Exhibitors listed in alphabetical order. Please let me know of any errors or omissions.
Geoff Cooper
1st One unusual container of liquid honey
Note – the container was a gift from Arran Taylor, so credit to him as well!
Marion Cooper
2nd Six small honey biscuits
2nd Limerick about bees or beekeeping (see below)
Andrew Halstead 1st Two jars naturally set or soft set honey (National class)
2nd Two jars naturally set or soft set honey (Surrey class)
2nd One jar naturally crystallised honey (Surrey gift class)
VHC Two jars liquid honey (Surrey class)
Dr Mark Hamilton
1st Two jars medium honey (Surrey class)
2nd One jar light / medium honey (Surrey gift class)
HC Two jars liquid honey (Surrey class)
David Parker
1st Two jars dark honey (Surrey class)
1st Frame suitable for extraction (Surrey class)
3rd Two jars naturally set or soft set honey (Surrey class)
HC Six small honey biscuits
Marion’s limerick Class: 106 Entry no: 10.
2nd prize
A beekeeper bottled his honey Which he hoped would raise him some money But the yeasts did their worst So the jars they all burst And the poor man did not think it funny
The ‘fermentation’ was achieved by stirring bicarbonate of soda into honey and Geoff smashed the jar with a log-splitting wedge. All good fun.
Other successes achieved by our Chairman
It should be reported that our Chairman, Andrew Halstead, achieved successes – again – at two other local Shows in September. Here is his reply to my enquiry:
‘At the Chobham Agricultural and Horticultural Show I repeated my ”success” by having a first in the classes for two jars of set honey and two jars of medium or dark runny honey. The quote marks around success are because my honey was the only entry in those classes at the West End and Windlesham show.
Surrey Beekeepers Association AGM, Saturday 4th December 2021, 2.00 pm
This year the AGM will be hosted by the Kingston Division of Surrey Beekeepers Association. It will be held at The Richard Mayo Centre, Kingston United Reformed Church, Eden Street, Kingston KT1 1HZ. The AGM will be followed by light refreshments, after which there will be a talk at 3.00pm by Jack Siberrad, a Rural & Urban Beefarmer. His talk will be ‘Hygienic Bees – Varroa Resistance in your Hives’. The meeting will close at 4.30 pm.
There are plenty of buses and several large car parks in Kingston; the Eden Walk car park is next to the venue. Kingston Rail Station is 10 minutes walk away and there is secure bicycle parking there.
The Surrey Agricultural Show, which always includes the Bees and Honey Tent where the Honey Show is staged, was obviously not held last year or this year, but the SBKA Show Committee decided to run the event at the Reigate Division’s spacious and attractive apiary, way out in the Surrey countryside. Apart from the Show, this tree-lined site with its extensive area for hives, excellent wooden building with all facilities and large car park is always worth visiting – how envious we are!
There was a very friendly atmosphere, a good display of exhibits and tea and cake were available thoughout the afternoon. Special thanks go to the organisers, especially Mike Axford, Daphne Thomas and Julie Hogarth, as well as the many helpers on the day.
Now for the Weybridge contribution to the Show. We did VERY WELL, with a total of 82 points, second only to Reigate, with 87, BUT, 51 of Reigate’s points were won by one exhibitor, without whose points Reigate would have been fifth – and – Weybridge first! Now, NEXT year… how about it?
Marion Cooper Here are the details of the 18 Weybridge achievements, with the exhibitors given in alphabetical order:
(VHC = Very Highly Commended, HC = Highly Commended, C = Commended)
Leona Cobham
VHC – Single Jar of Honey, Novice Class Geoff and Marion Cooper
1st – Two jars medium honey
1st – Honey cake
2nd – Interesting or Instructive Exhibit (heated tank for cleaning frames)
2nd – Honey biscuits
3rd – Lemon honey cake
Lisa Davis
1st – Honey and Beeswax Products
2nd – Single jar of honey, Novice Class Vanessa Inwood
Summer Meeting at Fairoaks Airport, 18th September 2021
The subject of this meeting was “Preparing your hives for Winter.”
As had been advised in David Parker’s notes that had been circulated in advance of the meeting, he winters his bees on two brood boxes with 8 frames in each thus closer simulating the colony nest in a hollow tree. The spare space either side is filled with insulating board to reduce heat loss during winter.
Disappointingly only 15 members turned up and 5 of those were committee members. The group was split into two groups and allocated 2 or 3 hives to go through. The plan was 1) to assess how much food each hive had, 2) to check that it was queenright and 3) to scratch the Apivar strips that were in the hives. The latter had been in for 3 weeks and the process of scratching the strips with a hive tool removes any wax or propolis and increases the effectiveness for the last three weeks. After inspecting each colony the estimated stores were recorded on the Hive record and the feeders filled up with appropriate additional sugar solution.
After we rejoined as one group away from the bees for tea, David showed us the mixing paddle and drill that he uses for mixing the sugar in his plastic containers. Using this he can prepare food and mix it into solution in three minutes.
We then had a picnic tea and talked about bees. An interesting meeting for those beginners who attended and everyone enjoyed the afternoon. Our thanks go to David for hosting the meeting.
Michael Main
Thanks for your report Michael. As you said, it’s a pity the attendance was so poor. David has sent details of the mixing paddle he uses for making up sugar syrup, as mentioned in the report above: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/272030611555
The Weybridge Beekeepers Annual General Meeting is scheduled to be held on Monday 8th November 2021 at 7.30 p.m.
We are currently considering a repeat of last year’s successful format of holding the meeting over Skype, with a physical venue a possible alternative. The final details will be in the November newsletter.
Our traditional honey tasting will not take place again this year, for obvious reasons.
We are looking for 60 beekeepers to take part in a project to record local air pollution. Working together we will collect small samples of bees to discover whether air pollutants are present in the hives.
This looks to be an interesting and worthwhile project. Do spend a few minutes reading the details even if you do not intend to be a volunteer. It gives an idea of our polluted environment.
Thanks to Jenny Nield (Report), Stewart Westsmith (Demonstration), Nicola Simpson, David Parker, Claire Balla (Photos), Michael Main (Host)
The purpose of this meeting was to introduce Stewart Westsmith, our seasonal bee inspector (between April and October), and for him to demonstrate how to carry out a disease inspection on a colony. Last year he inspected 1100 hives. David Parker and Michael Main opened the meeting by thanking everyone for attending despite the weather. (In fact this turned out to be quite good, warm with a hint of damp air near the end, not a return to the heavy downpour we had at the beginning – see photo below.)
Throughout the meeting, due to Covid and the local EFB outbreak, only Stewart and Michael handled the frames and any equipment during the inspections.
Quoting Stewart’s opening comments:
“We’ve had an increase of EFB in areas in Surrey which we never had before, so it’s obviously more important to be aware of checking your hives for signs of EFB and of course AFB, recognising it and being able to then have the confidence to say whether it is FB or getting it analysed. What I’m busy doing at the moment is finding cases, diagnosing them, treating them and making sure it is not spreading out of that area. This has been my whole summer.”
Stewart stressed the importance of hygienic practice throughout the apiaries particularly if you have multiple sites. Here is the list of the items he mentioned on a few occasions: boots, gloves, (disposable is better), jackets, tools and a bucket of washing soda solution to clean all tools between each hive, which is highly advisable (4.5 litres water to 1 kilo soda crystals). He uses wire wool in the soda solution to clean the tools between each hive.
Stewart has several clean suits to change into for every Apiary. He sprays his car with anti-bacterial solution and at home he sprays door handles and everything he touches, very mindful of potential spread.
He uses a plastic sandwich bag around the smoker. The puffer on smokers is sometimes difficult to scrub down, hence a bag that can be taken off and replaced with a new bag is good hygiene.
He stressed the importance of beekeepers registering their hives on Bee Base and keeping the record of hive numbers up to date. It is a big help for the inspectors as if there is an outbreak, they can contact all beekeepers within a 3 km radius of it or more.
Stewart then went on to inspect 2 hives that Michael had prepared.
When it comes to FB disease inspection, the only sure method is to shake the bees off each frame, looking out for that one cell that has any signs of disease. It only takes one cell to show us. And you can’t always see it with bees on the frame. The best way is to shake them off.
If found early enough, the bees can be saved, if not, it’s destruction and sterilisation of the equipment. The first step is to inspect the hive from the outside.
Make sure the hive looks ok, not damaged from woodpecker or other. Check underneath the floor of the hive, to see if there are dead bees about, this gives an indication of what’s going on inside the hive. If there’s a mass of dead bees at the front it could be an indication of starvation, varroa, poisoning or chronic bee paralysis, among other things.
Also it’s good to see what the bees are bringing in, pollen on their legs is a sign of brood in the hive.
You don’t have to see all the signs, 1 or 2 is sufficient to alert you.
Generally, EFB is found on unsealed brood, but can be found in sealed. AFB is mostly in sealed brood.
When looking for EFB some signs are an uneven or patchy brood pattern, dead and discoloured larvae in uncapped cells, twisted lying unnaturally in the cell, in some circumstances larvae may die after capping; sometimes there is also an unpleasant smell.
If a hive has any of these signs, the apiary must be put on stand still, (nothing allowed off the site). When results are verified, and the infested hive is cleaned, treated or destroyed by burning, the stand still order will be cancelled.
Stewart emphasised that if you have concerns at any time, do please take pictures and email them to him, as this can be a quick way of finding out if your bees require further investigation. Email in Contacts List.
We are very pleased to tell you that the Show will be held this year, following its cancellation last year. The details have to be finalised as we have not yet fully returned to normal from Covid, but the following website has much more information, including the Schedule of Classes: www.honeyshow.co.uk
The following is quoted from that information:
‘Thank you for supporting the National Honey Show. After such a long period of lockdown I think we are all looking forward to seeing each other face to face (not too close though!). Do start preparing your entries so we can make the 2021 show a bumper celebration as we start our return to normality. We are doing everything we can to make this a normal show, but as we go to print, we are unsure of exactly what rules we will have to follow to comply with COVID-19 regulations. We may have to implement a time schedule for you to bring in your entries, so please take note of the changes to the entry form and look out for specific instructions that will be sent out with the entry.’
Surrey Honey Show, 10-11th September
The Honey Show that usually takes place annually in a marquee at the Surrey County Show in Guildford, will not take place again this year because of Covid restrictions.
However, The Show Committee decided that there will be a Show. Full details will be available later on, but for now here is some advance information:
Venue: Henfold Lane Apiary, Beare Green, Dorking (home of the Reigate Division) Classes: 21 classes, similar to 2019 schedule, will be available later.
Look at the National Bee Unit (NBU) website for details and photos of the effects of the disease and check the larvae (unsealed brood) in your hives carefully. Report anything suspicious to our local Seasonal Bee Inspector, Steward Westsmith.
Over the last few years there has been a considerable amount of debate on the use of polystyrene hives. As usual with beekeepers and many beekeeping matters, there is a very wide division of opinion on this. Some have advocated their use in preference to wooden hives, while others, equally knowledgeable and skilled in beekeeping, have been totally opposed to them. The former have pointed out that they have heat insulating advantages in winter and claim that the colony grows more rapidly and to a greater size in spring. They also say that they are lighter to handle and that their cost is less than that of of wooden hives, but it should be remembered that the life of a poly hive is far less than that of a wooden hive, some of which are still perfectly usable after 50 years or more. It would be interesting to do a proper long-term comparison of the cost of the two types. A very rough estimate indicates that a conservative figure for the real cost of poly hives is at least twice that of wooden ones as they don’t last as long. Those who do not like them point out that polystyrene hives cannot be sterilized as effectively as wooden ones as a blowlamp obviously cannot be used for this purpose. However, a more sinister problem has come to my attention in recent weeks, now that EFB has been identified in our area. Apparently the NBU does not take responsibility for the sterilising of polystyrene hives (as they do by the flaming of wooden hives) when foulbrood (EFB or AFB) has been found in them and so this very important task is left to individual beekeepers to manage. Full details can be found under: Hive Cleaning and Sterilisation on their website (https://nationalbeeunit.com). Treatment of poly hives is on the 9th (unnumbered) page. Cleaning has to be done by careful scraping, then sterilisation by immersing and scrubbing the hives in a large container of water to which various chemicals (some dangerous to handle) have been added by the beekeeper and it is implied that this important process does not necessarily have to be carried out or observed by the NBU inspector. It does not take much imagination to realise that infected or inadequately cleaned polystyrene hives may well be put back into use, or taken to the local authority’s dump from where polystyrene currently goes to landfill, complete with AFB or EFB, which bees in the area could easily pick up. As poly hives cannot be expected to last for as long as wooden ones, we could expect a greater rate of replacement of them with the possibility of more infected hives being dumped (with or without sterilising). This all seems to be a great way of spreading these highly infectious diseases after the wonderful work done by the Bee Inspectors and others over many years to reduce them to tolerable levels, their work could well be undermined by the practices described above. Then, of course, there is the serious matter of AFB with its long-lived (40 or more years) highly infectious spores that could be spread around as a result of careless polyhive disposal. Also, there is the further damage to the environment by the scrapping of more plastic materials. There are currently moves afoot to influence the NBU in view of the likely effect of their proposals and no doubt we shall hear more of this in time.
Of course the simple way to stop this serious source of spreading of AFB and EFB is to make the manufacture, sale, importation and use of polystyrene beehives illegal. It would also reduce the mounting problem of plastic in the environment which is another major cause of concern. This would raise another set of problems, but I would suggest that these would be more easily solvable and of significantly less importance than disease spread.
I realise that there is a lot of disagreement among beekeepers on the use of polyhives, and I fear that the opinions of many beekeepers are deeply entrenched on this, one way or the other, as with many other beekeeping opinions! However, I would suggest that new beekeepers do make a very serious attempt to look into and weigh up the pros and cons of polystyrene before taking one view or the other.
I welcome any comments on this article. Do please point out any errors or false assumptions. I assure you that I will not be offended by anything you write. I hope there will be plenty to put into the next Newsletter, either with or without your name as you wish. This is too important a subject to take comments personally. I think that we need to deal in facts. The important point is to establish what the actual facts are, among the vast number of opinions.
UPDATE: WBK Summer Social Meeting, August 21st, 3.30pm
Given the lockdown we have all endured for the last year or so we thought it would be a good idea for us all to meet up and catch up. Hoping that the weather is good, Paul and Helen Bunclark have very kindly agreed to let us use their facility; most beginners and students of recent years will already be aware of it from the summer practicals they will have attended there. A map and details of where Paul’s place is for those that do not know were enclosed in the recent News Letter.
The structure will be that WBK will provide Sausages, Burgers, Buns, etc. with attendees asked to bring along any special foods they want as well as salads and desserts to share. Please bring any drink you want other than tea and coffee – for which please bring your own mug. As we will be buying the food we would like to get an indication of numbers in advance, please therefore email David Parker (address below) with ‘Coming to BBQ’ in the subject line with how many e.g. Coming to BBQ 2 or Coming to BBQ 1, thanks. If you require a vegetarian option please also put that in the subject line.
The invitation is open to all members and we hope you will bring your partner. It would be great to get as many people along as possible so some of our new members can meet the older ones. We do hope you can join us for what I am sure will be a great afternoon.
Given the lockdown we have all endured for the last year or so we thought it would be a good idea for us all to meet up and catch up. Hoping that the weather is good, Paul and Helen Bunclark have very kindly agreed to let us use their facility; most beginners will already be aware of it from the summer practicals they will have attended there this year. The idea is to have a bring along BBQ. Closer to the time we will ask people to give us an indication if they are attending and the division will supply rolls, sausages, burgers with everyone invited to bring any special foods they want as well as salads and desserts to share.
September 18th, 2.30pm
Preparing for Winter. This meeting will be hosted at David Parker’s Fairoaks Airport apiary. There is more than one way to prepare for winter so in addition to breaking into groups and going through some hives looking at stores, etc. David will take us through how he takes his bees through winter, his method of two National 8-frame boxes. It is also hoped that one or two other beekeepers will talk about how they take their bees through winter. When to feed syrup, when to use fondant, what ratios of sugar to water for syrup, how much syrup to feed, can you over feed your bees? All these and other questions will be addressed along with talking about winter chemical treatments and options for controlling Varroa. David Parker davidparker@polymathconsulting.com 07712 07930