Hi Will
I will say a few words on robbing.
Robbing varies in intensity and character from out and out carnage through to
so-called silent robbing. There is a continuum between the two. At the lowest
level, silent robbing consists of one hive quietly and non-agressively pinching
the resources of another. The robbed hive will tolerate the robbing, largely
because it doesn’t notice it. When it does, things can get ugly, perhaps only
for a while before things settle again. This may be what you are seeing.
However, other things cause bees to be at the entrance, such as orientation
flights with bees flying up and down, back and forth facing the hive. Robbing
bees will either fly straight in (like returning foragers) if the robbing is
silent or will dart about trying to spot a gap in the defences if there is
resistance. This latter flying is characteristic; the robbers will fly toward
the entrance and then back off, change angle and dart in again.
Also, robbing bees will tend to be flying when you do not expect bees to be on
the wing, such as very early or very late in the day. This is a warning sign
(to you). Dust some of the bees (if you can) with icing sugar. Returning
foragers will go into the hive and rest a while. They will be licked clean by
other bees. Whereas robbers will be quick in and out and will emerge white
shortly after being dusted. You might even be able to track them as they leave.
Entrance holes should be the diameter of a pencil (no more) if you have robbing
going on, although once started it is very difficult to stop.
Gareth
On 7 Sep 2020, at 14:07, WHP Spray <whpspray@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Hello all,
I was wondering if I could ask a couple of things; apologies if they’re
rather basic.
Robbing - How does one actually determine if robbing is going on? This
morning I saw frenzied activity outside my hive, which seemed strange to me
as it’s not especially warm and forage is not too abundant. It didn’t really
seem to me as if there was fighting or some bees were trying to prevent
others from getting in. I noticed that some bees were more yellow than my
predominantly black bees and so perhaps a different breed, but I’ve noticed
this before when they were calm, and was mindful of someone’s post earlier
which observed that bees join other hives more frequently than is often
realised. I was thinking that robbery issues might explain the rage with
which the bees greeted my attempt to open the hive a couple of weeks ago. The
hive entrance is already down to about 2-3 inches, plus a few of those
bee-space notches that entrance blocks sometimes have.
Feeding - What is the natural beekeeper’s approach to feeding, and how can I
judge whether to feed or not (and how much)? All of the info that I’ve
managed to find seems frustratingly vague on how much honey a colony needs to
get through winter - I expect because there is a lot of variability. Mine are
in their first year and only seem to have about half a standard super (I’m
not sure how much they have in the brood box). Is that enough or should I
supplement it?
Many thanks!
Will
