The Yorkshire Beekeeper

The Yorkshire Beekeeper Beekeeper in the Yorkshire Dales

www.theyorkshirebeekeeper.co.uk

[email protected]

08/06/2026

🐝 Ten days after carefully grafting one-day-old larvae, these queen cells are ready for the next stage of their journey.

💛 Placed into Lyson Mini Plus nucleus colonies, each holds the potential to become the heart of a future colony.

🪩 www.theyorkshirebeekeeper.co.uk

04/06/2026

🐝 Most people look at the weather forecast and decide whether they'll need a coat and perhaps an umbrella. Beekeepers tend to look a little deeper.

Last week's warm weather had the bees flying well, but it was also drying things out. Now we've started June with rain, which means the bees are spending more time at home while the trees, hedgerows and wildflowers get a much-needed drink.

We're also entering the June gap, the period between the spring flowers finishing and the main summer nectar flow beginning.

When we look at the forecast, we're not just thinking about sunshine and rain. We're thinking about nectar, flowering times, queen mating and what the landscape might look like in a few weeks' time.

The weather doesn't just affect the bees. It affects everything the bees depend on.

So while this weekend's forecast might not be ideal for flying, it could be exactly what's needed for the weeks ahead.

Sometimes a rainy spell in June does more for the bees than a sunny one.

🪩 www.theyorkshirebeekeeper.co.uk

03/06/2026

🐝 It takes around one month to turn a tiny day-old larva into a mated queen.

❤️ What looks like a single queen at the end of the journey actually represents weeks of work by both the bees and the beekeeper.

👑 Throughout the season we're grafting new queens, managing nucleus colonies and monitoring queens at every stage of development, from queen cells and newly emerged virgins to queens that have successfully mated and started laying.

💛 By the time one queen is being marked, the next generation is already being prepared by us and raised by the bees.

🪩 www.theyorkshirebeekeeper.co.uk

02/06/2026

🐝 The best beekeepers don't chase honey. They look after bees.

"Take care of the bees and the honey will take care of itself."

It's a simple piece of beekeeping wisdom, but one that still rings true today.

When people think about beekeeping, they often think about honey. The golden jars, the harvest, and the final product.

But experienced beekeepers know that good honey crops are usually the result of healthy, thriving colonies rather than the goal itself.

A colony needs a strong queen, healthy brood, access to forage, enough space to grow, and careful management throughout the season. When those things are in place, the bees are free to do what they do best - gather nectar and turn it into honey.

It's easy to focus on the jars at the end of the process, but every jar starts much earlier.

It starts with healthy bees.

At The Yorkshire Beekeeper, much of our time is spent on the things most people never see. Raising queens, monitoring colony health, making splits, maintaining equipment and ensuring our bees have the best possible conditions to thrive.

It's a simple saying, but one that reminds us that successful beekeeping begins with the bees, not the honey.

🪩 www.theyorkshirebeekeeper.co.uk

🐝 Many of you will know that we've been supplying overwintered nucleus colonies for several years. What some new followe...
01/06/2026

🐝 Many of you will know that we've been supplying overwintered nucleus colonies for several years. What some new followers may not know is that Matthew has also been grafting and raising his own queens for much of that time, using carefully selected, locally adapted stock that has thrived in our Yorkshire Dales conditions.

👑 Those queens have played an important role in the growth and development of The Yorkshire Beekeeper, helping to produce colonies known for their temperament, resilience and performance. We're now pleased that we'll be offering a very limited number of mated queens for sale for the first time this season.

🐝 Earlier this year, Matthew took the leap, he handed in his notice as a Mechanical Engineer and became a full-time beekeeper, allowing us to dedicate even more time to the bees and continue growing the business. Offering queens for sale feels like a natural next step in that journey.

👑 Our 2026 open mated queens are grafted and raised in Settle, North Yorkshire, from our locally adapted Yorkshire Dales stock and will be available in very limited numbers by collection only - please get in touch via the "contact us" page on our website for further information:

🪩 www.theyorkshirebeekeeper.co.uk

31/05/2026

🐝 A few days after introducing the latest round of grafts to the cell builder, we've checked progress and are pleased to see that 29 out of 30 grafts have been accepted by the bees.

👑 At this stage, the larvae are being generously fed royal jelly, a rich secretion produced by young nurse bees. While all young larvae receive some royal jelly, those selected to become queens are fed it continuously and in far greater quantities throughout their development. It is the quantity and duration of royal jelly feeding that triggers queen development.

💛 The bees are now hard at work extending the queen cells and caring for the developing queens. So far, this batch is looking very promising.

🪩 www.theyorkshirebeekeeper.co.uk

31/05/2026

🐝 Yesterday we spotted a Red Mason Bee using a hole in the side of our workshop where a wall plug had once been. Unlike honey bees, Red Mason Bees are solitary bees, meaning each female builds and provisions her own nest rather than living in a colony.

These fascinating pollinators are a common sight in spring and early summer, often making use of small holes and cavities to raise their young. Despite their solitary lifestyle, Red Mason Bees are highly effective pollinators and play an important role in supporting our native plants and wildlife.

While The Yorkshire Beekeeper specialises in honey bees, we love all bees and enjoy spotting the many different species that share our local environment. Every bee has an important role to play in supporting biodiversity and healthy ecosystems.

To learn more about Britain's bees, visit the Bumblebee Conservation Trust at:

🪩 www.bumblebeeconservation.org

You can find more about our honey bees and beekeeping at:

🪩 www.theyorkshirebeekeeper.co.uk

🐝 We’ve had lots of calls, messages and tags about swarms over the past couple of weeks and have attended as many as pos...
30/05/2026

🐝 We’ve had lots of calls, messages and tags about swarms over the past couple of weeks and have attended as many as possible, whilst also balancing the work involved in caring for our own bees here in Settle.

📸 If you contact us about a swarm, we’ll always ask you to send a photo or short video first. This really helps us identify what sort of bees they are and how accessible they are. Straightforward honeybee swarm collections are carried out free of charge.

❤️ The great news is that we’ve seen a big increase in people contacting us about what turn out to be bumblebees, a lovely sign that they’re doing well locally too. There’s lots of helpful information available from:

🪩 www.bumblebeeconservation.org

ℹ️ There’s more information about swarm collections, FAQs and how we manage collected swarms on our website:

🪩 www.theyorkshirebeekeeper.co.uk

💛Thank you to everyone who has contacted us and helped look after the bees

30/05/2026

🐝 People know Brenda (Matthew's mum) for her beeswax candles, but she's a woman of many talents.

🔨 This week she's been busy assembling hundreds Langstroth and National frames we use across our apiaries.



🪩 www.theyorkshirebeekeeper.co.uk

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Settle
Settle

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+447934589891

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