Backyard Farming Forum
Bringing food production home

So far my bees in the backyard have been doing REALLY well but when I checked them on Thursday they were breaking open their honey stores! Its been really warm and dry here for the past month when it should be cooling down and wetter but its not normal.......

Anyway, any flow we had before is well and truely gone but the bees are super active with the warm temperatures and as a consequence they are chewing up their winter supplies at a great rate.

Started feeding them on Saturday morning with a [url="http://www.honeybeesuite.com/how-to-use-a-baggie-feeder/"]baggie feeder[/url] and its brilliant. Not a bee drowned or lost so far and they have chewed through 5kg of sugar. With the baggie feeder I have found its important to watch when they are finished so you can get the bees out of the bag or they will surely die in there if left - easy in a backyard hive. Other than that they are fantastic compared to the other types I have used previously.

Anyway, they are off and running again and pulling in lots of pollen so things are on the up and up.

Glad to see no beetles at all in the hive this time

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Cheers
Rob.

I fed my first swarm through their first summer as there was little flow. I used a baggie feeder but instead of slitting it as that url suggests I punched a dozn needle sized holes in it. The bees find the holes and extract throough them. they would empty a large sandwich bag in a couple of days.

Yeh, I might go to the punched holes a bit later but I am trying to get them to pack away lots quickly so they can get through the dearth.

The hole method would be really handy when you cannot check them so often, if your hive was in a remote location for instance. The good point is that they cannot get trapped but they may not be able to get all the syrup out as they can with the cuts (will have to test that later). Swings and roundabouts

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Cheers
Rob.