Category: Summer

Mid-Summer Update & Beehive Replacement Program

This year’s hive loss for me was astounding, but it did not really have an impact on my desire to keep beekeeping. It was really more of an Act of Nature that helped me to reduce my hive count (a goal that I had set out on, as of the end of last year.) After the big losses (around 50%), selling a dozen full hives and my normal increase for the year, I am down to 51 hives. It’s been a MUCH easier Spring/Summer and I should actually finish honey extraction this weekend. I have never finished in July! Well, maybe I did a decade ago, but certainly not in recent memory. Ideally, I hope to offload between 15 and 20 hives next year – this should get me to a much more manageable number for my current situation today (given family and general life demands). I will surely increase my hives again, sometime in the distant future, but look forward to running between 20 and 30 for the next decade or so.

Yesterday, there was an article in the Times Dispatch regarding bee loss – it looks like it averaged 60% for the state this past Winter!! At least I am not losing my mind – it was a tough one. The article did not point to a single issue, but I am quite certain there was one. I had too many hives that exhibited the exact same symptoms for me to believe otherwise. Plus, I have never had losses anywhere near what the state has until this past year. I have a hunch that a strain of nosema or something similar hit them hard (or maybe the weather created the perfect storm for that parasite.)

Regardless, the Spring ended up being one of my best for Nuc creation and survival. I am not sure if this was because I had less hives (and thus more time for the Nucs) or if it was the weather (it’s hard for me to believe that all that rain was good for the bees, but what do I know?) In addition, I feel really good about the hives that I sold, given they were stock that survived this previous, tough Winter.

The final observation for me is the low swarming season. Maybe I am about to get hammered with swarms, but I really have had VERY few swarms this season. In addition, I also received very few calls. This may all be coincidence (or maybe my hives are simply going to rock July and swarm away), but it is worth noting. I have several White queens out there, so something should happen in some of those hives. We shall see.

Lastly, the article in the paper pointed to a new Beekeeper program that is giving away full hives (from the state) to help offset some of the past Winter losses. I am really not sure if this is just equipment or it includes the bees, but it is worth checking out.

http://www.vdacs.virginia.gov/plant-industry-services-beehive-distribution-program.shtml

And so the tough season begins…

Based on the last two weeks, the nectar flow has dropped substantially in my areas (eastern Henrico and Charles City County.) I have seen a slight increase happen towards the middle of June in the past, but who knows what this Summer has in store. As I write this, we are finally getting some rain, although not the real soakers that I like. Still, hopefully this will prompt the Summer bloomers to be a bit more productive then normal. The clover has gone crazy and continues to bloom everywhere. Queen Anne’s Lace is also going to town now. Hopefully, this will provide a last shot of honey before the real tough season begins.

On the negative experience front, I lost a ton of honey in a robbing situation. I found 4 hives over the last couple of weeks with queen problems. Two of them had gone so long that the foragers had started laying, which is always a nightmare. I have been really lucky with placing a Nuc on the spot where the hive was and moving the main hive 15 feet away (or more). This has allowed me to save the primary force of bees and then, about 5 days later, combining them back with the main hive. This has worked very successfully 3 times already (I’ve had a few queen problems this year, due to all of the daggone swarming!) In my opinion, the foragers for the main hive end up coming back to the queenright Nuc and they combine naturally. Then, after a few days, the Nuc is so strong that combining them with the (now much reduced, since the foragers have moved to the Nuc) original hive is easy.

This past weekend, I did it on two hive and it cost me a ton of honey. Both of the main hives ended up being robbed substantially. I didn’t care so much about the bees (they were laying workers and only a very few nurse bees), but both hives had a lot of frames of honey that I had planned to use for the Winter Nucs. Clearly, with the flow dropping, more bees are testing the defenses of neighboring hives. This strategy is still a good one, as I did save the foragers and ended up with a fine hive building up as it should. But, I need to take the frames of honey in the future, once we get towards the end of May. Live and learn.

The other two hives I caught in time to drop a frame of eggs from one of my better hives into them and are (hopefully) now building new queens.

There are a couple of things that I have come away with from all of this. For one, my feeding will now take the conservative approach. No more feeding outside of the hives. Only feed late in the evening and only open young/weak hives late in the evening. This also means that most of my inspections now start to happen on a monthly basis, as opposed to every other week. I’ll pretty much just check supers and pull a middle frame from the brood nest to insure there is (or at least was recently) a queen. In all honesty, I have so many hives that capped brood is good enough for me. Plus, I don’t like to do full inspections when the nectar flow drops. Too much fighting when other bees are attracted by the smell of honey!

I have also decided that I will buy a voice recorder for my inspections. Most of my queen problems were easily prevented, but I simply neglected to either note it in my journal or, if I did note it (such as, hive swarmed – check for laying queen in 3 weeks), to come back and check at the right time. I have great notes from the last few years, but not as good this year. My Nuc program and trying to keep up with the honey production (as well as wife and 20 month old) have kept me so busy that I have slacked off of this important task. Again, live and learn!

Overwintering Nuc’s

There is a well respected beekeeper in New England (he is respected nationwide, but has his operation in New England) named Michael Palmer. He has been extremely successful raising bees and what follows is a recap of one of his methods from forum threads, articles and 3rd-party sources. I wanted to record it here, as I will definitely experiment with some of his ideas. I am a big fan.

Per the title of this post, the end goal of the following approach is to successfully overwinter Nuc’s. One might assume that this is aimed at the fellow who accidentally has a small hive that he has to place in a Nuc before Winter or maybe someone who has hived a small swarm late in the year. Although some of these concepts may work for those situations, the purpose of this information is not for use as a life saver. It is actually a strategy.

The first question should therefore be ‘Why do you want to have Nuc’s that even need to be overwintered?’

1. Improve the genetic quality of your apiary – you’ll always have a hive or two (or ten) that  under-performs. It produces less honey and or possibly suffers more from natural stresses. You really do not need this hive sending its drones out to mate with your new queens and continuing this poor gene pool.

2. Nuc’s are great resources for other hives or Nuc’s. They represent a ready pool of capped brood or eggs for those emergency situations.

3. It’s a great way to increase the number of hives in your apiary. Many Nuc’s will come out of Winter so strong that they will build up very quickly and may become your next top producer.

Again, the primary reason is culling  your genetic pool. So, the first step is to identify your weak hives. Take these hives and create Nuc’s from them. Each Nuc that you create from a single hive should include the following:

  1. At least 1.5 frames of capped brood
  2. 1 frame of pollen and honey
  3. 1 empty drawn frame or a frame of foundation

The timing for this should be after the main flow. Michael Palmer does it in mid-July. In the Central Virginia area, anytime in July would probably work, but I will need to experiment.

You should be able to get 3 to 6 Nuc’s out of a single, mature hive. Now that you have your Nuc’s, you add your new queens to the mix. The key here is new queens. You defeat the purpose if you let them raise their own, as you are only continuing the poor gene  pool. Michael Palmer goes on to say that you should be using your own queens. In a worst case scenario, you are using queens from a local supplier that is breeding from established, non-treated, strong stock. Michael Palmer is adamant that any given beekeeper with a 2 year old hive can raise better queens then he can purchase. Regardless of the truth of this statement or not, the underlying principle is logical from a biological perspective. (It should be noted that I am still purchasing queens/new hives as part of my build up strategy – I am trying to obtain a diverse gene pool before I begin the master plan!)

So, where do you put your Nuc’s? I have read where some folks in Northern Virginia use regular Nuc bodies just fine. Michael Palmer users what he calls a ‘4 frame double nuc‘ (he actually uses a lot of things, but this is his primary vehicle for overwintering Nuc’s.) This is simply a deep brood chamber with a divider down the middle. The bottom is similarly divided with a small, 3 inch wide entrance for each side, on opposite sides of the super. I am pretty sure he uses tight-fitting, migratory covers, but the point is that neither side should be able to touch the other side, period.

Once you have your Nuc prepared, it’s time to move it to a new bee yard. The reason for this is not clear to me at the moment, but it probably has something to do with keeping any foragers that ended up in the splits from returning to the original hive.

As to the original hive, you can actually still gain something from the old queen if you find her. Place her in the original bottom deep (from the weak hive), along with 4 to 6 frames of honey and the rest simply empty, drawn frames. She will receive the field force (foragers out in the wilds) and has a good chance to build up to a nice, single deep chamber before Winter, when you can either requeen (late Fall) or wait until the next Spring and requeen then.

Now that you have your Nuc’s setup, you need to do some management. You have new, young queens with a good set of bees. There is a very good chance that, as the Fall flow comes on, they will build up so quickly that they want to swarm. You have to watch them and remove brood frames on occasion (for the really strong queens, you may have to do this 2 or 3 times.) You can supply the weaker Nuc’s with these frames of brood, to make sure they have the best chance of getting through the Winter.

So, now we have our new, double Nuc’s in the new yard and they are building up. Fall comes to an end and we start to see the occasional drop into the low-30’s. Now it is time to take these Nuc’s and drop them onto a strong hive. You can stack them right on top of another strong hive’s inner cover. There are a couple of tricks involved with this approach. To begin with, it works best if you have a small entrance drilled into the side of the Nuc for each side. You should also have another entrance, about 3/4 of an inch wide, drilled on the opposite side, towards the top (ventilation.) Double tape the hole in the inner cover of the strong hive, as you do not want them to know about each other (and you do not want the Nuc to have to deal with all of the moisture from the larger hive.)

You can stack the Nuc’s, if you like, but it makes it harder to inspect the gals and give them food, if needed.

Oddly, Michael Palmer will occasionally put a queen excluder on top of the double Nuc and then drop a full honey super over the entire group. He claims that the bees will work up into the super and be content to return to their brood chamber without a hitch. They appear to be content to work together (I look forward to testing this one out!)

Once Spring comes along (when the Cherry Blossoms start, or probably early to mid-March for me), it is time to take them off of the strong hive and let them fend for their own. At this point, you should be able to judge the good ones (for expansion) from the weak ones (to use to supplement the other hives). This can also be a good source of funds, as you can sell these Nuc’s for a premium (a queen that has overwintered and is starting to build up is about the best Nuc you can ask for.)