BINZEL Bees in the new year

The ABICOR BINZEL bee colony has come through last winter in good shape. The small animals were already busy, so that honey production is in full swing. But how can you tell after the winter that the bees are doing well?

First check in February

Depending on the weather, February is the first look at the bee colony but without looking directly into the colony, because it is still too cold for that. Therefore the full attention is on the foil, which is under the lid on the frames. If there is condensation on the inside, everything is ok. The condensed humidity is an indicator that the queen bee is in oviposition and the workers are warming the brood, which causes the humidity to condense on the top of the film.

This is good news - because other beekeepers are already reporting the loss of colonies that unfortunately did not survive the winter!

View of the colony at over 12 degrees

In March, on a warmer day above 12 degrees Celsius, the beekeeper takes a closer look at the bee colony. What was already visible a month before, due to the condensation on the foil, can now be seen directly: The BINZEL Bees have survived the winter well and the colony is developing normally.

Early fruit blossom and mass production

During the first weeks of April it became very warm and the fruit blossom started earlier than usual. First the cherries were in bloom. Mirabelle, apple and plum followed immediately. As if that wasn't enough nectar and pollen already on offer, there are also several hectares of canola in the vicinity of the BINZEL Bees.

This partially simultaneous flowering of fruit and canola is called "mass flowering" in beekeeping. When such a large supply of nectar and pollen occurs, it leads to a real growth spurt in a bee colony. Good for the bees - but as a beekeeper you have to be very careful to always offer the bees enough space and to keep an eye out for queen cells. Otherwise it leads to swarming.

If the swarm gets too big ...

Swarming is a completely natural behaviour of bees. If the beekeeper were to counteract this by offering larger bee boxes or new housing for the new colonies, which are too close together, the danger of parasites is increased. For example, the varroa mite contributes to the colony dying after a certain time. In addition, the honey harvest is then also smaller, so there are enough reasons not to let a colony swarm. If it does happen, the beekeeper has to be there at the right time to catch the swarm and thus raise a new colony. This colony will of course be treated against the varroa mite.

The BINZEL Bees in May and the first honey harvest

In order to prevent the BINZEL Bees from swarming, our beekeeper has given them more space by taking brood and thus created a branch of the bee colony. For this purpose she has removed two brood combs, one with covered brood and one with open brood - and of course a lot of brood-maintaining bees, food and pollen. But more about this at a later date.

Our BINZEL Bees were very diligent under all these conditions, which is why the first honey frame could be put on the colony already on April 12th, the second honey frame followed on April 28th.

In this honey frame there are initially frames with soldered-in middle walls and in the middle frames from last year, which were thrown out during the honey harvest. So the bees could start immediately with the construction and storage of nectar. To do this, the industrious little animals first inspect the new room, clean some of the combs, and convert the middle walls into combs. For this they need wax, which the bees produce themselves by "sweating" it out. In this way, the finest wax plates are created, which are attached to each other and form a perfect honeycomb.

On 21 May the first honeycombs could be removed and hurled. Already, the first honey is ready!