Record Keeping- The Year's Calendar

 I've never had any takers from anyone I've shared this record keeping method with, but I've used it for more than 5 or 6 years now, and think it's awesome- much moreso than any other method I've used. I use it in conjunction with a regular hive log book, for details and notes and "to do lists"- but what this offers is a way to quickly "grok" (Heinlein word, for those of my generation), what need to be done, and any give time, for entire apiaries.  No flipping pages, it's really obvious.

I've share it in this blog before, even provided a PDF format (since improved upon), but I'll describe it again here.

Basically its a calendar of 1/2"x 1/2" squares, with rows for every hive in one's apiaries, and scrolling out to as far as one wants to keep records for the year (generally November, but easy to add to if longer).

Each time I inspect a hive, I draw a square in ink on the chart, possibly make some short notes (sometimes "see log"), and color code it. Here is this years, just a month's records so far, laid out:

Close up, here is a typical part of the chart.  The colors mean a lot. Blue means I looked in the hive, and thought is pretty good. A laying queen, no queen cells, food, etc. It doesn't need anything, and can wait for 10 days or so.

But the other colors are flags, and they are basic. Yellow for a hive that has obviously swarmed, orange for one I've found queen cells in, red for a queenless hive, green for a hive I done something with, like Demareed, and purple for a mite treatment.

Red, orange, yellow= they of course are the one's that need attention, So, for example below, hive one, on the 28th, was found to be queenless. I added a frame of eggs, so I count to the right to tell me when to check for queen cells - or even further, to see if she mated.

I really think this has been a great benefit to me- to be able to quickly see which apiaries need action, and to know delude myself as to how long it's been since last inspection. It an tell so much.

Should anyone want a copy, let me know, I can tailor if of course!