I went down to Devizes to a cutely named little place called Bishops Cannings on Saturday morning for my mycroscopy one day course.
I had an very satisfying day – there was so much to learn that the day went very swiftly and the Lecturers were so good it was made easy to know what you were doing.
I’m beginning to wonder what has happened to me – I think I need to win the Lottery to finance all the fascinating times one could have just studying stuff! - I don’t think the innards of a frog should really have been my original intro into science! The lecturers Sally Wadsworth, Alan Stonell and Tony Herbert are all Beekeepers from Wiltshire who are Scientists in real life and whom are terrific Lecturers.
Tony Herbert has designed a combined hive – base brood box is the size of a commercial but is a forshortened top bar hive which will accommodate national supers above it. He will be publishing his detailed plans as soon as he has them finished – for free - just asks that it’s refered to as the Herbert Hive, his email address is tony.herbee@btopenworld.com - drop him an email and he’ll send you the link when he has finished the design.
He had a prototype to inspect - it would seem to be easier to make than all those rebates and cross bars on a national so I might have a go in the summer.
Back to the mycroscopy course , we were taught how to detect Nosema, how to inspect the trachea for Acarine mites, how to dissect and identify the abdomen innards and how to prepare pollen slides for identification using Catkin Pollen as the standard by which to measure all others at 25ums (yes – first time I’ve ever used the measurement in text or ever! I’m sure I must qualify for an ology of some sort!).
The best result from the day is that a lot of the guess work has been taken away when I worry about diseases. Obviously we didn’t study EFB or AFB but I think with a little more research I could at least have comparisons in mind – seeing the stuff in real life makes the diagrams spring off the page – fabulous! Studying made easier!…………I wonder if……………..!
