It was good to get back to a physical 2nd Monday meeting. Our AGM was of course our first physical meeting of 2022 but last night was the first of our monthly 2nd Monday meetings.
There was around 20 of us in the front dining room of The George in Brailes. For those who don’t remember our previous 2nd Monday ‘home’, the Cherrington Arms, closed suddenly last year when the landlord decided to return to France. The consensus seems to be that The George is a slightly better venue especially as it doesn’t have that screen separating the two halves of the room.
The theme was preparing for the season (yes, I know that strictly preparing for this year’s season should have started last August / September) based around the following topics:
- Early inspections (time, weather, how ‘deep’, reading OMF boards)
- Emergency feeding
- Stimulative feeding
- Common spring problems & how to deal with them (drone layers, dead outs, nosema)
- Comb change practicalities.
- Equalising colonies
Some of the points we discussed included
- When to do the first inspection – well possibly about now given the warm temperatures
- When to add the first super – by the end of March or where there are 8 seams of bees
- Time to remove insulation from the roof – not yet, the warmth helps the bees to draw comb. Leave it in place until April
We also had an interesting discussion about ‘equalising colonies’ i.e. if you have one strong and one weak colony. The recommendation was that this is best done in April (oops, did it to my 2 colonies the other day, should have paid more attention!).
We had the 100 Club draw and then some certificates were passed out by our Training Manager, DAvid Blower
Paul Baines, Module 7 (Queen Rearing)
Bill Budd, Basic Certificate
