Kairos summer bee report

Volunteers have been a highlight of this spring and summer, writes Kairos beekeeper Grace Madden. We recently hosted two more work-experience students from Eden Park High School, Tomas and Sam, who were introduced to beekeeping by our team. The students learned how important bees and pollinators are to the environment, the mysteries of hive life and how we humans can do our part to care for them. The boys also got to grips with the messy business of extracting and bottling honey.

Overall, it’s been a very busy summer. Heavy losses last winter left us with only four out of nine colonies. However, we have peaked this summer with 15 spread over three locations by using the ‘artificial swarm’ technique. This is when we split a colony getting ready to swarm into two new colonies, so tricking them into thinking they have already swarmed. In addition, we captured two swarms we found. Now our aim is to make sure the colonies are strong enough to thrive this winter.

Thank you to all our volunteers who helped make this possible. And to those moving on to a new chapter in their lives, we wish you well in your adventures.