Trouble shooting
If you are having a problem with your bees that you can’t identify,
have a read through this list.
My bees are standing at the entrance of the hive swaying. Are
they ill?
No, they are simply cleaning the entrance of the hive.
Lots of my bees are visiting my neighbour’s pond and bath bird.
This is causing a nuisance. How can I stop this happening?
Your
bees will need water for their cooling their hive and diluting honey. Your
neighbour’s pond is probably the closest water source that they have
found. If you provide a closer water source, it is likely that they will visit
this instead. You can read about how to create a water source in the
Beekeeping Section under Water on Page 20.
There is a lot of activity in the hive, with bees flying in and out of
the hive very quickly. The bees appear to be fighting one another
and some are falling on the ground. What is going on?
It is most likely that your bees are being attacked by another colony of
bees or wasps. They are trying to steal the honey from the hive. You
should take action to stop this immediately to avoid lots of bees getting
killed. You should place the wasp guard in immediately (don’t forget to
wear your veil and gloves).
My bees were really nice and friendly, but have now become
aggressive and unpleasant. What should I do to make them
nice again?
There are several reasons that a colony can become more
aggressive.
1. Have you been smoking the colony properly? If you are not using
a smoker properly,the bees will be much harder to manage. The most
common mistake is not smoking the bees 3 minutes before opening the
hive or simply not smoking the bees enough. Read Page 25 for more
details.
2. Has the colony grown a lot? If you started out with a nucleus colony or
swarm, the number of bees that you have in the hive might have increased
over the time that you have kept bees.
3. Have you washed your beesuit or gloves lately? If your veil and gloves
have been stung on previous inspections, they can be covered with old
stings and alarm pheromone, which causes the bees to become defensive.
It is a good idea to regularly wash your veil and gloves to stop the build up
of these. It is also good to keep your veil clean for hygiene reasons.
4. Has your queen changed? If your queen has changed, the temperament
of the hive can change too. This can happen because the old queen has
died, been superseded or the old bee might have swarmed. You might
not be able to tell unless you have a marked queen. If you have tried all
the other options above and you still have aggressive bees, it might be
worth considering re-queening your colony. This is covered on Page 41.
There are a lot of bees hanging on the front of the hive.
If what looks like a beard of bees has formed on the outside of your
Beehaus and it’s a hot day it could just be the nest has got too hot and the
bees are trying to cool it. This normally only happens if they don’t have
enough space so check, and add more brood or super frames as necessary.
If the same thing happens in the evening, it means there is not enough
space for the foraging bees in the hive. You should add more frames.
I can’t find the queen.
If you can’t find the queen, check for eggs. This will tell you if a queen has
been in the hive within the last 3 days. If you find eggs, note the frames
you saw eggs on and check again in the next couple of days, if you find
more eggs you know the queen is there.
If you don’t find any eggs it could be that the queen has stopped laying
or that she has been lost or accidentally killed. To find the queen you can
secure the queen excluder over the entrance to the hive and then shake
all the bees off the frames onto the lid of the Beehaus. The bees will all
walk up the lid (which you have leaned up against the entrance) into the
Beehaus. If she’s there the queen will not be able to get back in through
the excluder giving you an opportunity to catch her and mark her.
My bees are queenless
If your queen has been lost or accidentally killed and your colony has eggs
they will re-queen themselves and, once you have selected just one queen
cell and removed the rest, the best thing is to leave them undisturbed 2-4
weeks.
British Beekeepers’ Association
If you are thinking of starting to keep bees, we highly recommend that
you join your local Beekeeping Association. The BBKA is a charity made
up of over 63 local associations and has over 15,000 members. They
are very helpful in getting new beekeepers started. What do you get
for joining?
Lectures and Bee Books
Most associations have a wide range of lectures covering all manner of
beekeeping topics. They run throughout the year and cover interesting
topics such a hive management and disease control. Most associations
also have a really good book library, which you can use free of charge.
Insurance
You will get public liability insurance for all beekeeping activities and
also disease insurance. Disease insurance covers you in the unlikely
event that your bees catch American Foulbrood (a rare disease). In
this unfortunate situation your hive would have to be destroyed by
a Bee Inspector and the insurance should cover the cost of a new hive
for you.
Friendly Advice
Last, but not least, the beekeeping associations are full of like
minded friendly people. You can get advice about your hives, find
someone with bees to spare and make friends. To find out more visit
www.britishbee.org.uk.
If your bees don’t have any eggs, you can take a frame of brood from
another colony and put it in the hive so they can raise a queen. If you
don’t have another colony, you will need to buy a new queen, which you
can do throughout the season. She will arrive in the post and can be
placed into the hive.
My bees are not using the supers. Is this a problem?
It could be that you have put the supers on a bit early, in which case don’t
worry, just leave them on. You could try taking the queen excluders off
until the bees have started drawing out the wax foundation. Once they
have done this, put the queen excluders back on.
I forgot to put the queen excluders on and there is brood in the
supers. What should I do?
It’s not a problem, just make sure the queen isn’t in the supers (if she is
carefully move her down into the brood nest) and then put the queen
excluders on. Within 4 weeks all the brood will have hatched and the
bees will use the cells for honey. This is still perfectly hygienic and good
to eat.
I am spending too much time with my bees and neglecting my
husband/wife/children/job. Should I see a doctor?
This is normal, bees are highly addictive. The best thing is buy beesuits for
the rest of your family and boss and encourage them to join in.
Clouds of bees are taking off from the hive. Should I worry?
This could be one of two things:
1. When a new queen goes on a mating flight she is accompanied by an
entourage from the hive who protect the queen from being eaten by a
bird and from getting lost.
2. Your bees are swarming. Refer to Page 45 on how to catch a swarm and
try to keep the swarm in sight. Once caught, you can either transfer them
to a free end of your beehaus or call your local Beekeeping Association
who will put you in touch with someone that would like to collect the
swarm from you.
A lot of bees are crawling around outside the hive and there are
quite a lot of dead bees.
Are the bees mostly drones? At the end of the season the workers ruthlessly
throw out any drones in the hive and you can see these bumbling around
outside the hive where they often die overnight.
There are a lot of drones in the hive. Is this a problem?
It could be that you have a drone laying queen – caused by a queen that
hasn’t mated properly. If you haven’t seen the queen for a while, it could
also be she was lost and the bees couldn’t raise a new queen. In this
situation occasionally a worker will start to lay but, because they haven’t
been mated, they will only produce drones. Either way, you will need
to re-queen the colony by buying a queen and introducing her into the
colony. Alternatively you could combine the colony with another or add
a frame of brood with eggs in it from another colony with a good queen,
so the bees can raise their own queen.
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