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
