Club Meeting - Wally Shaw

Wally lives on Anglesey with his wife Jenny. He represents Wales on the Bee Health Advisory Panel and is the WBKA Technical Officer, in which role he has written a number booklets for the Association which are distributed free to all members.

Wally has given permission for this talk to be recorded.

The Role of Swarm Control in Beekeeping

Jenny and Wally came to live on Anglesey 44 years ago. They have about 2 acres of land and one of their first activities was to establish a large vegetable garden and plant an orchard comprising about 65 trees – mostly apples (over 50 varieties) but also pears and plums. After about 8 years, during which the trees had plenty of blossom, they had still not borne much fruit and they thought it might be lack of pollination. Through their children they knew a beekeeper in the next village and asked him if he would like to put a hive in the orchard. Like most beekeepers, he jumped at the chance. He came and went during the following summer and at the end of the season had some honey and for the first time, a crop of fruit.

During the following winter the beekeeper had to move to another area in the country and needed to downsize. He offered Jenny & Wally the colony and that is how it all started. Knowing next to nothing about beekeeping, at first they struggled. One hive became 2 and then 4 making a steady progression until they were keeping about 65 colonies in 6 apiaries. A minor activity had become an obsession. Both have a background in ecological research so it was the interest in bees that became the driving force. For 10-15 years they struggled with swarm control but eventually devised a series of methods that really worked.

For the last 11 years they have also be making 20-40 nucs to supply new beekeepers with their starter colony of locally adapted bees. During that period they have also been responsible for the management of the ABKA Training Apiary of 12 hives. Jenny is the ABKA Training Officer.

Beekeeping (and particularly work around the hives) has always been a shared activity. On entering an apiary the one who is togged-up first inspects the first hive and after that they take alternate hives. Required management for each hive is discussed and if mutual agreement is reached that is what is done. If they don’t agree (which is fairly rare) then the one whose hive it is predominates.

Wally represents Wales on the Bee Health Advisory Panel and is the WBKA Technical Officer, in which role he has written a number booklets for the Association which are distributed free to all members.

They produced over 1700 pounds of honey in 2022 and also cut comb which has won prizes at the Anglesey show.