Started feeding the bees and lesson learnt.

Fondant block placed into the hive

So over the weekend I removed all the supers and the queen excluders. I have applied the next dose of the varroa treatment and place a 12.5 Kg block of fondant on each hive. I have enough to apply two does on each hive and if  I need more then I will start feeding syrup.

Fondant block in less than a minute

I was down at the orchard on Saturday and checked on the bees I can see capped brood and eggs in all the hives. The weather has been generally warm but the mornings and nights are getting colder. The last dose of varroa treatment will be applied this coming weekend.

When I put the fondant into the hives, which was a straight forward task i noted that within minutes I could see that the bees had started clustering around it and had immediately started to consume it, and bring it down..

The suppers that I removed did have some honey in them but not large amounts so its probably the right time to start feeding the bees. So I took the supers home and the plan was to place them in the garage.This is when I learnt a lesson. I place the empty equipment next to the garage door and opened the garage door and I was distracted by friends coming to visit. I didn't return to the garage for about 45 minutes. When I got to the garage what should I find to my horror, all the suppers were covered in thousands of bees, some had even gone into the garage where I keep my spare suppers, and extra hive and my nuc box and the fondant, it was like a large swarm had descended onto the equipment.

My smoker, which many bees found interesting

I closed the door to the garage, which meant inside the garage its reasonable dark and we have a side door which lets in light. The bees had gathered around the window and when I open the door the majority went out. I did the same again about minutes later and all the remaining bees came out.

I started then to deal with the suppers I had to literally remove each frame from the supers one at time brush off the bees and then take the frame away. Then the actual super itself. It took a while but was a learning experience. The bees, I'm not sure who's bees they could have been were very docile and a pleasure to handle. When I managed to remove the suppers I fund that the small quantities of honey that were still in the frames had all been removed and the supers were completely dry. The bees had even uncapped and removed some of the crystallised honey that was remaining in a couple of the frames.

The bees remained for am hour or so or more, I didn't received a single sting in fact, I sow the bees fighting each other for the honey and found a number of dead bees on the floor. The bees were even trying to remove any extra wax that they found lying on the floor from capping etc.

I learnt a lesson this week, don't leave equipment out and about, after use, it far to dangerous. Its a good thing my neighbours didn't the masses of bees that had gathered on the suppers, they may have truly had a shock.

I didn't managed to get around all the trees this weekend. I was hoping to but its was a busy weekend.