Read and Write - Honey Bee Valley Arnia monitoring systems in use

Hello readers,

As I posted a while back I'll start doing 'read and write' pieces on here.

No weather Report, no hive Reports, well if you want to see bees, scroll down, I have a surprise there that has nothing to do with cleaning out my dropbox that's stashed with documents.
I hope to find some gems in there and today I'm reading a paper written by Dries Laget from the University of Gent, Department Honey bee Valley.

Dries Laget is the founder of the project VespaWatch.  The project keeps an eye out on how the Asian Hornet is doing here in Flanders, Belgium.  It also does 'pest control' towards this Vespa Velutina.

To keep an ear to the ground, or rather a monitoring device inside the hive, they have 35 systems active spread across Flanders.  It comprises of a recording device for sound, it has scales and measures the outside temperature and temperature inside the brood nest (if the sensors are placed in the right spot).  Oh I almost forgot they also measure humidity inside the hive and the amount of rainfall there is.  (If you want to see what devices are being used, head over to www.arnia.co.uk.

The report I'm reading is an interpretation of data recorded from 22 systems from september 2018 to 16 October 2018.  I'm not sure how useful this report is since the time period is rather short... But that's not the main goal for this document, it is meant to showcase what data can be collected and how it can lead to interpretation of what's going on.

The Scales

First the document shows the scales are very accurate.  

Looking at one day; When compared to the outside temperature you can see a drop in weight in the morning when temperatures are around 12°C; Indicating the foragers have left the hive to start their work.  The coming and going of bees shows on the diagram in fluctuations of weight during the day. As temperatures start dropping the bees return and the scales stop fluctuating showing an overall increase of weight.  Looking at the scales the next day shows that the weight has dropped again, this is accounted to the vaporisation of the water from the nectar, and possibly some consumption.

Comparing all these daily results over the whole period shows a clear correlation between the weather, the flow of nectar in plants and the weight of the hive.

As winter sets in a weight loss is noticed that does not follow this trend, what did cause is is unclear but could be attributed to the death of the 'summer' bees in combination with excluding drones from the hive (that were still present till that day)

Differences in resources across Flanders

As weather conditions were steady across the whole of Flanders between 15 - 21 september this was an ideal time to compare the flow of nectar.  And there were differences!  Some hives consumed, others only consumed what they could find and then there were those that found some or a lot of resources.

The abundance of resources is not always deemed profitable for the bees, some do see it as a good thing (pollen coming in late in the year) others say it's a negative thing for the bees as the broodnest gets clogged up with whatever they find preventing the queen to lay eggs to provide enough 'winter' bees + the amount of 'winter' bees that are already there shorten their lifespan by foraging!  Both hypotheses are plausible, but cannot be confirmed (nor denied) by looking at the current (small) amount of date.  Let's hope the continuation of this project helps solve this puzzle!

There we have it folks,

a short paper that now makes me wonder if I can find a follow up on this project...  I'll have a look around and report back with the next Read and Write for you guys!

- - - - -

On another note, I caught my first swarm of the year and deposited it in a hive at a Freinet School : De Kleine Wereld (The Small World)  Here's a video on that (up on 21/04/2020 18:00)

Bob Out

Hello readers,

It's time for some beekeeping!
I have bought 2 more hives to bring my number up to 6 and I'm preparing to go out to catch some swarms.
But the most important thing is: I got to check my hives!

There was a lot of confusion at first ; Would we be allowed to travel to our bees during the COVID-19 lock-down (it is a semi lockdown here in Belgium) so I prepared as you can read up on in my previous post here.
So I was pleased to learn that taking care of your bees is allowed and moving them to pollination areas if you have a contract is also allowed.
And yes, buying bees is also allowed - if overseen by the beekeeping association.

But let's get to it!

Weather Report:  

Spring is finally here! This last week has been beautiful and temperatures go up into the 20° C.
It's not raining a lot, but it's not a dearth either so the plants are flowering and the pollen are in the air!

Hive Report: 

Home Apiary:

In my home apiary only 2 hives made it through winter: the LL2018 and the IC2019 (or the ZK2019 in previous reports)

As an intermezzo I'll show you a bee-watching video from my home apiary (and other bees)

The blue hive is the IC2019 - the wooden landing board is from the LL2018

The LL2018

I took out some old frames for comb renewal.  Frame 1 and 10 in the top box.  Frame one was of a smaller size (from making this hive) and I believe the last frame of this smaller size is now removed from this hive.  I moved frame 2 over to position one, that frame had a lot of pollen and bee-bread in it.  Next to it on position 2 I put in an empty frame to get them building. 

Next to that on position 3-5 is brood, not a lot!  So this hive had it rough coming out of winter!

On position 6 I put a frame with foundation moving all previous frames towards the edges.

7-10 is all honey!

The box I put underneath is untouched.

I don't intend to super this hive just yet.  Hopefully they'll start building down as the nectar flow starts, if not, I might have a swarm on my hands.

The IC2019

This hive is on Warré boxes, and I intend to not inspect them by going in.  I hope to do visual inspections through a window, looking at the bottom board and looking at the hive entrance for this hive.

I can't see a lot through the window.  The bees are all towards the front of the hive, away from the window.  It feels like there isn't a lot of them.

Looking at the landing board I notice a lot of poop, so they might have a case of NOSEMA on their hands.  I also noticed the one bee with DWV.

Seeing all this made me think the varroa load was going to be heavy in this hive, something that is to be expected.  I did not treat any of my hives, so all varroa that survived winter will want to gain maximum profit out of the first few brood cycles.  Let's hope the bees can handle the stress.

When looking at the bottom board I get confirmation : a lot of varroa.

The landing board tells me there's 43 bees coming in at 15:00-ish in the afternoon with 3 different colours of pollen.  I believe it's willow (bright yellow pollen) and dandelion (a more orange color), The third color is a dirty white-ish/light grey and I have no clue where they get it from.

As there are 2 unused boxes here for the bees to expand their nest I'm sure there's enough room!

Apiary 2

LL2019

One of the survivors is a nasty one.  They let me take of 2 empty boxes and look through 4 frames (without brood) before the humming started letting me know I'd better close up.

I moved 4 frames of nectar and a bit of pollen to the first super, over the brood nest.  Thus giving them space next to the brood frames to grow and showing them there is room above for honey stores.

I hope to move these frames to the top most box next inspection but we'll see what happens when we open this one up again.

As this hive is on Simplex I might use it to ship out for a Darwinian Black Bee Project (minus the queen).

MC2019

This hive survived on one Zander box, something I didn't expect, I gave up on them!  But they are here!  And they are doing good.  Going through the hive I noticed position 1 still had a filler block putting the hive on 9 frames.  This one needs to be replaced during my first inspection.  Those 9 frames have 5 frames of brood 3 frames of pollen and an empty frame.  I hope they'll build towards the bottom.  I'm toying with the idea to put 3 frames of brood in the bottom box with 2 frames of brood above - or something along those lines, depending how many frames of brood I find during my next inspection.

Something else I noticed, and I wish I took pictures now, is possible signs of VHS; Some of the capped brood was opened up with the pupae still white.  Are they doing something against the varroa mites?  I hope so!

Also, if you read back in my reports, I wouldn't be surprised that you'll find me planning on changing the roof on this hive... Well I still have to do just that!

Apiary 3

This is a new hive! (as the old hive that was here didn't make it!) Welcome to the:

MCA2020

The MCA2020 is a hive I bought from a beekeeper within throwing distance of my home.  So local bees! (the beekeeper does use oxalid acid) They are on 6 frames of Simplex when I got them and are now inside one 11-frame box of Simplex.

The plan is to let them grow and ship them out (minus the queen) for that same Darwinian Black Bee Project I mentioned earlier.  I'll have to write a blog report on what that project is, so if you're interested, keep your eyes peeled!

So, they were on 6 frames, now in positions 3-8.

Position 1 is an empty frame, position 2 is a buit out comb frame.

In slot 3 we have some pollen and nectar and the next 5 frames are all brood!

Frame 9 is an empty frame, 10 has foundation and 9 is empty again.

God I hope they build straight here!

I'm going back in a week since they are in a fruit orchard with cherry, plum and apple.  The plum was already in bloom, the cherries are ready to go and the apple is sprouting flower buds.

They'll get ample opportunity to fill out this hive.

I have half a mind set on instead of supering them putting a 6-framer next to them and to divide up the frames to make a walk-away split next week - depending on how strong they are growing and if they're building or not.

So that's it for today!  I hope to make pictures and video's again this year!

Bob Out