May 2008

Hello Beekeepers,

Thank you for your response on the state of your bees. The numbers of colony losses, poorly mated queens and struggling hives will be collected for the whole country by BBKA. Doug Jones has sent a press release on Danish bees which I will bring to the next meeting.

If you are one of the ten percent of beekeepers that BBKA have asked to complete a survey, please, please, do complete and return it. It is very important that we get an accurate view of what is happening throughout the country.

I have a lot of information sent recently which is too expensive to send by post. I will always set it out for you to look at, at each meeting, so to keep up to date, do come.

We used to go to Stoneleigh for the one day trade stands to get bargains, but now we go for the variety of great lectures, courses like basic beekeeping, the microscopy, queen rearing, and the trade stands. If you are just curious or would like to find out what it would be like to be a secretary, treasurer, honey show organiser, the BBKA are now providing it!
If you are interested next year, we can see if we can set up a car share. The one day Convention was better attended by Liverpool as Doug Jones kindly hired a coach for the day, but a three day event is more complicated to arrange as people want to go on different days or stay two or three days.

I am producing this letter before Arthur Gillett’s meeting as it is only a fortnight to the next one at this apiary, Park Cottage, on Saturday, 10th May, at 2.30pm when Seasonal Bee Inspector, Stuart Beattie, will cover making up a nucleus hive and swarm control. Hopefully a practical demo. But if poor weather it will be a ‘semi-practical’ session!
We hope to see you in May and on a glorious day!

Good beekeeping,
Sheila Myron
Hon Secretary