Log inThe Telford Mann Beekeeping Journey So Far By Charlie Hancock
We started our beekeeping journey here at Telford Mann in July 2019 and having recently harvested our first honey crop, it feels like a good time to reflect on the challenges and triumphs of the last year.
After attending a two-day intensive course with my colleague, Kieron Brace, we set about building an apiary in the grounds of our office to house our beehives. We found a reputable supplier for two ‘nucs’ (small colonies created from an established hive, housed in a small box), purchased all the essential equipment, and built our hives. On the 17th July we collected our nucs and the following morning we transferred the bees into their new homes.
The first month saw our bees flourish and the population in both colonies quickly expanded. In her prime, a queen bee can lay up to 2,000 eggs a day and so it didn’t take long before both of our hives were well established, with plenty of foraging taking place.
We carried out weekly inspections to monitor the health of our bees, check they had adequate room and food stores and to try and control their desire to swarm. When a colony feels they have outgrown their hive, the queen, along with several thousand bees, will swarm to a new location. At this point, the bees will have already done the work to develop a larva into a new queen and she will usually be ready to emerge from her ‘queen cell’ when the swarm takes place.
Everything ran smoothly until late August/early September, when the hives started to struggle with unwanted interest from local wasps. Once a ‘scout’ wasp has located a beehive, it will notify its nest, resulting in dozens of wasps attempting to gain access to the hive in search of honey. Given that a wasp is able to sting without subsequently dying, whereas a bee is not, it usually requires several bees to defend against one wasp. After monitoring the situation for a week or so, we ordered some wasp traps and, thankfully, these helped to reduce the local wasp population. Unfortunately, our bees did not emerge unscathed – the population had noticeably shrunk, and their honey stores had declined.
We started to feed our bees in the early part of Autumn to try and ensure they had sufficient food stores to survive the winter. A simple sugar syrup mix is sufficient for the bees and they store the syrup for winter in the same way they would do honey.
In late February, as the temperature started to increase, the bees emerged from hibernation. We waited for a sunny afternoon where the wind was mild and opened up our hives. We were pleased to find that both colonies had survived. The population in both hives was perhaps smaller than it might’ve been without attacks from the wasps, but nevertheless our bees seemed well placed to thrive throughout the spring.
Without being able to thoroughly inspect the hives weekly during the national lockdown, both colonies swarmed in early June. We feared that one hive was left ‘queenless’, however, newly laid eggs which we have spotted over the past couple of weeks put our minds at ease.
Our first honey crop in early July was successful, with feedback being positive and money raised for the Alzheimer’s Society. We are hoping for another crop before the end of August, depending on how the bees get on in the coming weeks.
Overall, the last year has taught us some valuable lessons, not least the importance of regular hive inspections and adequate wasp control! However, our enthusiasm for beekeeping has not waned and one of my colleagues, Ryan Butler, has recently started to help with our weekly inspections. We hope to increase the number of hives next year and will hopefully continue to see our bees thrive.
