Quick update

Just a quickie to say I did the inspection today and there is heaps of brood, capped and uncapped, compared to last week so I can relax, my queen is still there and still laying.  Yay!

And it’s nearly a month later

I’m obviously fairly crap at updating.  I wanted this to be an informative insight into the life of an almost-natural beekeeper, but somehow I’m not doing it.  Perhaps I should write more about what natural beekeeping means to me with illustrations/episodes from my bees.  Well we’ll see

The important thing is they are still here and as my Flickr feed at the bottom right should show, new photos have been taken since the last lot and things are going according to plan.  The plan is simply to get through the winter!  Seriously, there is always something to worry about and at the moment I am worried that the queen is not laying enough.  One time I visited them recently and they were quite aggressive, however they have calmed down since then and this might be because I fed them a bit.  The theory is that if there is a dearth of food, they will get a bit grumpy (well wouldn’t you?) and the queen will wisely not lay so much if things are scarce.  And if the queen isn’t laying the bees get grumpy for that reason, ie a double-whammy.  So I am going to feed them some more.

I am fed up with the ziplock bag method, I don’t have a good enough feel for how much the bees are drinking and how much is ending up on the grass underneath the hive (it will drip through the open mesh).  So I have ordered a device from Thornes that will turn a 1lb jar into a feeder and I think/hope this will solve my problems, at least for now.

I have also ordered some thymol crystals because I am going to make some thymol treatments as per Gareth’s recipe at Biobees.  This will need to be applied in late August/early September if I have evidence of varroa in the hive.  So far I have not seen a single varroa mite: while this is not impossible (bee management via TBHs is supposed to help reduce varroa and lots of beekeepers report no varroa at all) I am concerned because (a) I just don’t have that kind of luck and (b) I don’t want to miss them through inexperience.  So I am doing another check today (haven’t looked for a while) and will monitor every two weeks or so.

I am having trouble developing a good record system.  I write up each inspection and occasionally note things I do between inspections, but it’s not very systematic.  I need to be able to track when I last did a varroa check, eg, and what it was, when I last fed them, with what and how much.  Will think about that, a spreadsheet seems to be the answer or even, dare I say it, a database…

Meanwhile they are busy busy busy and have finally found our borage in the garden, although they only send a few bees at a time over to it, they are at least coming.  Thought they never would.  They are turning up their noses at our beautiful calendula though, perhaps the Asters will take their fancy more.  There is something in Brackmills (a mile or so north of here) that is attracting them at the moment.

All is still well

Just went into the hive to check up on how things are, and everything is just great.  Today I got stung in the finger!  the first time I have been stung by my own bees.  Another tried to sting the other hand but her sting didn’t make it through to me, I saw the sting in my glove.  It’s so sad, but given what I was doing today, not that surprising.  I was adjusting some comb that was bending onto the next bar by squishing it back, and I think I squished the bee(s) in the process.  Sorry, very sorry

However, to compensate, my technique of lifting up and replacing the bars is improving all the time and I don’t think I squished a single bee today.  I also managed to puff some icing sugar over most of the population, I have discovered the secret is to only have a leetle teeny bit of icing sugar in the puffer, then it doesn’t get bunged up.  I am pleased that I’ve done this as I’ve wanted to do it since I got them.

The capped cells that I saw last time, that I hoped were brood but wasn’t sure, until some Biobees people confirmed it, definitely was brood because they have now hatched out.  Which is fantastic, the cycle of egg, larva, pupa, bee is working.  The Fortitude bar now has a comb on it and although it’s not full sized, it is full of uncapped nectar.  So perhaps that will mark the end of the brood nest.

I added the Honour bar today, so I now have 10 bars in the active area, 7 have comb on them. I’ve only had them four weeks!

Beez iz fabz

Well I’ve had the bees for a month and everything’s going great.  I hesitate to say this, because I haven’t seen inside the hive for over a week, but they are making beautiful comb and we have seen capped brood, larvae and nectar and the hive is “a hive of activity” every day.  In the evenings we can hear a background hum while they go about their business inside the hive and fan off the nectar before they cap it as honey.

Here are some pix:

Comb with nectar

 

 

 

and I am very fond of this one, although this particular comb is now much bigger:

New comb

It’s so white!

I haven’t seen the queen yet but I have seen babies so I know she is in there and laying.  The bees work purposively, day and night, so I conclude that the colony is “queen right.”

We are surprised how little they seem to come into the garden.  Positioned in the corner of two ivy hedges, flanked by the greenhouse on one side and the oak tree on the other, they obviously perceive a sort of barrier between them and the garden and just don’t come this way.  However our next door neighbours both say they have seen more bees in the garden and assume they’re mine.  So they must be crossing the garden or going along the back!

So far, whenever we’ve gone into the hive, they have been a little bit agitated and the buzz rises in both pitch and volume once we pull the follower board back.  But neither of us has been stung yet.  The rest of the time they are lovely happy docile bees.

The birds are more active particularly the robin and the woodpecker (the woodpecker wants to eat them I expect).  A local cat was a bit annoyed to find bees on his route.  People are starting to ask me for honey so I am compiling a list.

I have named the top bars rather than numbering.  You can write the numbers so that you can tell which way up to put the bars (6s and 9s are particularly difficult, not to mention 8s) but names are nicer and you can see immediately when one is the wrong way up.  And it’s better karma.  The names so far are:

Wisdom
Strength
Joy
Serenity
Beauty
Peace
Generosity
Fortitude
Kindness
Patience
Courage

The little one in the pic above is Beauty, the larger one is Wisdom.  I name them as I add them and the next two will be Honour and Valour.

More beez!!

And once again I have beez!  The swarm coordinator brought them round last night.  To backtrack a bit, Husband and I figured out a way of retrofitting a bottom board – we got some tracking from B&Q, husband attached it and now we can slide hardboard along all, part or none of its length, to our hearts’ content.  I think the bees will be comforted by the reduced wind and light, but there is still plenty of ventilation as there is a gap between the board and the mesh.

After the swarm coordinator phoned, I shot out to the hive and put in a bag of sugar syrup in readiness.  The swarm this time is much bigger – probably double the last one, or even bigger than that – and I gave them less space, so hopefully there won’t be any heat issues this time.  I’m sure that’s what the problem was last time.

This morning I watched them for about an hour – they were orienting themselves, going in, out, around, over to the oak tree and back, over to the hedge and back, up the sides, over the roof, in again, out again.  We have only one entrance open at the moment, I shall open another after they’ve gone to bed.  Tomorrow I’ll risk a look through the observation panel, and if all is well I’ll open the hive up on Thursday or Friday.

J’aime Washington DC en printemps, mais j’aurai préféré avoir l’expérience avec les dents

Just come back from a lovely weekend in Washington DC with my brother and his family, and my parents were there too.  Flights there and back passed off without trauma, we did get caught in a traffic jam caused by 4-lane accident on the Beltway but given that it was 4 lanes wide AND there were 4 fire engines AND there were 4 ambulances, the 45 minutes delay we experienced was in fact a slick operation I would say.  You’d think that was enough excitement, but no.

So, back at home, quietly going through my emails and enjoying a nice snack of a handful of prawn crackers, when crunch!  off comes my gold crown, with half my tooth with it.  I now have a hollow tooth without a top or one of its sides.

And British NHS dentistry to look forward to.

It seems these things happen a day or so after transatlantic flight.  Hmph

Now you see them…

…now you don’t

When I got home from university today, they’d all gone.  Well, about 10 of them left, drowsy and stumbling around the hive.  A few dead ones in the bottom too

There must be something they didn’t like.  My money is on the open floor – will think about fitting a bottom board, but it must be removable…hmmm.

I miss them (sob) but I’m confident there will be more.  Just have to be patient.  Off to the US for the weekend so will forget about them for a bit.

I haz beez :)

If you’d asked me yesterday, I should have said “Not much happening on the bee front, in terms of visitors to the garden.  Plenty of phone calls though.”

Now as you may know, I have been assigned a mentor by the local association, who happens to be the swarm coordinator for my immediate area.  I call him SwarmBeek on these pages.  He knows I need bees, ideally a swarm and not on frames. (Because I am going to take them off frames if they are on them, that’s why.)  The Training Officer for the Association also knows I need bees, she has compiled a list of all the students on her course that need bees.

So then I get a phone call from the swarm coordinator for the county, asking if I need bees.  ”Yes!” I said brightly.  ”A swarm, if poss”  I said even more brightly.  ”SwarmBeek knows about it” I said, progressing forward to precocious.

So then a week later the same guy rings me again: “Do you need bees?”  Stepping over and ignoring the massive deja vu feeling I said “Yes please!  A swarm if possible please!”

So then the following week another chap from the Association rings me.  ”Do you need bees?”  ”Yes please! ” I said.   I decided not to add the bit about the swarm in case that was what was confusing matters.  ”Righto, I’ll put you on the list” he said.  How many lists am I on?  I am very pleased, of course, that so many people are helping me, but hmmmm.

A few days later he rings again.  ”I’ve got you a swarm!  It’s already in a box and on frames.”  ”Fantastic!” I said (thinking, hmm, bummer about the frames, but I’m not passing this up).  ”Will you be able to give the guy who’s put it together about 5 frames?”  errrr, no.  Some scratching of heads.  In the end we agreed I would not have this swarm as the bloke who had it was mighty keen on getting some frames back.  Hmph.  But never mind.  I think it’s a shame to cut a comb off a frame if you don’t have to.  Some other lucky person will have those bees and the frames and will be very happy.

Then tonight, county swarm chap rings again.  ”I’ve got you a swarm.  It might be ready tonight, or tomorrow morning”  Now the bummer here was, tonight was fine, tomorrow morning is NOT fine, as I’m on a course which means I’m out 7am to 7pm.  And Husband was not able to hang around and facilitate tomorrow morning, as it so happens, although he usually is on a Friday (double bummer).  So, while manically running around making sure I had everything ready, top bars, icing sugar, sieve, water, and putting the margerine pots under the hive legs and filling them with water too (stops the ants, don’t you know) and frantically making sugar syrup because they might need feeding, all in the 30 minutes notice he gave me, I’m praying praying praying they’re coming tonight.  And they did!

The swarm coordinator put them into the hive for me and helped me dust them with icing sugar.  I’m glad I was able to do that – it’s best when there is no brood (as in a newly-housed swarm) as all the varroa mites are on the bees and the icing sugar helps them fall off the bees and onto the ground through my lovely varroa mesh with which I am so pleased.  (Nb: Varroa is a major pest to bees)

Unfortunately when the bees went in, some of them fell the other side of the follower board and while I got most of them out, a few were a bit more recalcitrant.  We resolved to leave them there, behind the follower board, and open the other entrance so they could get out.  With luck they will figure out that the only show in town is behind the main entrances on the other side.  I will check on that tomorrow.  I will also put in some of my syrup for them, I am going  to try the (technical term coming up) “ziplock baggie method” where you put the syrup in a (guess what) ziplock bag, lay it on the bottom of the hive and jab some holes in it.  It’s all research, right?

Despite all their upset, having been put in a box and driven across town, turned over and over while he took the tape off the box, then unceremoniously dumped into my hive, they seemed pretty docile.  I hope this bodes well and they are lovely friendly bees.

Not complaining or anything, but the timing of this is rotten!  Not only do I now have three assessments due in the next two weeks, I am away in the US for my beloved godson’s first holy communion this weekend, and I am going to have to leave my bees behind!  Sob!  but this is probably a good thing as it means I will not fiddle with them or be distracted by them and they shall be left alone to just do their thing.  When I get back they will have settled in nicely.  It reminds me of when I got the four feral kittens and then had to go out somewhere and my sister had to spend the evening with them.  ”It’ll be fine, they’re very sweet and quiet”  I said.  She gently advised otherwise when I got home  So Husband will have all the fun of the first few days.  At least I should see them flying in the morning before I head off.

In case you were wondering…

…the scouts never came back in force, and I think I know what happened.

I spent a couple of days fretting about whether they disliked something about the hive and if so, would other bees feel the same and if so, would bees ever stay.  Destructive self-talk, I think is the technical term.

Anyway, a few days later I went out to SwarmBeek’s apiary again and on the way he mentioned that on the same Sunday, he had picked up a swarm of bees about 1.5 miles from my house.  I am convinced they were the same bees.

This is comforting in one way: it’s not that they didn’t like the hive, just that the body of the swarm were physically removed and unable to take up my offer of a palatial home.  It’s irritating in another – I could have had those bees.  But never mind.  Onward and upward.

Well well! Scouts!

So the hive has been in the garden for a while now, and a few days ago my lemongrass oil arrived, so I put a bit on around the entrances.  Lemongrass oil is said to mimic the scout pheromone so is attractive to bees looking for a new home.

We went to the annual BBKA Convention on Saturday to get Husband kitted out and for me to pick up a J-tool, bee brush and some nice gloves (all missions accomplished) and had a great time, actually.  Husband found a microscope vendor – he has always wanted a binocular microscope and now finds they come with all kinds of fixtures and fittings for you to be able to attach your laptop, camera etc, and even better, at the convention, where everything is on offer, he can get a good one for a great price.  This will be one of his retirement presents to himself in a couple of years’ time.  We also bumped into SwarmBeek, who is now my mentor for my first year so it was good for them to meet.

On Sunday, after a leisurely breakfast I was browsing through the paper while sitting in the conservatory and happened to notice a couple of bees checking out the hive.  I sincerely hope our chosen location for the hive works out because I can see the entrances from the kitchen, the conservatory and the spare bedroom upstairs, all fabulous viewing stations where I can watch the bees come and go and get a feel for how they are without disturbing them.  My only concern is that the entrance isn’t due south which may lead to crosscomb in the hive, but we shall just have to take each step as it comes.  Anyway, some scout bees!  Fantastic, obviously my lemongrass oil had done the trick.

As the minutes and hours passed the bees grew in number.  It’s hard to estimate how many there were in the end, Husband reckons over 100.  They were flying all around the hive, going in and out, guarding, examining the varroa screen, figuring out the observation panel and generally, as far as I can tell, checking its credentials as a des.res. for bees.  Husband was working in the garden pretty close to the hive and I was worried he might inadvertently get stung, he refused to tog up in his canary yellow bee suit (obtained at a super special price as the maker couldn’t sell it ) or even the spare hat&veil we bought.  The bees weren’t that interested in him or bothered in any way, but he might still have accidentally walked into one or caught one under his arm or whatever, which would be Bad News.  Not only for Husband –  We do not. Want. Our Hive. To reek of panic pheromone.

We went out to the garden centre just before lunch and while we were out I realised that I had left the hive with an empty chamber to the left of the entrances, then a follower board, then about 6 bars, then an end follower board, then another (bigger) empty chamber to the right of the hive.  If the bees are thinking about swarming because they’re overcrowded, they might think my hive too small.  So the plan for the afternoon was to finish off the top bars and put them in between the followers, thus increasing the livable space. (I now have doubts whether that’s the right thing to do so will take advice on that one).  So I sort out my bars and melt some wax and take it into the garage to apply it to the bars and within 90 seconds the garage was full of bees!!! they could obviously smell the wax!  So I darted back inside the house, carefully keeping the bees out!!! and resolved to do them later and put them into the hive at dusk when the bees would be sleepy.

At this point we couldn’t help hoping that a swarm was moving in.  It seemed odd to me though – there weren’t anything like enough and they hadn’t all arrived at once.  But they were sticking around much longer than I thought scouts would, and there were so many of them! Were they all from the same colony?  Was a queen already in there and the other bees arriving later?  And it’s all so early – I didn’t expect anything to happen until early May.

At about 7pm I togged up and went over to the hive with my spray bottle and my bars.  I had no idea what to expect.  There were two bees checking out the rear side of the hive (where the observation panel is, and where I intend to stand when I open the hive).  I gave them a quick burst of my water spray which worked like a charm – they landed immediately, on the side of the hive under the eaves, to dry off, and didn’t bother me at all.

Off came the roof but by then I already knew what was happening.  There was no noise at all.  I pulled back the end follower board and took a peek inside.  Not a single bee to be seen.  They’d all gone back to where they’d come from, they like to be near their queen for dusk.  So – clearly there was no queen in there (not v. surprising).  The question – would they come back?  Would others come instead?  Will I get bees with no effort at all? (that’s three questions)

Today I am happy to report that they, or others, are back!  So you never know, maybe they’ll move in!

This is so exciting, and fast becoming real!  Keep your fingers crossed for us.

Scout bees

SwarmBeek’s apiary

Went to SwarmBeek’s apiary this afternoon – didn’t want to get stung again!  so purchased a pair of jeans.  They aren’t brilliant but will keep more bees out than my leggings do

The Association has arranged for SwarmBeek to be my mentor so this is all working out very well.  I met two other newbees who are presumably being mentored by him as well.

We had a great afternoon with his three hives which are out in the country not far from where I live.  The first hive had about 10 sealed queen cells in it, which worried him a little – he’d prefaced our opening of the hive by saying they were a small colony, and they didn’t appear to be any smaller than he expected, but he wondered whether they had swarmed already.  His earliest known swarm in his experience was April 21st, so this would be a week early, but we have had a long long dry spell so things might be a bit out of whack.

On the other hand it could be supersedure, where the bees get fed up with a queen so decide to replace her.  The number of queen cells would be right for this, for a swarm you’d expect 20-25.  However there was plenty of brood and everything else in the hive seemed happy, the bees were not aggressive in any way.  SwarmBeek decided to treat it as supersedure and he destroyed all the queen cells apart from one good one.  He didn’t have the equipment with him to try for an artificial swarm, which he was kicking himself about because he said it would have been a good colony to split.  He was caught out with how early in the season this is happening.

The other two hives were non-eventful but very enjoyable – lovely docile bees.  I did not get stung at all!

First beekeeping practical

On Saturday I had my first beekeeping practical – my first time getting physical with the bees.

Last August I went to an open session at the Association’s apiary and I saw bees up close, but I didn’t handle them.  This time it was me and the bees.  I was in a group of four that had five hives to inspect.  Another chap went first, glad he did as when he took the roof off (this is a conventional hive we’re talking about), the crown board AND two of the frames came up with it, as they were all gummed up together with comb.

This did not please the bees.

The chap training us, who happens to be the swarm coordinator for my neighbourhood so I am hoping he will help me get a swarm, and whom I shall call SwarmBeek, sorted that out and the inspection continued.  Meanwhile I started to wonder if I was getting stung – I could feel pinpricks in my legs.  But they didn’t feel like anything so I ignored them (you already know how that’s going to turn out)

Then it was my turn.  Lucky for me the roof came away cleanly.  The crown board was fairly firmly stuck on with propolis so I eased that off.  Inside, loadsabees.  There was only the brood box – no supers – but every frame was completely full of bees.  How many bees is that?  don’t know

So then I brought out each frame, one at a time, and checked each side.  I saw larvae, eggs, capped brood including drone brood, and food stores, but no queen.  We didn’t see the queen in any of the five hives in the end, but each had their own as each had newly laid eggs in abundance.

I got stung in the finger but managed to pull the sting out.  That made me think my legs were OK because I felt the one in my finger more acutely. Not badly, I could ignore it and carry on, but I was actively ignoring it rather than forgetting about it.

Anyway, apparently I did a reasonable job with my inspection and I was very happy with my first interaction with bees.  I just can’t wait to get my own!  One thing I did discover – conventional hives are Too Low Down and I would knacker my back if I had to work at that height, ie bent over at right angles, all the time.  Am so glad I have opted for a long hive style with a working height about the same as countertops in the kitchen.  Given that conventional hives are all on stands, why don’t beekeepers put them higher up I wonder?

SwarmBeek invited me to his apiary later on this week and we have exchanged mobile phone numbers so he can call me if he gets a call.  He was very pleased that I am around during the week most of the time, not just evenings and weekends

When I got home I was very tired, oh so tired, and discovered I had about half a dozen stings on each thigh.  This is a good thing – I wanted to get stung, sort of, to see how I would react, and I felt I was handling it OK.  But it was a bad thing in that I wasn’t really aware I’d been stung, so didn’t get the stings out, so the stings were far worse than they needed to be.  And that afternoon I had a real case of the chills, and walking was uncomfortable.  The stings caused hot and red blotches around each puncture up to about 3 inches in some cases but antihistamine cream was v. effective.

Two days later, ie today, the blotches have considerably reduced.  There was no effect on walking yesterday – back to normal – and although I’d been warned I might itch, I haven’t really.  So all in all I am very very pleased with my sting reaction and have no anxiety about this new hobby.

Husband finished off the follower boards (which needed trimming) and I put some lolly sticks in two of the top bars and string-and-wax on four more.  Need more lolly-stick ones – husband has to chisel me out some grooves – but if a swarm arrived tomorrow I Am Ready.

I have a hive in my garden :)

I planned to give you a step-by-step account of the construction of the hive, together with frequent, if not weekly, summaries of lessons learned, particularly in classes.  Some of the Association meetings have been very interesting and there are a couple of people there running or intending to run top bar hives, with and without experience of beekeeping generally.  I have also discovered that a friend of my husband’s ran bees for many years before allergy to the stings forced him to stop.  So that’s nice.

Anyway, study and life got in the way and while I have a number of photos to upload, suffice to say that the hive is finished (well, nearly) and in the garden.  Here it is.  We have painted the non-cedar parts of it green to match the shed, deck, compost bin etc, and coated the cedar in linseed and beeswax on the outside.  Inside is beeswax only.

I have left it open but will check with the online mob to see if that’s wise.  I’m wondering if a scout bee will find it and they move in  The inside is painted with beeswax so will smell lovely and homely (that’s the hope anyway).

The only things left to do now are to put the lollysticks on the top bars and trim off the follower boards – watch this space

Week 3 of the beekeeping classes

I was late for this one because this week’s class was in a different location to normal, and despite preparing and making sure I knew where to go and everything three days ahead of time, on the day I forgot and turned up at the usual place on the dot of 12.30, only to realise (it took me a couple of minutes to figure it out) that I had a 20-minute drive ahead of me.

No matter.

It was about Wintering and Spring tasks, and the chap delivering it is clearly very knowledgeable, and he had a lesson plan because he kept referring to it (it looked like a list of things to remember to talk about).  But other than that it was very unstructured, anecdotal, and reliant on phrases and experiences we don’t have.  Now it appears that I’ve done a lot more background reading than some of the people in the group, on the other hand I’m pretty sure some of the class have bees already, or, at least, have had them.  So there’s a mixture in the room.  Some are still at the stage of figuring out that when a swarm goes, the queen goes.  Others have raised queens themselves (well, you know, they got the bees to do it).  The class leader was pleasant and funny and when asked direct questions he answered them clearly and succinctly.  But the “lecture” did ramble a bit.  What he said was also at variance with what was in the handbook we’ve been given.

Here’s the thing.  When you’re knowledgeable, you can listen to five opinions and figure out which one to go with or synthesise the bits you like out of all five or reject them all or whatever.  When you know next to nothing, it is very difficult to identify whether what Person A is saying is the same or different from what Person B is saying (it might just be different language, or a different circumstance), let alone which is “right” (if any of them are).  They tell us we needn’t make any notes because “it’s all in the handbook” yet what we’re being told is not in the handbook because this chap has a different idea.

I think what I’m getting round to is the class leaders have volunteered to deliver a class because they know a lot about it and are keen and passionate and want to help the newbees etc, but they don’t realise the need for structure in a lesson plan.  The handbook is all straight text too – few headings, no summaries, no key points etc.

Part of the reason why I am able to be critical is that I’ve spent the last year reading up on this so I’m coming to it with a bit more than the basic.  But like I say, I’m not the only one who knows a bit, and there are people there who have a good deal more experience than me (not hard – I have none)

The class leader made a really good point that if we are going to buy pollen/pollen substitute, fondant etc it would make sense to club together with other newbees as we will all have small colonies and won’t need the whole packet of whatever-it-is ourselves.  So I, being bright as a button as usual, bounced up to the training coordinator in the break and said “Are we going to get a list of participants so that we can get to know one another?”  ”Oh no,” came the reply, “some haven’t given consent.”  ”OK, so what about those that have?”  ”No.”

*sigh*

I’m thinking name badges, I’m thinking group exercises, I’m thinking WHY THE DICKENS suggest we get together and then not facilitate us in doing so

*shakes head*

Latest beekeeping class

Had my second class  yesterday.  It was a bit livelier than the previous week, mainly because he was showing equipment and talking about how you stack a hive etc.  All this is largely irrelevant to me as I will not be using a traditional hive.  Nevertheless I picked up a few tips, such as needing to replace brood comb once every three years at least.

I have been wondering about this.  Honeycomb gets harvested when you harvest the honey (unlike in a traditional hive where you try and get the bees to reuse it) but how do you get them to make new brood comb? Either there will be brood in it that you don’t want to lose or it’ll be winter and they’ll be clustered on it and you won’t want to move them because that would chill them right down.  Hmmm.  Will have to do some reading on this methinks.

Anyway, the class was somewhat better.  The lecturer made plain his dislike of long hives (on which the one I shall be using is based) and said it is difficult for newbees (geddit?) to start with, but I’m up for that challenge.