Wakefield and Pontefract Beekeepers: February Meeting

Monday just gone was the February meeting for my local Beekeeping association. This month the talk was held by a guy from the NBU or the National Bee Unit. The main purpose of the talk was to give the results of some research that has been going on recently. He covered how they conduct their research, which was done over 2 years in random apiaries. There were plenty of pie charts and diagrams to show the different levels of disease that where found within the apiaries. I won't include any of the figures, this is mainly due to not having access to them! The general idea I got was that EFB and AFB aren't at high levels, but other diseases are higher. One of the higher level diseases was DWV (deformed wing virus) and there was a further graph to show how levels of this problem relate directly to varroa levels. All in all the presentation gave me confidence that no matter how many problems the Bees face there is still a lot of research going on to try to combat them.

Within the presentation a lot of emphasis was on encouraging people to register on Beebase Website. I have already done this some time ago and can confirm that it is a very good resource for UK Beekeepers to use. Within the site there is a section for putting details about each hive inspection and can also easily be set up for various different apiaries. There is also a lot of information about the various problems Bees suffer from and what to do. There are lots of .pdf documents to download and print out to hand out to people to provide further info. All in all it's well worth registering if your either a Beekeeper or interested in becoming one.

After the presentation I went to see the secretary as some goodies that I had ordered as part of my associations bulk buy scheme had arrived:-

Apiguard. This is a treatment for varroa mites. There is enough for 5 hives in this box. I'll describe how it's used closer the time that I use. I think it's very similar to the other treatment I used last year, APILIFE VAR, but in an easier to use package!

Another varroa treatment. It's the same as the stuff I used in the winter time except already made into a liquid.

Hessian sacking. This is just a bundle of hessian. It's useful in the smoker and really helps get your smoking working properly.

There are more items that I ordered but they will be there next month. I think all I have left to arrive are some more packs of wax foundation.