Langstroth Brood Box and National NUC - Progress

Well my girls are making great progress. I have BIAS (Brood in all Stages)

I have Queens, Brood, Larvae, Honey, Nectar, Pollen. All Hive Bright and Queen Right

:bee: :bee: :bee: :bee: :bee: :bee: :bee:

I love being a NewBeek!!

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Thanks for the video Valli, we are newbies, and we found it very interesting, and we did see the sapphire queen :slight_smile:
Cheers Tim.

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@DextersShed Stephen Iā€™m a NewBee any help and suggestions are welcome - and hopefully my rooky mistakes will help other NewBees

Yes I have had the a few comments about the frames - I should have put the first strip out, Iā€™m pleased to see your starter strip Idea is working wonderfully - yes I do listen!! Thanks for your help - the UK group are really good as well.

My bees came from someone who doesnā€™t smoke much so I was trying to be similar - they were pretty good really.

I did look on the underside of the feeder - it may have been out of camera view - we had this mentioned at the club meetings - but Iā€™m getting the hang of it all - I keep saying pulled out when I mean drawn out, and grubs instead of Larvae - I must use proper terminology itā€™s good practice and better for the newBees

Thanks again Stephen - all feedback welcome :bee:

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Thanks for a fantastic video. I could hear those busy bees buzzing inside my headphones! Weird but exciting all the same. I notice you say ā€œnucā€ as in ā€œluckā€ while USAns say ā€œnucā€ as in ā€œflukeā€. Is this a British pronunciation? I want to do some YouTube videos myself when I get my bees so I need a handle on how to pronounce the lingo. Two of my kids live in England so I plan to bias my Orstralian bee lingo towards British English.

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No it is NUC as in Luke but I prefer NUC Luck!!! But then Iā€™m just weird.

At a bee Meeting I called the Snelgrove board a Sneggle Board - he thought it was funny but liked it so Sneggle has stuck for me.

I will try to use correct terminology - I still say Bite not Sting and my OH even tells me off LOL :bee:

BTW - Iā€™m an Ozzie but I like to wind up the local Poms and say things my way - I like to be individual

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Iā€™ve Changed the Video as Youtube was supposed to still it a little and made it horrible

Love your Ozzie sayingsā€¦donā€™t ever change. Your excitement is infective!
Savour your inspections and take it slow. When you have a big colony to inspectā€¦if you start at the bottom firstā€¦they wonā€™t get annoyed with you so quicklyā€¦and by the time they doā€¦the hive is being put back together again. That is why I like the Long Hiveā€¦the brood doesnā€™t get split. I donā€™t use much smokeā€¦but then I am able to pick and choose when I inspect. Avoiding stormy days and unsettled weather.

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As Always HHH - I thank you! :wink: :smiley: :bee:

Iā€™ve added the super to Emerald as there is so much nectar. Iā€™m hoping they will transfer some of the honey up into the super and leave the Brood box to Queenie.

I did see Sapphire but my camera was full and shut down

Still at it

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@DextersShed sort of why I donā€™t like the idea of smoking. It has been suggested I nadir but all I have left are the supers - I think I need another Brood box

Look up ā€˜nadirā€™ā€¦Valli ā€¦it is when you put the honey super under the brood box for the winter. The bees then take up the honey and store it around the brood nest. ATM they are storing what they forage around the brood. To expand the brood nest sidewaysā€¦you need to move the outer empty frames next to the brood nestā€¦or they will just fill them with honey before the queen can lay in themā€¦she gets blocked if there is a frame of honey stores in the way as she rarely crosses honey stores.

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Yes I did thanks HHH Your Brill! :smiley: :bee: :bee: :bee: :bee: :bee: :bee: :bee: :bee:

I agree Dexterā€¦I only went double brood in the springā€¦on 2 hives. They have filled both boxes. Now I hope we get enough of a flow to fill some honey boxes! The rest are all smaller colonies and are building brood nests. I hope they can forage enough for the winter. Nectar flows are poor compared to the bumper crop last year.

Hi Dexter , Thanks for the advise on removing frames. We are always gentle and slow at removing and re inserting each frame as we worry about swishing the queen. SO the advise to pull out the outer frame(after inspecting) ,and then having the room to slide each frame out and back with less chance of swishing the queen accidentally. Cheers from QLd AU

Last yearā€¦my 2 hives were on brood and a halfā€¦so I nadired the half brood and removed it in the springā€¦one colony was national the other was 14x12. Nearly killed my husband lifting the jumbo box! Both hives had plenty of stores left in the springā€¦in fact I had to remove some to make room for the queen to lay.
This year I will have 2 national hives on double brood going into winter. I will be rehiving the biggest one into a long hiveā€¦so will be able to check the number of frames with brood and with stores. Last year by the end of the winter this colony was down to about 5 frames. It will also give me a chance to take out the national frames and give them 14x12ā€™s instead. The other colony will stay in the national boxes. I have read that some people leave them in the double brood boxes as the extra space below protects them from the air exchange with the OMF. Then in the spring they swop the boxes overā€¦once the queen is going strongly to form part of early premptive swarm controlā€¦I am going to give this a try.
So far this season I havenā€™t lost any beesā€¦so next year I will have to watch and try as many early swarm controls as I can. I want to try to make honey next year ā€¦if the weather plays nicely! I hopefully will be starting the spring with about 9 coloniesā€¦3 mature colonies and the rest will be previous years nucs. We will seeā€¦have to get them through the winter yet. I am increasing insulation as much as possibleā€¦following the articles I have read about bees in treesā€¦the colonies have very thick wood all around themā€¦no OMFā€¦and they propolised up the single entrance as much as possibleā€¦so no drafts. We are going to monitor one of the long hives and one of the Nationals for temperature throughout the winter as a comparison study. As the colony will move it wonā€™t be possible to keep the sensor above themā€¦but a general temperature can be monitored. After making them as insulated as is reasonable.

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Youā€™l have to write up your findings and use the paper towards any modules you do.

Have you started the Modules?

I have put my name down for January which is our next course