All Change – plans for comb management

With EFB at Southowram, the Association Apiary is obviously unfit for a visit.  This meeting was cancelled in May but has now been rescheduled to The Good Shepherd, where there will be practical demonstrations without bees.

The current advice is that brood comb should be changed every 2-3 years to prevent disease build up within the colony.

At this meeting we will look at various methods of achieving this with practical demonstrations:

• annual piece- meal change
• 50% change in a double brood
• Bailey comb change
• Shook swarm method
• using nuclei to draw comb

We will also look at an alternative method of varroa estimation using a sugar roll.