
Despite a break in the nice weather and a couple of rainy days, it has been a very satisfying week. I jarred up some of the dandelion honey, which exceeded a hundred pounds, and filled back orders from local customers who have been patiently waiting for the bees to do their thing this season. Most of the cut comb from one super has been sold too.
Monitoring Varroa
I told you that Steve Riley’s The Honey Bee Solution to Varroa wouldn’t reach the bookshelf for a long time, and, so far, it hasn’t. https://www.beelistener.co.uk/beekeeping/the-honey-bee-solution-to-varroa-book-review/I spent yesterday afternoon re-reading parts of it. With all the productive colonies divided for swarm control, and one half waiting for new queens to emerge and mate, my attention turns to monitoring for hygienic behaviour and resistance to varroa. I’ve ordered up an inexpensive, supposedly, super duper magnifying glass to check for uncapping and recapping behaviour and chewed out brood during hive inspections.
Chance conversations with two thinking and inventive beekeepers led to discovering a relatively easy way to check another dimension of hygienic behaviour which involves killing 100 pupae in their cells and counting how many of them are removed by worker bees over 24-48 hours. Ian came up with the solution to freeze killing when you can’t buy suitable canisters of nitrous oxide but need to freeze patches of brood for the test; buy a cheap can of freeze spray for temporarily freezing water pipes when you want to work on them. In the UK, it is branded as Artic Hayes Freeze Spray and you can buy it in Screwfix.

Peter dropped in with a lovely surprise present for me yesterday afternoon. As you can see above it’s a purpose built varroa check container with removable basket. He’d watched me give a demonstration of the alcohol wash test for our bee club with my homemade apparatus using a very large Bonne Maman strawberry jam jar with 2 lids, one intact for shaking, and the other perforated for straining. The new one will certainly make the test easier.
Peter knew the story behind the jar. I’d originally bought one of these plastic kits at the Eastern Apicultural Society meeting in Delaware in 2017. But I couldn’t kill the bees back then so I sold it at a beekeeping bring and buy sale. I could have kicked myself; after a few years of sugar-shaking and wasp-attracting sticky messes, I realised how much easier the alcohol wash test is, and probably easier on the bees too in the long run; for the greater good and all that…
Anyway, when you get a couple of beekeeping geeks in the same room you always come up with something new. Over oatcakes and dandelion honey, we talked about Ian’s discovery and management strategy, and how we could improve our own set-ups. Peter came up with an idea for making a test ring for measuring 100 capped pupae, and will work on it this week.
Asian Hornet.

Seeing the wasps back again in the apiary triggers an alert to be mindful of the Asian hornet. I reviewed a book for Northern Bee Books recently and you might find this helpful if you want to hear from someone who has experienced Asian hornet in France. As with all pests and diseases, understanding the life cycle and biology of the organisms is key to developing an integrated pest management strategy. You can find any amount of information on these, but few people here in the UK have had a chance to deal with Asian hornet face on in their apiaries.
Title: Fit2Fight: A Practical Guide For Managing The Asian Hornet
Author: Alan Baxter
Publisher: Northern Bee Books
Year published: 2024.
Paperback: 65 pages.
ISBN 978-1-914934-74-2
Cost: £15. Available from Northern Bee Books www.northernbeebooks.co.uk,and other good bookstores.
Fit2Fight: A Practical Guide For Managing The Asian Hornet is a short compact book full of practical advice on dealing with the Asian hornet when it arrives in your apiary. Alan Baxter has practical experience managing this predator from his days of beekeeping in France, and he is positive that beekeepers in the UK can deal with the new threat and continue beekeeping.
The key to success is adjusting practical beekeeping management over the active season in relation to the life stages of the Asian Hornet and to when they are most threatening. Baxter explains exactly how to achieve this through notes, bullet points, and tabulation. A traffic-light system of colour codes indicates high risk points. The book is well illustrated with many clear colour photographs and some cartoons.
The writing is casual and crafted in the style of a blog which may appeal to readers who like to find practical information quickly and in once place. However, for more in-depth reading on Asian hornet the reader will find references listed. In addition, the definitive work by Professor Stephen Martin, The Asian Hornet (Vespa velutina) Threats, Biology & Expansion, which is based on his experiences studying this hornet in Asia, is a must-read.
Keeping colonies of honey bees strong and healthy is paramount to keeping on top of Asian hornet and there is good practical advice on apiary hygiene, disease monitoring, swarming, and other aspects of good beekeeping practice.
The controversial topic of trapping hornets is addressed. Baxter keeps an open mind explaining that no traps can guarantee 100% avoidance of capturing and damaging other insects. He points out that ideas on management will evolve and change as we learn more about how to deal with Asian hornet in the UK. Current deterrent methods, and track-and-trace tools are explained in this useful handbook.
Fit2Fight… achieves its goal to provide good practical advice on managing Asian hornet. However, Baxter’s use of acronyms such as NBU is puzzling. An explanation would be a helpful consideration for beginners, and readers in other parts of the world, who may not be familiar with the jargon.