Tips for the Month:

• Surround hives with chicken wire if woodpeckers are a problem 

• Strap up hives or place a brick on rooves to stop them being blown off in high winds.

• Keep hefting or weighing hives to assess the rate at which stores are consumed over the winter. If you need to top up, feed fondant.

• Put in Mouse Guards if you have not already done so - mice are looking for warm food-rich places to overwinter - what better than a beehive.

• Store extracted supers but watch out for wax moths - put frames in the freezer for 48 hours to kill eggs, larvae and adults before storing boxes in such a way that wax moths cannot enter with solid boards top and bottom of the pile.

• Clean equipment - flame broodboxes and scrape off wax and propolis.

• Ensure you have registered your apiary on BeeBase so that if there is disease located in our area you can be contacted by the bee inspectors to stop it from spreading.