Yes, I assume the piping is a new queen challenging rivals. The hive is
taking in pollen though, so I think the supersedure went smoothly.
I tended to get confused by differing accounts of what new queens do. I now
realise it differs, there is no one behaviour pattern. I think it is
something like this:
- Early in the year the colony may be strong enough to send out several
swarms, in which case the workers stop the young queens killing each other
until the swarms have left.
- If there are way too many queens (say, 12 instead of 3 or 4) the
workers let the queens duel to determine the fittest, or let early queens
kill late ones before they hatch. Sometimes both die in a duel but hey,
there are spares.
- If it is after swarm season, and the colony needs an emergency queen
(supersedure) then it is too risky to let her duel. They may only manage to
raise one or two emergency queens. Once one hatches they keep her away from
the others until she mates. The workers may let her kill her rivals in
their cells or do it for her (I'm a bit vague here).
- In swarm season, the old queen leaves with the prime swarm. So the new
queens only have each other as rivals. But in some strains of bee,
particularly in northern Britain, mother and daughter don't fight but tend
to get along fine in the same hive. Some beekeepers in the north regularly
find 2 generations of queens co-operating in one colony. It's thought this
is because the forage is sparse up north so the bees cannot afford to swarm
every year and instead, have adopted this system. This way if the old queen
dies they have a fertile backup.
Or something like that. I may be wrong on some details, please educate me
if I am, but my key point is there is no "One True Story About What Queens
Do".
Paul
On Sat, 25 Aug 2018 at 18:36, Ann Welch <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Could the queen piping be due to supersedure?
A
*From:* Paul Honigmann (Redacted sender "paul.honigmann" for DMARC)
*Sent:* Saturday, August 25, 2018 12:52 PM
*To:* oxnatbees@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
*Subject:* [oxnatbees] Re: Feral bees in Didcot
Thank you for all the work on this, Will.
I agree with your assessment.
I have some colonies which have low entrance traffic. It seems to vary a
lot over the day for colonies which have swarmed, whereas colonies which
never swarmed always seem to have loads of traffic. But the smaller ones
tend to be back to full strength the next year, so I don't worry about it
unless it's so low that I suspect queen failure.
Talking of which, I heard queen piping from one hive a couple of weeks
ago, which I thought was remarkably late in the year, but explains wh the
drones have not been kicked out yet (still queens around to mate with).
They're carrying in pollen now. Must have superseded successfully.
Paul
‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
On 25 August 2018 6:33 AM, Will H <whanrott@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Please find attached two photos of the tree which the bees are living in.
My view is that we won't be extracting the bees this year. I will write to
BBOWT in the hope that the bees can be left in the tree, or that we can
extract the colony once the tree has been reduced in size by tree surgeons.
The opening for the colony is on a central limb approximately 4.5m above
ground. It should be reasonably accessible with a ladder. I have marked on
the photo where the nest entrance is and where I think the cavity is. I was
unable to establish whether the cavity is above the opening (in blue) or
below (in green). I expect it to be below the opening because it appears
that several limbs have grown together, causing and inclosure (marked by a
vertical seam) which has then rotted away. I see no reason why the limb
circled in blue would rot.
The main problem is that all the limbs above the nest cavity are very
large. The limb on the left of the photos is particularly large, extending
at least 15m above ground. Opening the limb of the tree to extract the
colony might cause the the limb to weaken and collapse, particularly if the
cavity is within the green circled part of the tree.
In my view the crown needs to be reduced before it will be safe enough to
open the limb. The tree is only threatened because it is hazardous to
people who visit the Nature Reserve. It may be possible for the tree
surgeon to reduce the crown, make the tree safe and leave the bees in
place. If the tree must be completely removed then we might persuade them
to remove it in stages so that we could extract the colony after the crown
height is reduced.
There is one more relevant observation. There wasn't much activity at the
hive entrance -- perhaps 1 bee every 2-5 seconds. The colony was very
active during spring, and they assumed that it had swarmed and had not
rebuilt its size. They didn't know when the swarming event had happened. I
definitely saw pollen going in so I assume that the colony is viable. I
couldn't tell why it hadn't rebuilt its size. It may not have had time;
there may have been too little forage; or the colony might be diseased or
otherwise distressed.
I will let you know when I have more information from BBOWT.
Will
On 23/08/18 10:38, Will H wrote:
To my great surprise I've just heard back from the Education Officer at
BBOWT. The bees are in an unsafe tree in the Sutton Courtenay Education
Centre. The tree is scheduled to be felled during the winter.
I'm really impressed that the group tracked them down given the fragmented
information.
I'm going there this afternoon to see the site and to establish where in
the nest is in the tree. I'll take a camera and share the images later
today.
Will
On 10/08/18 11:18, Will H wrote:
http://www.bbowt.org.uk/sutton-courtenay-environmental-education-centre
https://goo.gl/maps/6W6FCqRvDqB2
I still don't know whether anyone from this group wants to do an
extraction, nor whether we could successfully do it before winter. That
notwithstanding, I phoned BBOWT and I'm hoping for a call back from one of
their team.
Will
On 10/08/18 10:51, Andrew Bax (Redacted sender andrew.bax for DMARC) wrote:
That’s probably it! There is a nature reserve in Sutton Courtenay, soon to
be replaced by two vast warehouses. Andrew
*From:* oxnatbees-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [
mailto:oxnatbees-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] *On Behalf Of *Michael King
*Sent:* 10 August 2018 10:40
*To:* oxnatbees@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
*Subject:* [oxnatbees] Re: Feral bees in Didcot
Progress - I think !
My wife, Kathryn, has done some research on the options, and based on what
we know, she is fairly convinced that the location for the feral bees is
*Sutton
Courtenay Environmental Education Centre*, run by the local Wildlife
Trust.
Hope that helps.
Have a great weekend,
Mick
On Fri, 10 Aug 2018, 09:24 Michael King, <kingmichael845@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I have quizzed my wife, who also overheard the conversation, to see
whether she can remember anything else that might help identify the site
She is certain the woman worked in the 'education centre' there, and said
the tree was going to be felled because they get lots of school parties
visiting.
So, one more piece in the jigsaw - we are looking for a country park with
an education centre!
Apologies again that this is all so opaque.
Happy bee hunting
Mick
On Fri, 10 Aug 2018, 09:01 Gareth John, <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
How about Mobray Fields in Didcot:
https://earthtrust.org.uk/visit-us/mowbrey-fields/ ;?
Gareth
On 10 Aug 2018, at 06:05, Will H <whanrott@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
this is rather a wild goose chase, but let us see whether the internet can
help. I found these possible country parks:
- Stonor is about 20 miles from Didcot towards Wycombe
https://www.stonor.com/discover/park-gardens/
- Basildon Park is about 12 miles from Didcot near Pangbourne
https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/basildon-park/features/parkland-at-basildon-park
- Greys court is about 17 miles from Didcot near Henley
https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/greys-court/activities
- Shotover is also nearby
I couldn't find any country parks *in* Didcot or any nearer than 10 miles
from it. Perhaps someone can do better.
Will
On 09/08/18 22:05, Michael King wrote:
Regrettably I don't have any more details.
She was definitely associated with the park, rather than just an
interested member of the public.
I don't know the area, but I assume that there can't be many options for
country parks around Didcot? So, I thought it might perhaps be worth a
couple of phone calls to the likely candidates if anyone is interested in
trying to extract the bees - with or without a piece of tree trunk!
Good luck,
Mick
On Thu, 9 Aug 2018, 19:35 Oxnatbees, <oxnatbees@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Well.. there are members of the group who still have no bees after swarm
season:
- Sam Acton (10 miles from Didcot)
- Liz Robinson (13 miles from Didcot)
- Sarah Pulvertaft (25 miles from Didcot)
- (Anyone else?)
Assuming someone wants them, we'd need to know more about the situation.
For example if they are 30 feet up, or behind a really thick wall of wood,
they may be too challenging to cut out. It's not clear whom to contact, do
you have other details of the woman / country park?
Paul
On 9 August 2018 at 17:14, Michael King <kingmichael845@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Hi,
I was helping out on the BBKA stand at Countryfile Live at Blenheim last
weekend, and overheard a conversation that might be of interest if anyone
is in the Didcot area.
In summary, a woman from a country park in Didcot was asking for advice
about a colony of wild/feral bees that are under threat at the site.
She said that the colony has been living in a hollow tree there for a long
time - I think over a decade. However, the tree is scheduled to be cut down
and she was keen to see what could be done to save the bees.
I don't think she got much joy in response to her query, so my guess is
the situation is still unresolved.
Sorry the details are a bit sketchy, I was trying to show someone how to
make a skep, so only overheard fragments of the dialogue!
Hopefully it will mean something if you know the area? And I thought I
would pass it on, in case anyone was interested in salvaging what sounds
like a hardy and we'll adapted feral colony.
Best regards
Mick King
