Hive checks

We carried out a check on all our hives today. We have 10, two of which are new - they contain the two swarms I captured last month. Four hives have supers that are nearly full and could be taken off in the next two weeks. If they are anything like the super I took off one of the hives on Wednesday, they should each have about 15 kg of honey. So, in total, the honey crop will be 75kg by the start of August.

Two of the hives had given us cause for concern earlier this year. Both looked weak at the time but now both are strong. We added a super to one of them two weeks ago and that hive has nearly filled it. Today we added a super to the other one.

It wasn't all good news. One of the new swarm hives looks weak. One of last year's hives also looks odd inside - with drone but no worker brood. It may mean it has an infertile queen. These two hives may be candidates to merge with others.

Nevertheless, we are looking at a good crop of honey and with a bit of luck could get over 100kg by the end of the summer. The video above was filmed a couple of weeks ago. It shows our checking the hive from which we removed the honey last week.