peak-hives.co.uk » Apiary

Beautiful Apiary!

admin — Wed, 23 Feb 2011 20:24:44 +0000

A much valued Peak Hives customer has sent me this stunning photo. It’s two Peak Hives Nationals painted up in white and set in his beautiful garden. I think the white works really well here and paint is also the best protection for any outside woodwork including hives.

Beautiful Apiary

Aesthetically it very much puts my apiary to shame…but you know what they say… ‘cobbler’s children…’

Flat Pack 14×12 Apiary

admin — Mon, 17 Jan 2011 19:56:48 +0000

Quite a big order this one. It’s essentially an Apiary in a box. There’s 2 Flat Pack Cedar 14 x 12 National Hives with Open Mesh Floors and Framed Queen Excluders with 3 National Supers a piece, Standard 4″ National Roof, Crown Boards and National Hive Stands with Landing Boards.

Also on the right is a 14 x 12 Nucleus Hive in Cedar with Varroa Floor.

At the back you can just make out a couple of Ashforth Feeders too. One for the full sized Hives and one for the Nucleus Hive.

Flat Pack 14x12 Apiary

I think I’ll advise the customer to buy a BIG pot of glue!!!

Christmas 2010

admin — Mon, 17 Jan 2011 19:53:26 +0000

Christmas comes but once a year and one of our clients has given permission to show this picture of a beautifully wrapped Peak Hives National Hive given as a present. We were very worried that they might not get it in time for Christmas but as you can see it arrived in time for some luxury wrapping…

Christmas Hive

There were a few customers for hives as presents and thankfully we managed to get them all out in time for giving on the big day.

Happy beekeeping!

Tideswell Dale Honey

admin — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 16:19:32 +0000

Now we have a printer that’s working I’ve finally printed up some labels for our Tideswell Dale Honey. It’s a simple affair and doesn’t precisely conform to the honey labelling regulations etc but we’re only going to sell around 60 of these jars locally.

Tideswell Dale Honey

An inspector calls…

admin — Sun, 23 May 2010 07:35:57 +0000

Regional FERA Bee Inspector Tim Roper called round under the FERA free inspection offer (you need to register with Beebase in order to qualify for a free inspection and it’s definitely worth it. My opinion is that it in these times registration should be obligatory. Anyway, after looking at Peak Hives 2 colonies he pronounced them in good health. There was some evidence of chalk brood but not enough to cause too much concern.

The bees are now filling up the new super with drawn comb and there’s the ‘old socks’ smell of Dandelion honey. Tim says it’s quite nice to eat though.

Fera Inspecting Peak Hives Apiary

Monitoring Varroa

admin — Sun, 16 May 2010 20:10:45 +0000

We’ve now got two strong looking colonies of British Black Bee (Apis Mellifera Mellifera) in the Peak Hives Apiary. On inspection the other day with our experienced beekeeping friend Carl we popped off a cap from a drone cell and there looking up at us was a fat and annoyingly healthy Varroa Destructor mite. Today I decided to start a monitoring process using the slide out trays on our Varroa floors which will be in the hives for the next seven days. When they are removed the mite drop will be counted and action taken if the mite drop is above certain suggested levels (see the Beebase page on Varroa and the very useful Varroa Calculator).

I read somewhere about putting oil onto the paper laid on the slide out trays to make sure the little buggers can’t get away or don’t blow away and in the photo you can see the two trays that went into the hives today at 4pm. On the right is just plain white paper and on the left the paper has been liberally coated with sunflower oil. I did wonder if the smell from the oil might cause fright to the bees. Perhaps someone with better knowledge could comment on that. Anyway in they went and now to wait for the results.

Varroa Mite Monitoring