This Livestream focuses on spring hive management, with an emphasis on making sure colonies have enough space for the queen to lay and enough room in the honey super to prevent the brood box from becoming honey-bound and triggering swarming. Cedar demonstrates harvesting honey from a Flow Frame, inspecting a recently captured swarm, checking that naturally drawn comb is being built correctly, and looking for eggs and brood as evidence of a laying queen. The session also discusses queenless colonies and failed splits, explaining that a split without a queen may need to be merged back with the original colony until a new queen is available, or given a frame containing eggs so the bees can raise a queen themselves.
The second half covers managing colonies with low bee numbers, using the Super Lifter to safely separate and lift heavy hive boxes, and monitoring colonies that have swarmed or recently been split. It highlights the importance of ensuring a laying queen is present, managing hive beetles, and reducing the hive size when a colony is too small to adequately patrol the available space. The discussion also covers Varroa management, including cutting out drone brood as a mechanical control method, safe hive-inspection practices such as using smoke and protective equipment, and the general level of maintenance required for beekeeping. In areas affected by Varroa, Cedar recommends regular inspections- potentially a couple of times a month- to monitor Varroa, hive beetles, colony strength and queen status.