Really cold weather

[Becky Hampton]

Is there anything we need special we need to do for the next few nights of really cold weather to protect our bees? Is anyone taking any special precautions with the single digit temps?

[Wally]

If they have food and their numbers are high, they will be fine.

[red rambler]

Had plenty of food but not enough bees.
Looks like I lost the queen earlier. It had been cool/cold enough I had not gone in for a couple of months. Had two mediums of honey.
These were combos of a removal and a swarm.

Off we go into the new year!

[Wally]

I found a deadout today, too. Was alive and flying just before the cold. 3 to go.

[herbcoop]

With the sub degree weather we were getting I went ahead and put tar paper around mine, I went out today and they were out doing a cleansing flight I guess. I took the tar paper off today and did a quick check and all OK.
I have been feeding the sugar bricks to help supplement the food source since I noticed the hives were light, when opening the hives they were going to town on it.

[Jacobs]

It has been a rough winter so far. I brought home 2 more dead outs today-1 expected and 1 a bit of a surprise. These 2 hives were side by side in Summerfield, and the "stronger" hive had a small cluster of bees starve in place covering a tennis ball sized patch of capped brood. I brought home 60-70 lbs of honey in the combs and will figure out what I want to do with it. I may rearrange freezer space or possibly go ahead and extract some honey to open up drawn comb.

[herbcoop]

I read on another board today that a man had 7 hives and lost all of them when he was able to do a hive inspection this weekend, and others saying the same thing
Man this is what I went though last year.... I hate it for everyone an worried about mine at the same time

[B_Lee]

It has been a rough winter so far. I brought home 2 more dead outs today-1 expected and 1 a bit of a surprise. These 2 hives were side by side in Summerfield, and the "stronger" hive had a small cluster of bees starve in place covering a tennis ball sized patch of capped brood. I brought home 60-70 lbs of honey in the combs and will figure out what I want to do with it. I may rearrange freezer space or possibly go ahead and extract some honey to open up drawn comb.

What do you think happend?

[Jacobs]

None of my hives going into winter were as strong as they had been in the past. I think the cool, wet summer led to less nectar and less feed for brood rearing. I probably should have been much more aggressive about combining hives, but I still have difficulty killing queens, even bad ones.

[B_Lee]

None of my hives going into winter were as strong as they had been in the past. I think the cool, wet summer led to less nectar and less feed for brood rearing. I probably should have been much more aggressive about combining hives, but I still have difficulty killing queens, even bad ones.

So you're saying the hives died off because of the cluster was small in numbers and could not stay warm enough until the Queen started laying again?

[mike91553]

Jacobs, won't that honey super be fine sealed up in a garbage bag until spring? That is what I just advised someone to do that had lost a hive. Many people don't have the option of freezing it.

[Jacobs]

It looks like these bees starved in place. The cluster stayed over a small amount of capped brood to keep it warm. The cluster was so small that the bees could not keep brood warm AND reach the food/honey nearby. Even if we had a very mild winter, these bees probably would not have made it. Once an over wintering hive gets small enough, there are not enough workers to take care of the amount of brood needed to replace dying workers and build numbers. Even if a small amount of brood makes it to emergence, the hive is in a spiral down toward a deadout. If this takes long enough and goes on into late winter/early spring, these dwindling hives may be saved by frames of nurse bees and brood from stronger hives.

[Jacobs]

Mike, I'll probably put the fully capped good honey frames in the freezer and take partially capped frames out to make room. For the last few days I have been using my cappings scratcher to lift some cappings off of these partial frames and have put them out for my bees to clean up. They seem to like this plan. They are going absolutely nuts for the spent brewers yeast/soy flour/powdered sugar mix.

Fully capped frames probably would do ok in plastic bags, especially if kept in a cool/cold area. If there are significant amounts of uncapped nectar, I'm afraid that fermentation might cause problems.

[Bsummitkeeper]

I've been reading this board for a couple years but just signed up so this is my first post.

Back story. Last year was my first winter and I took two hives through. I was so scared of starving my bees that I threw 2:1 sugar water at them every day it was 50 degrees. My thought was that 2:1 wouldn't stimulate egg laying but I've since learned different. 1st time I went in was the first of March and both hives were so packed with bees, capped honey, swarm cells and capped brood that I knew I was in trouble. I removed 4 frames of honey from each hive and replaced with new foundation but it was too late. I had 4 swarms (captured 2) from the two hives before March 10th which is hard to believe but I've got the pictures and video to prove it.

I spent all year building my now 4 week hives up and took all 4 into this winter weaker than last year but with what I considered decent stores and a determination not to feed until at least the end of February. Problem is that the posts on here have just about kept me from sleeping at night. I walk out every day and tap on the side of each hive and every day I get a dull roar in response but I just couldn't take it any longer and started feeding today. I assume the queens will kick it into gear and I've counted forward with a calendar and figure there could easily be 50k or more bees in each hive by the middle of April but I'm hoping I can cure that with some early splits while leaving the hives just weak enough to not swarm before the flow starts.

No matter what happens, I'll be adding to my notes so I can get better at helping them. In the end I guess I'd rather have swarms and little honey than complete winter dead outs.

Sorry for such a long post but I'd appreciate any thoughts or advise.

[Wally]

Have you lifted the hives to see how heavy they are? I would go by weight until a sunny 60+ day when they can be opened. Feed only the light ones. The heft test, or just lifting the back of the hive an inch, can tell you lot.

With the weather we had last winter, hives with good stores started brooding in Jan., if they quit at all. It wasn't all caused by your feeding.

Thanks for joining. We appreciate any activity we can get. The more post we get, the more folks will be checking in for new info.

Also, the Guilford club is open to the public and you are welcome to attend the meetings and ask questions of the multi-year beekeepers before and after the meeting. We also put out some pretty good info in the presentations given during the meetings.

[pholcomb]

I didn't have to combine hives and kill a bad queen because my bees did it for me. In September they robbed out a split I had made back in June. That left my three remaining hives fat and happy going into winter. I also fed heavily between July and early October.

All three were foraging heavily yesterday afternoon around 230 when the temp peaked at 53 degrees. The 2nd year hives (Carniolans) were almost as active as the 1st year hive (Wayne's Bees.) I noticed they weren't bringing in as much yellow pollen as last year at this time so I checked the camellias in the neighborhood and (no surprise) the blooms were killed by the cold snap. However, I did see a lot of new blooms about to bust open so if we don't have anymore extreme cold the haul of camellia pollen into the hive should (hopefully) rebound by next week.

Last year was my first keeping bees and my hives made it through without any feeding until late March. They were brimming with bees by then any way despite no extra feeding to stimulate brood production. All three are are still fairly heavy so I'm going to use the strategy and not early feed this year. We'll see how it goes...

Paul

[Jacobs]

This year I want to stimulate brood at my home hives to boost weaker hives in other locations. Last year at this time, the bees showed no interest in the spent brewers yeast pollen substitute mix. Constant storms got in the way of spring swarm management with resulting swarms. All of my hives were much stronger going into last winter than they were going into this one. My goal for this spring is to have the additional bees available to boost surviving, but weak hives. With recent deadouts, if these hives get too crowded and I have to split, I have equipment to put bees in.

[Becky Hampton]

I'd like some advice on making a split. I got into my one hive on Sunday to check on the bees. I fed them 2:1 sugar water heavily through the fall to help them build up. When I checked on them Sunday, the top super was still heavy - full of capped honey and had bees walking all around on it. I lifted it off and the middle super was full of bees as well. I didn't pull any frames out - didn't want to be in it too long. I didn't go into the bottom super because the top two seemed fine at this point. So I know I might be counting my chickens before they hatch, but I like to be prepared. I'm thinking if they stay strong for the remainder of the winter, I'll make a split with them. I want to do this before they swarm (again - assuming they make it through the rest of the winter). My question is when should I make the split? Late February? Early March? Once the red maples start flowering? What do you think?

[Jacobs]

You either need to have drones flying that can mate with the queen or you need to be able to buy a mated queen to introduce into the split. You are probably looking at around early April for drones in this area. The temperature also has to be warm enough (60°F or higher) to do the extensive frame manipulation involved in a split.

John Pledger of Triad Bee Supply is scheduled to be our March speaker on the topic of spring splits.

[Becky Hampton]

Thanks for the info! Good timing to have John talk about making splits in March.