We had a really great talk on the winter cluster of the honey bee at the East Richmond Beekeeper’s Association meeting last night. Ann Harman of the Virginia State Beekeepers Association came down from the western part of the state to give us an overview of what the bees do from November and onward through the colder months of the year.

Before Ms Harman started her talk, several folks asked about feeding their bees. Should you keep feeding your bees if they are still taking it? When do you stop? Like anything with bees, the answer largely depends on the goals of the beekeeper, with environment taking a close second.

My primary goal is to raise a bee that can survive (well, I should say thrive) in my apiaries despite my intervention. By intervention, I refer to all things that I do as a beekeeper (like opening the hives to look at them, taking their honey, stealing their brood to catch a swarm or whatever.) So, my bees need to be able to handle the mites and other diseases that come along (‘me’ being one of them) and they need to be able to make it through the Winter without my help.

Without any defects (a term from my job that basically means unexpected results/consequences, like a drought, me killing a queen by accident, me taking too much honey, the hive falling apart or some other bee experiment gone awry), I expect any hive that is more then 1 year old to make it through the Summer and Fall without any chemical treatments and through the Winter without any feed.

Some might read the previous paragraph and say ‘that fool won’t have bees for long’, and they may very well be right (well, I will always have bees, but I may lose all of the ones that I currently have, I suppose.) But, I think it is more probable that I will lose a few. I might even lose half of my hives. For me, it is a loss that I am willing to bear. I believe that the ones that do survive are my proven lines. Each year (past year 1) that a hive makes it without help is further proof to me that this line is a valuable one.

By feeding the bees, I am simply helping an otherwise weak gene pool to make it to the next year. I would rather let them sort it out themselves and end up with a few strong hives then a mix of weak and strong. So, I am not feeding any hives that are older then 1 year old. In fact, of all of my hives, I am actually only feeding my Nucs that I am overwintering at this point.

But, as mentioned at the start, everyone does it differently and I have no beef with anyone who does feed. The point of this post is just to point out that your goals really drive that, not the bees. It should also be noted that I do manage my hives in other ways that do not include chemical treatment (cycling out old comb, swarm management in Spring, splits, nuc creation, etc…) I simply rely on strong stock to fight off the mites and build up their own honey stores. In closing, the observant will note that I did not mention anything about honey output. The vast majority of folks manage their bees primarily for honey output. It is likely that my bees will not necessarily be the highest honey producers (I do not select for that trait at the moment.) They will give me all of the honey that I want and might give me record crops, but I doubt that my current strategy will result in all of my bees being super producers. Maybe in a decade or so I will have the base survival stock that I want and can then start to manage for that!

Anyone who has followed my travails since last October will remember that I learned a valuable lesson about the meaning of ‘Winter’ to beekeepers. Last year, several folks had given me advice of things to do in advance of Winter. Now, being a farmer and a hunter, Winter for me starts right around Christmas. The shortest day of the year usually hits around then sometime and is considered, by most people at least, to be the start of Winter. Here in Richmond, Virginia, we rarely get any significant snow (well, rarely get it period) or any real stretch of freezing weather before that day comes.

But, this is not what a beekeeper means when he says ‘be sure to get your hives ready before Winter’. Winter to the beekeeper is really what we refer to as the first hard frost. In my area, this averages around October 15, well in advance of the previously mentioned day in December! Needless to say, I was behind the eight ball last year (I didn’t start Winterizing until November, when I discovered this misunderstanding!) Well, this year I am a bit wiser (not much, but a bit), so my Bee Hive Winterzations started this weekend.

Yesterday, I was able to Winterize 5 hives and hope to get another 5 or 6 done today. So far, so good. My goal in this process involves six major points (and one optional point):

1. Make sure the hive is not honey/nectar-bound. This basically means that I do not want to find honey/nectar stuffed in most of the brood cells. The queen is now laying the eggs for the workers that will see her through much of the Winter. I want those cells open. I have never had this problem, but have heard it is a real risk with hives that you are still feeding (I only feed young hives, so I do not have much risk here). You should move an empty frame of drawn foundation to the center of the brood nest if you discover a honey bound situation at this time.
2. Find the queen or recent evidence of her (eggs) in the lower brood chamber. If you find them elsewhere, either move those frames to the lower deep or move the whole daggone box to the lower position (this latter strategy might be necessary if  a lot of capped brood is up with the frame of eggs.)
3. Confirm that honey stores are stocked to either side and above the brood nest. Move capped frames to these positions if they are not.
4. Put the entrance reducer in place, to help with defense and keeping the mice out.
5. Record how much honey stores they have. I make a journal entry like this : 0/2/8 Medium, 0/2/3 Deep. This tells me that the hive has 2 partially capped Medium frames, 8 fully capped Medium frames, 2 partially capped Deep frames and 3 fully capped Deep frames. This way, I know which hives to look at first when January comes around (which is the next time that I will pop most of these hives open again.) It also tells me who is strong in stores (I have a couple of hives with two full Mediums, or a full Medium and two full shallows), in case I need to borrow some food for a struggling hive.
6. Make sure I have a vent up top. I put a stick between the inner cover and outer cover, propping it up about a half inch or so.
7. [optional] Cover the bottom of your screened bottom boards. I did this last year, but I know of a fellow to the north of me that keeps them open all year long. So, who knows what the best strategy is. This is one thing that I have not done yet, but may do in November, after the elections (when I can use election signs for the covers!)

I was very encouraged by all of my inspections. Lots of honey and lots of capped brood. Found either queens or eggs in all of them and saw a lot of activity at the landing boards (bringing in both pollen and nectar.) Things look good so far, but more hives are on the agenda for today. I now know to expect the unexpectable (is that even a word?)…

For the past several posts, I have been sweating about the fact that I could not reverse my bee hives in my Richmond, Virginia area. To begin with, I was worried because it seemed that March was when it should be done for my area (based on my internet forum browsing – I do my beekeeping in Varina, Virginia, just outside of Richmond, Virginia, in a Zone 7 area) and my bees had not gotten to that state in March (both the Geronimo Bee Hive and the Albo Bee Hive are in the bottom deep.) Secondly, I wanted to clean up the bottom Deep’s, because of all of the burr comb that I thought was all in between the frames.

Well, to the second point, it appears that my main problem was that I did a terrible job of keeping the propolis off of the frames last Summer. The gals would gunk up the area where the frames touch and I kept letting it build up. Each time I inspected the hive, I would remove the frames and then push them back together (without removing the propolis.) As it so happens, the frames were slowly getting further and  further apart, as the propolis kept building up. Over the past two weeks, I have removed the majority of this propolis and effectively dealt with that mess. I also learned a valuable lesson about ongoing maintenance as you inspect your hives! Clean off that propolis! It’s  fairly easy to do anyway, taking just a swipe of the hive tool.

But, the first point is still a problem. Only now I have read where other folks are talking about reversing now or even in mid-March. Many of these folks are in my area or zone. So, now I am wondering if my bees are doing everything right. Only a week will tell, but if this turns out to be the case, I will find the queens up in the upper Deeps laying (well, I might find a new queen in the Albo  hive, who is not  laying yet.) If this turns out to be true, I may still reverse yet (although probably not until two weeks from now  or so.) One poster indicated that he reverses when the main dandilion bloom comes on. I am close to that, as more and more are showing up. I am not cutting my lawn because of that (although my wife believes it is a convenient excuse…)

The weather continues on its current course of ‘lots of moisture’ and ‘cold temps.’ In truth, the moisture is the only oddity, from my standpoint. The temps have not been too bad. We had 10.5 inches of snow at the Wilton House this past Saturday. A lot of it is still out there, since the nights have remained below freezing. As with the December snow, several bees from both hives either crawled out to die on the landing board or were able to muster enough energy to fly a few feet before dying (unless that was the work of the ‘Undertaker Bees’!) I am not nearly as worried about this as I was in December. It seems that both hives were pretty strong a couple of weeks ago, despite all of the cold weather.

But, there is always the threat of starvation. It would appear, based on conversations and reading, that February and March are the real times when starvation is a threat. In February, a strong hive begins to build up for the early March blooms of the Maples (and, I am guessing, the hollies.) With all of this new brood to care for, a long stretch of cold can keep the bees from moving to their food source. Even if they can move, they might have eaten it all up.

So, February is the time to go in and check on them (when the temps rise above 50). Make sure that a full frame of honey exists on each side of the cluster. If not, they must have some supplemental food (sugar water and some pollen.) The ramp up of brood needs to be in full swing by early March, when the Maples should be blooming.

This is also a good time to consider a Hive Body Reverse, where you swap the top Deep with the lower Deep. Basically, the bees should have moved fully into the top Deep, eating into their reserves. Swapping the Top Deep with the Lower Deep will put the bees back at the bottom of the stack and create the illusion of empty stores above. This is another option to the Checkerboarding strategy that I discuss elsewhere on the site.

I ended up deciding not to open the hives today, even though it reached the mid-50’s and both hives had bees outside of them. The weak hive, which has a top feeder on it, was again the most active. They had bees all over the place, some of them actually coming and going! This was not purely an orientation flight.

Upon closer inspection, I found that several of the bees were actually bringing in a gray pollen of some type. I suppose this could be from one of my camellia’s, but I doubt it. This looks like grass pollen or something. I remember seeing this same kind of thing happening in December and wondering where these gals had found their little gold mine of pollen. But, the main thing was the activity. These things were going to town.

After looking at them for awhile, I became concerned (as always, my mind goes to the worst case) with this activity. Was this robbing? Do bees actually rob in the Winter? There was no fighting, but maybe these rogues had already killed the fighters? More then likely, all of this activity is just evidence that Hive 2 is thriving. But, I plan to put up my robber screen tomorrow, during a rain (when they will not be active.)

The stronger hive (or the one that was stronger back in November) showed very little activity. But, this time there was some flying about, which I suppose was orientation flights. These gals only received (straight sugar) supplemental feeding as of yesterday. Maybe this keeps them a bit more docile in the Winter.

Well, I have living bees, which is a positive no matter what. Hopefully, all is well.

We are now running about 6 weeks of wet. I have not been keeping an accurate count, but I am fairly certain that we have not had longer then a 4 or 5 day stretch without rain. The problem is two-fold, as the weather has turned cold (so less evaporation) and the ‘spots’ of rain have sometimes been down pours! I have actually filled up my 8 inch rain gauge twice (in 6 weeks – it’s pretty much a record in central virginia and certainly in Varina, Virginia.) Weather like this is not good for the bees or the beekeepers!

At any rate, the temperatures today have hovered in the low 40’s and are heading to the low 20’s tonight. This means that the only thing I do with the bees is kwalk by the hive and think about them. I actually placed my hand on them today, just to see if I could feel any warmth. But, this drove me to do some more reading about the bees and winter in my Zone 7 area, so I have documented these notes below, for future reference.

Ventilation

This whole ventilation concept has been one of those things that I typically do not learn unless I experience it. I apply most bee concepts to myself, so the thought of creating a natural vent (opening a window in the basement and one on the second floor of my house) was repugnant to me. How in the world could that be helpful!? I would be really mad about it, if I were a bee.

The thought, or so I have been told, is that the bees maintain a temperature that is a bit above 90 degrees in the cluster (the area where the bees all huddle in a ball and rub their hands together because it is so cold!) This heat, when present in a cold environment, causes a steam of a sort to waft up the hive and condense on the cover. Soon, as it cools on the bottom of the cover, it forms droplets that eventually fall back down (at a much colder temperature then when they wet up) into the center of the cluster (assuming the cluster is in the center of the hive.) This is fatal for the bees.

So, this is one reason why they strongly recommend against painting the inside of your deep/brood chamber. It is better to leave it unpainted, so that it can absorb some of that moisture (as open wood is likely to do.) But, many folks recommend creating a ‘draft’ (a small hole at the top of the hive to pull air up through the hive and push the wet air out) to help the bees out with this.

Today, my misgivings have been mostly laid to rest, as I have read where a very successful beekeeper from New York (an area much colder then my Varina bee yard) creates a ventilation by pushing his top Deep back about an 1/8 of an inch so that a small gap is created between it and the bottom Deep. This has actually worked for him, although I have to maintain that his bees get mad about it! Still, it must be a good plan.

To close out my discussion of this subject, I found where a good number of beekeepers in my area will take a Popsicle stick, cut it into 4 pieces and place one at each corner of the top of the bottom deep. This creates a narrow (about 1/16 inch) ventilation area. This will be my plan going forward.

Wind Break

My stronger hive has no real wind break, which has been bothering me. One fellow recommended putting up two fence poles (T poles) and spreading burlap between the two of them. I might try this before January.