesting!

March 2021

The course introduces participants to;

• what bees need
• some key choices for beekeepers
• a beginner’s guide to beekeeping throughout the year
• honey bee pests and diseases and what to look for

• Date: Monday 4 September to 16 October (7 sessions) plus a practical session in Spring 2024
• Time: 7.15-9.15pm
• Cost: £110
• Venue: The Youth House, Moorgreen Recreation Ground, Moorgreen Road, West End, SO30 3EG
• Free parking. Lift from Botley Station negotiable.

If you have further questions or to register, please contact Louise Evans on 07434 952900 (text only) or email louisewithbees@gmail.com

Meridian will appoint a mentor to guide you through the early stages of your beekeeping. Your mentor(s) will help you hive your first bees when they are ready and guide you through the early days by attending your first inspections and helping you understand what’s going on in your hive.

Your mentor (or somebody else from Meridian or another local beekeeper) will raise your first colony of bees. When those bees are ready, your mentor will;

• help you ‘hive’ your first bees  
• attend your first hive inspection(s) to help you understand your colony’s progress and what’s happening in the hive. Your mentor will ensure you know how to recognise a healthy colony and what to look out for.
• be available at the end of the telephone to answer the questions that will certainly arise during your first season!
• visit you at your apiary if it’s not possible to answer your questions during a telephone call.
• from time to time, help you with hive manipulations as you encounter them for the first time; for example, a colony split or artificial swarm, collecting or hiving a swarm or queen introduction.
• help you or provide advice if something in your colony doesn’t look right or is out of the ordinary.

Additionally, before your first bees arrive, your mentor or somebody else from Meridian will have helped you;    

• select a suitable site for your apiary and advised you on safety and other considerations; for example; access and avoiding inconvenience to your neighbours.
• guided you through the selection of your equipment and helped you choose what best suits your individual requirements

Your mentor will not;

• look after your bees for you! A mentor is exactly that, a more experienced beekeeper who voluntarily gives-up his or her time to advise and guide you. It may be that a your mentor or another beekeeper is willing to help manage your apiary on a more permanent basis and we do have a buddying programme in place. Buddy

• provide holiday cover. It may be that a member of the association is willing to help you look after your bees when you go on holiday but please don’t take that for granted.  

Robin on mentoring.

Existing members

On 22 January, we sent you an email containing a link via the British Beekeepers’ Association’s online system. To renew your membership in 2022, click on the link and check your details are up-to date. Then, select the number of hives you plan to run in 2022 and the membership category you require and your subscription will be automatically calculated.

If you did not receive the email, check your junk folder first then contact howard.towl@meridianbeekeepers.com.

The renewal link must be used for existing members. Please do not send your subscription without completing the online form as this may result in a delay to your membership. Any applications made after we have completed our return will result in a delay to your insurance cover and to the receipt of BBKA news.

Once you have submitted the online form, you can send your payment electronically to Meridian’s bank account as usual.

Meridian Beekeepers, Lloyds Bank, Bishops Waltham, 30-90-85, 00962116. Please use your surname as a reference.

New members and those wishing to rejoin

If your membership lapsed in 2021 but you would like to rejoin in 2022, please complete the application form: Membership application form 2022. This form can also be used for new membership applications.

Membership fees for 2022 have been increased by £1.00 and as as follows:

• Full membership £39.00
• School membership £39.00
• Partner membership £18.00
• Associate membership £17.00
• Junior Membership £17.00

If you are considering joining Meridian for the first time or would like more information on what’s included in each membership category, please click here for a full explanation. Classes of membership and fees

Changes to British Beekeepers’ Association and Hampshire Beekeepers’ Association subscriptions

The BBKA has increased its 2022 subscription for full members from £19.00 to £21.00 and Hampshire Beekeepers’ Association (HBKA) is restoring its annual fee to £5.00 from £2.00 last year. As Meridian did not reduce your subscription in response to HBKA’s previous reductions, we have been able to absorb most of the £5.00 increase in subscription costs to HBKA and BBKA. However, in order to maintain Meridian funds for apiary and events costs and to support developments such as the proposed queen rearing programme, your committee decided on 16 September 2021 to increase subscription fees by £1.00 in 2022. This is the first increase in membership fees for many years and we hope you will understand the need for this change. For further details about each category of membership, please click here.

If you have any questions at all about membership, please don’t hesitate to contact howard.towl@meridianbeekeepers.com

So you’re thinking about keeping bees? Well, we want to help you understand exactly what you’re getting yourself in to!

We’re also keen to ensure that your beekeeping is sustainable because for us, it’s all about the welfare of the bees! This page is to give you an idea of what time commitment would be required in your first year. It is of course, only an estimate; as the skill of the beekeeper increases, less time is needed to complete the tasks. Please note, the time estimates in 2 to 7 below are for one hive and you can roughly multiply the estimate for each additional hive.

Estimated time commitment per hive annually

• basic training, 20 hours, usually autumn or winter (a one-off time commitment)
• setting-up, 1 hour, spring
• hiving your bees, 1 hour, spring
• inspecting your bees, each inspection is typically 25 minutes; 8 hours, spring through summer
• building, maintaining and cleaning equipment, 6 hours, usually winter
• continuous beekeeping knowledge development, 20 hours, mostly during winter
• extraordinary activity, 10 hours, any time!
• total time commitment, per hive, per annum, approximately 66 hours

1. Basic beekeeping training

It’s highly recommended that you attend a basic beekeeping instruction course run by your local beekeepers’ association Introduction to beekeeping. This one-off time commitment is usually an evening class, typically two hours per week running for 6-8 weeks. There is usually a practical session a few weeks later on, typically a weekend afternoon.

Once a new beekeeper has started, it is good practise to keep up-to-date with what’s going-on in the beekeeping world and to make time to improve your knowledge and learn new techniques. There is also an extensive range of beekeeping qualifications which can be pursued by more experienced beekeepers. Most beekeepers attend winter evening talks organised by their local branch and read the BBKA news. There are plenty of text books, websites and tutorials on Youtube but beware, some are of dubious quality!

There are also conferences and seminars for the more enthusiastic. Generally, those involved in beekeeping find it is such an engrossing topic that learning is not a chore but part of the pleasure! However, for the purposes of this page it is estimated that a new beekeeper will commit 18-20 hours per annum to continuously maintain and improve their knowledge.

• Getting your equipment ready A pre-assembled hive will take approximately 1 hour to set-up. It is less expensive to purchase a self-assembly hive and for a novice, it will take approximately 4 hours to build it. A person experienced in woodwork will be able to complete the task quicker.    

• Bees arrive When they are ready, your local beekeepers’ association (or another local supplier) will deliver your bees. Hiving your first bees is an unforgettable milestone and is usually very exciting and enjoyable. It will take less than 1 hour for your bees to be hived.

• Hive inspections Each hive you have will need inspecting at regular intervals and how often a beekeeper opens a hive varies at different times of the year. Each time a hive is opened, it sets-back the bees by at least 2-3 days and best practice states that beekeepers should complete their inspections within 20-25 minutes per hive. You should always have a good reason for opening your hive and this page is not designed to cover how or why hive inspections are completed but simply to provide a guide on the time needed for beekeeping. In mid-Spring through to the end of the swarm season your hive will need inspecting a maximum of once every week for 25 minutes. Later in the season, this will reduce to one inspection per hive every two weeks until the bees cease flying in the autumn. The average time commitment for hive inspections (per hive) is therefore approximately 1 hour per month.

• Extraordinary activity Beekeeping is full of surprises and that’s what makes it so enjoyable. The novice beekeeper doesn’t have to worry too much about ‘extraordinary activity’ because in the early days there will be plenty of help and assistance available from your local beekeepers’ association. There’s also the BBKA, the National Bee Unit and the Bee Inspector; all there to play their part in supporting your beekeeping venture.  However, here is a non-exhaustive list of possible other events which may affect your beekeeping in your first year; Feeding syrup to your colony (4 hours), Collecting a swarm (3 hours), re-queening your colony (1 hour), supering-up for honey, unlikely in year one (1 hour), preparing for winter (1 hour)

• The role of your Mentor Meridian will appoint a mentor to guide you through the early stages of your beekeeping. Your mentor(s) will help you hive your first bees when they are ready and guide you through the early days by attending your first inspections and helping you understand what’s going on in your hive. Your mentor (or somebody else from your association or another local beekeeper) will raise your first colony of bees. To find out more about mentors, please click here Mentoring

If you’ve decided that beekeeping may be for you and you’d like to enrol on our beginners course, please click her for further information Introduction to beekeeping

If it all sounds a bit daunting now, good; you’ve probably got the right attitude! We know that when you get your bees, you will probably thoroughly enjoy them and the many related activities; uncapping and spinning honey, candle and soap making and of course tasting your very own honey!

Enjoy your bees!