Beekeeping - like Christmas in April!
Posted: Saturday 10 April, 2010
Our beekeepers' association has a talk from an officer in the Bee Inspectorate on Tuesday. It was really interesting and he seemed very nice and helpful. The role of the Bee Inspectorate, which is part of SGRPID (Scottish Government Rural Payments and Inspection Division), is to deal with notifiable diseases of bees - mainly American and European Foul Brood. All Association members are being asked to provide details of where they keep their bees so that if there is an outbreak of either disease, the Inspectors can notify local beekeepers to be on the lookout for infection. Both diseases can devastate colonies, so close inspection, good biosecurity, hive hygiene and varroa control are really important. I'm so glad we'll have an experienced mentor to help us.
The highlight of the evening was the distribution of our equipment - brood boxes, supers, frames, foundation, hive tools, smoker - the car was full! And the smell! The hives are made of red cedar and the scent of the wood was pretty marvellous, especially combined with the honey, waxy scent of the foundation. We're not going to build the boxes until we move - they will be easier to transport flat pack. We'll put a hive up when we get there and put some frames and foundation in - if we're lucky, we might get a swarm moving in.
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