It's propolis! The bees laid it down last year, as a caulking agent round
the wooden block, which was further over at the time. The "tail" is
straight because it follows the end edge of where the block was, then.
Oo, I'm a bit smug at being able to answer that.
On Mon, 25 Feb 2019, 20:36 Liz Greenhalgh, <liz.greenhalgh@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Hi,
there is a flat outline of a mouse shape with tail partly under the grill,
but as you say the grill should have kept them out. Perhaps it's a shadow.
Liz
On Mon, 25 Feb 2019 at 19:05, Oxnatbees <oxnatbees@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I don't see it, can you describe where in the picture you see it?
The metal mouse guards should keep 'em out of the hives. There's a wooden
block in front of that, which I put there in Autumn to reduce the entrance
gap, because it's a small colony and I wanted them to be able to defend the
entrance more easily if the larger colonies trued robbing it.
On Mon, 25 Feb 2019, 18:45 Liz Greenhalgh, <liz.greenhalgh@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Hi Paul,
Is that a dead mouse in picture 1?
Liz
On Thu, 21 Feb 2019 at 13:32, Oxnatbees <oxnatbees@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
All my hives are very active today and 3/4 are gathering plentiful
pollen. The colour looks like crocus or willow pollen. As I said before -
there is often a lag between city bees like Will's Oxford ones and the
rural ones like mine. I stated it was up to 2 weeks; Will first posted
about the Oxford ones gathering pollen 8 days ago, so maybe it's more like
a week.
People often worry about whether their hives are "OK". I attach two
photos to illustrate how much hives can differ - the entrance of hive 3 is
jammed with activity while hive 1's has much sparser traffic. The photos
were taken a few seconds apart. In this case, hive 3 is a strong,
established hive with 2 boxes of comb and loads of stores and bees. Whereas
hive 1 is a colony that was only founded last year, and whilst it may have
been a prime swarm, its founding was followed by a nectar dearth so its
growth stalled. It only managed to get half a box of comb made before
winter. But it seems happy enough, and purposeful, so I think it is
queen-right. If it gets through to Spring it will probably build up to
normal size over the year. The point is, don't worry if your hive is
dramatically different to a neighbour's. What's more significant is sudden
changes in behaviour.
Paul
On Wed, 13 Feb 2019 at 16:55, Karl Pattison <
dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I’ve been helping the undertakers clear out their dead, using a thin
stick at the entrances. All three hives have been very active over the
last
few weeks.
Bee Happy,
Karl
Sent from my iPhone
On 13 Feb 2019, at 16:24, Dawn Gosling <magikmum49@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
My hive is on its way and I had loads of bees on my carpet of crocuses
so that's a good omen
On Wed, 13 Feb 2019, 14:20 Will H <whanrott@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
The bees in the perpetual hive in Headington Hill Hall park were
flying at 1pm today -- 13th February.
There were flights every 3-5 seconds and I saw one bee land near me
which had dark red pollen baskets. I couldn't check that she was carrying
pollen but it seems the most likely. There were red Hellebores nearby
which
I think were probably the source of the pollen
The flowers in bloom nearby were:
- Hellebore (half a dozen or so within 20m of the hive. Some were
red)
- Snowdrop
- Crocus (several hundred in flower within 150m of the hive)
- Mahonia (very few flowers)
- Lawn Daisy (very few flowers)
Pollen is usually a sign that there is brood in the hive. I can't
think of any other reason for collecting.
Will
