Day out at Seán Osbourn’s Farm

Yet again, the tribe’s beekeepers had a great day out at Sean Osborn’s farm. The sun was out and the place was buzzing. We all arrived pretty much on time for the 1 pm start as lots wanted to get away to see some match on TV J can you imagine watching TV over playing with bees, well I never.

The day started with a quick talk about varroa mite and the native bee society http://nihbs.org/. We were then split into 4 groups as there

were 4 demonstration stands covering, queen rearing, splitting a hive to produce a queen, hive inspection for diseases, queen cell selection.

Each stand was a wealth of information as we all swarmed around the teacher like new bees hungry for honey. During the day we got to see a live swarm take place, the air was full of the little kamahis pilots as they lit up the sky with buzzing and dashing after the queen. As we went about our talks and later about an hour (what are you trying to say here)the swarm landed on a bush and later Sean got the bucket and sprayed water on it, tapped the bush to knock the bees back into his safekeeping and popped them into a new hive. I bet he set all this up just for our sake. At the end of the event we were served fine cakes, sandwiches and tea. I spoke to Sean and he kindly offered any help that he could to help the new club to get going and he was delighted to do what he could for us. We had five members turn up for the day and it was great to meet you all. We will have to make sure we are ready to hold an event next year and the hardest part will be competing with the after event tea and buns so now we need to find the baker in our club.

Tonight the rest of the club get their new bees so the very best of luck to each of you and don’t forget we are all here to help each other so don’t be afraid to ask.