Author: The Moderator

Mother Colony (28-29) is packed full of bees. We decided to begin making splits early. 3 frames of brood and open eggs were taken with 2 frames of resources into a 5 frame NUC (30).

Total number of viable colonies has now been reduced to 6. All colonies on the campus berm have perished. I am now considering moving the hive stands from the berm to a less exposed area. We lost all 7 colonies which were located on the berm. A new location is most certainly warranted.

The colony at officer Ed’s property and the polk building property are still viable and very healthy.

We also lost one of the Warre hives at the Niagara property. This loss was a complicated one. I learned a few lessons from this problem.

I opened the hive on a nice day and suddenly discovered that this colony was extremely weak on the very edge of collapse. I could immediately see the queen and that she had been laying eggs. However there were only approximately 45 worker bees with her. One more cold evening and the colony would have certainly failed.

I caged the queen and moved her and the workers to a 3 frame Nuc box. I took one frame of brood and nurse bees from a stronger hive and combined them. I then smoked the box extensively. There was a problem though. The candy plug I put into the queen cage was not secured. The queen escaped prematurely and I found here being attacked and balled about 15 minutes later. I rescued the queen and caged the queen again and checked back the next day.

The next day the queen was released. She was working the brood frame had begun to lay new eggs. I assumed that we were in the clear and that she was doing just fine with the new bees. However, a quick check the following day revealed that she had died or was attacked again and was on the bottom of the hive.

So what did we learn from this queen death. I should be far more careful about queen rejection when combining bees from different colonies. It is possible that this queen was not viable and that is why the foreign workers killed her off but she was laying eggs and appeared to be a viable queen. So I probably just screwed up the introduction of new workers to strengthen the hive. More care is needed with queens and new bees.

Also, the small 10watt heater did not do anything to keep these bees strong during the cold winter nights.

Corona property hives were quickly inspected. External entrance activity between the two hives is greatly different. Both hives show activity and are viable with queens. Hive (28-29) over wintered with 2 deep 8 frame brood boxes. Colony (25) overwintered with only 1 deep, 8 frame box.

Colony (28-29) is packed full of bees in both boxes. The Queen is laying across at least 3 deep frames. Signs of drone brood are present but no drones were seen. This hive does not show any signs of remaining nectar or honey resources. Supplemental carbohydrate was given immediately. Also pollen supplements were added.

We will consider splitting this colony well in advance of drones and spring nectar flow. Our concern is that this colony, when it chooses to split during the normal spring season, will swarm without much warning.

In comparison, Hive (25) contains only about 5 frames of bees and queen laying is far less. The hive is still viable and should launch into spring very well. However the difference is quite startling between the two hives. Hive still also contains at least 3 frames of resources on the outer boundaries of the active cluster. This hive does not need any supplemental carbohydrates. I would supplement with pollen.

Keeping a feeder out during winter can certainly help your own bees. However I had an interesting observation today. I can see bees flying away from the feeder in 3 distinctly separate headings. This would indicate that 3 distinctly separate bee colonies which are not my own are visiting the feeder. I will need to map out the headings and return flight times.

We are almost through the worst of February. This month has been truly nasty. The backyard colonies are doing well and now have number plates.

Colony (06-07) has a serious worker bee shortage problem. This colony will not be able to survive the winter much longer and may not be viable for spring. We will see if we can combine them with some workers from another colony. Or perhaps we will feed them more to stimulate egg laying.

8 viable colonies going into a tough February.

Last week saw temperatures drop from 70F to -10F in a 24 hour period. Soon after, we had approximately 10 inches of snow accumulation and temps back up into the 50F range. I stored 4 colonies indoors during this period of instability. All 4 colonies came through the process viable. The one hive that stayed outdoors remained viable as well but had about 15-20 dead bees perished in the entrance area.

A strange winter so far. I have lost 13 colonies since fall. Some of these lost colonies had absolutely no chance of making a full winter. While others which failed were in excellent health with the largest numbers and stores. The 2 most interesting surprises were a couple of 5 frame Nucs. These 2 colonies were small and going into winter without a huge supply of food. Despite my expectation, these colonies are surviving and look as though they might make it until spring. To help, I took several full honey frames from other failed colonies and added another 5 frame Nuc on top of these colonies. Thus giving them a huge amount of food directly over their brood chamber.

Other Warre colonies were given more solid sugar boards to ensure survival.

3 Campus Hives; Officer Ed, Woody’s Pond and Berm are still viable and strong.

5 Niagara Way Hives are still viable and strong.

Three more colonies at the campus have collapsed. The last commercial colony that was previously doing so well has died off. And two of the smaller 5 frame NUC colonies have perished at the campus.

Additionally, the 10 frame colony that was installed at the neighboorhood foster home died off. This colony was packed full of honey but simply did not have enough bees to survive the winter.

The small 5 frame NUC that was installed at the Barrett location, surprisingly has a viable working colony. This colony was moved indoors for the terribly stretch of below zero temperatures and high winds that are expected in the next week. The remaining 5 frame NUC at the campus was also moved indoors. Two other small colonies were moved indoors as well. We will need to feed them with honey frames from failed colony supplies.

11 Hives with Queens.

Niagara hives were inspected during a mild winter day. Any hives that were opened were opened quickly and only to add sugar. Bees were out foraging for a small period of time at the sugar water feeder. One Colony collapsed and died off.

The colony that dies off seemed to simply not have enough bees to keep the colony warm. For next season we need to prepare the colonies better with fall feeding regiments with both sugar and pollen.

12 Hives with Queens

Four more hives have died off. Two out of the three commercial hives have died off. It seems that all the hives which were exposed to any sort of poisoning have not recovered. While they had queens, the queens may have not been viable. The Woody’s pond hive is doing extremely well. I supplied all hives with more sugar.

I was called out to the back property behind the campus. Anecdotal evidence calimed that there was a hive located somewhere in a pile of logs. Tree clearing personal would not move the logs because of the swarm of bees. I spent two days looking but could not find any signs of the bee colony. Either the Colony left or maybe they were never bees.