The Walrus and the Honey Bee
A friendly, informative space for both new and seasoned beekeepers, offering practical advice, personal storytelling, and an emphasis on responsible care for honey bees. Steve Donohoe is a bee farmer, author, and magazine editor based in Cheshire, UK. He works alongside his son, Alex.
Episodes
Intro
00:25 New book by Dorian Pritchard on conservation of native bees
01:10 Argument for conservation of native bees, legally protected areas should be created
02:40 Is the black bee really the best bee for all people? I think not, but each to their own.
04:40 Sue Coby's New World Carniolan project could be a template to follow
05:00 Examples of human interference in nature to domesticate wild animals into farming livestock. Also BEA...
Intro
including reference to Ian Steppler YouTube video just posted on varroa treatments, using Randy Oliver spreadsheet model. https://youtu.be/Z2FLoAq6LDc
02:20 Recent apiary inspection of nucleus colonies
03:50 What causes swarming?
06:40 Impossible to eliminate, but we can influence
07:10 Genetics, personal experience, Paul Horton's bees, sub-species
11:25 Queen pheromones, age of queens
12:35 Brood nest congestion
15:10 Climate and w...
00:30 Importance of both good queens and low mite levels
01:40 How Steve's thinking on varroa treatment regimes evolved from 2 times per year to three.
02:20 Alcohol wash on all colonies as per Randy Oliver, treatment threshold
03:15 What to do with infested colonies in summer when supers are on, what causes outlier colonies with more mites than the others, benefits of winter oxalic acid treatment
04:50 Shook swarm - the drastic option
...
0:00 When oilseed rape (OSR) first arrived in the UK
00:50 The UK has moved from being a net exporter to net imported of rapeseed oil, costing the UK economy £1 billion
01:10 List of the main cooking oils ranked by healthiness
03:10 Rapeseed oil is the most consumed oil in the UK
04:00 OSR is useful to arable farmers as a rotation crop
04:40 OSR downsides, cabbage stem flea beetle, neonics
05:20 The neonic ban in the UK, lower crop yield...
Based on post of 19 November 2024 on thewalrusandthehoneybee.com
01:30 The damage caused by varroa mites - leading cause of colony losses worldwide
03:30 Learning to keep bees alive
04:00 Current trend among hobby beekeepers for going treatment-free
06:00 USA honey bee colony losses, deformed wing virus
07:45 Using an alcohol wash to monitor mite infestation
09:00 Randy Oliver spreadsheet model
10:20 Available mite treatments, using them...
Intro and reasons for not using an AI reader.
01:30 Reasons for making queens
02:35 Importance of being organised, knowing timings, mindset - sometimes things go wrong
03:19 Breeder queens, Steve's three breeder queens in 2024 and why these were selected
06:45 Keeping breeder queens in nucleus hives
07:40 Drones, open mating, using drone comb
08:20 Using BeeBase
09:20 Re-queening poor colonies
10:08 Cell builders, double nuc method compare...
Imogen reads from Steve's blog post of 1st September 2024
00:53 Queens
The importance of the queen in a honey bee colony cannot be overstated
02:37 Gruff Rees reviewed "Healthy Bees, Heavy Hives" by Paul Horton and Steve Donohoe, calling it "the best beekeeping book ever". We'll take that.
02:40 Comparison between colonies headed by my normal queens and four which contained queens made by Ivan Nielsen in Denmark. It turned out that t...
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