This month’s download is from 1920 and is called “The Natural History of the Bee”, written by John Anderson. As well as some lovely hand-drawn details of bee anatomy, there is another book tagged on from page 36 called “How to Handle Bees”, from the same author. You can download…

We are almost half way through our third round of NatBIP webinars. Thanks to Jo for opening the topic with two sessions which included a lot of good questions from the attendees at each event. Thanks also to Norman Carreck for his scientific perspective on the bees and, most recently,…

For myself and my local association, Wisborough Green BKA (WGBKA) in West Sussex, where I am Apiary Manager, I usually produce at least 100 queens per year. This is mainly to replace poorer queens in honey producing colonies, provide queens to head nucs for new beekeepers and for members who need queens for a variety of reasons. We try to encourage members to rear their own queens, but sometimes their bees need requeening with better stock. As many beekeepers only have a couple of colonies, they may not have bees that are good to propagate from. A BKA teaching apiary can be a genetic resource to distribute good local stock from.
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Welcome to the October Newsletter. I try to help new beekeepers on their beekeeping journey. I have somewhat ‘adopted’ a couple of first year beekeepers who bought Buckfast nucs this year and then contacted me for help. One had two colonies on commercial frames. Both colonies swarmed in June. The…