Tuesday, February 12, 2013

Lost Another One

As I feared Winter is taking a toll on the hives which were made from the little swarms of last year. The days have not been overly cold and we have only had a very few really cold spells but it hasn't been warm enough for any nectar producing plants to bloom either and many days have been too cold for the girls to break their ball and venture out. Couple this with the incredibly dry and hot middle and late Summer we had where the bees stopped building up and then didn't have enough workers to bring in Winter stores and you have a real problem for the smaller hives.

So far I have lost three hives now and each of them were a swarm from last year. The first two not only had problems building up comb and brood during the Summer but also suffered some robbing from stronger colonies. This last hive to succumb to the cold and lack of food was actually the first swarm I captured last year in late March or early April. It was a ground swarm of barely a cup of bees when I found it. The queen looked healthy but for some reason this swarm didn't go very far and just settled down in a little ball about 2 foot in front of the hive it came out of. I carefully gathered up the queen and then transported as many stragglers as I could into a nuc and from there it began building up nicely for the first couple of months until the drought hit us that is.

As with the other hives I began feeding this hive in July yet just like the others no amount of syrup feed would make them begin laying brood. As the drought continued they simply just did not have enough bees to build up the stores they needed, even when it was handed to them. This hive actually had dry sugar in a top feeder that they had been feeding on for the last month but apparently they were just unable to process it fast enough to keep themselves warm and fed.

I thought about combining the small hives into a large one for Winter but I also kept hoping for a Fall flow and by the time I realized we were not going to get one it had gotten too cold for combining the hives.

Since I still cannot get my image software to work I couldn't take any pictures but inside the hive you could see where they had made a ball in an effort to keep warm and simply ran out of food they had immediately available. My guess is this hive finally succumbed Sunday night as they were flying during the day on Friday. Although Sunday was not overly cold the Sun never came out and the wind kept the bees in their Winter ball which meant they were unable to forage for food.

So I am down to six hives now and praying the rest make it until things begin blooming again. I have placed emergency feed in the top of each hive and have syrup feeders at each apiary, let me tell you the girls are really hitting those feeders as well. The question is will it be enough? Another real cold snap that keeps them balled up for a few days may spell doom for all the remaining hives. All I can do at this point is keep the feed available and hope for the best.

Keep Prepping Everyone!!!



10 comments:

  1. I wonder if that is what happened to my Nevada hive. They actually died WHILE eating the sugar in the hive.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Gracie - I am sure that is what happened. We can give them all the raw food possible but it still takes time for them to process it into what they eat. Even dry sugar has to be turned into a type of honey for them to consume it and without enough worker bees they cannot get it processed in time.

      This last hive had consumed quite a bit of the feed I had out for them they just couldn't get it processed fast enough.

      Delete
    2. Have you read this? I lost two hives, I am glad I didn't lost 70-90% like some of these other people!

      Delete
    3. http://news.yahoo.com/why-california-desperate-bees-200145917.html

      Delete
  2. I am so sorry. It's a tough thing to do, to winter bees sometimes. Here's hoping the remainder come through just fine.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. JoV - I kinda had a special sentimental attachment to this particular hive as well because it started from such humble beginnings and took me a few hours to get it settled in. It looked like it was really going places last year as well until the drought and heat hit us hard.

      The good thing about bees is that even when a hive dies out all is not lost as the remaining comb gives the next colony a bit of a head start and the woodenware is already built and painted.

      Delete
  3. Our winter has been warm and wet. We have had some of our spring flowers coming out. Weird weather.

    There is an alternate theme to the story of agriculture: Agriculture became practised on a regular basis when the weather stabilized enough to make it a regular practise. Beekeeping presumably fits somewhere in there as well.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Russ - We haven't has an especially hard Winter either but it hasn't been really warm for extended periods like last year either. A number of nice days yes but not warm enough to get things blooming ahead of schedule like last year. Of course we haven't had extended cold spells and the ones we have had were only down into single digits a day or two at most.

      They simply still ran out of food. They got to a point that their numbers were too low to keep up with demand. February and March are the worst months for this kind of thing.

      Delete
  4. PP...I am sorry you lost one of your hives. I only had two and lost one of those and it was my fault...I could not even blame it on mother nature.

    I appreciate all of your post on bees. It helps us new folks more than you know. I e-mailed the president of our bee club a few weeks ago to ask him about my hives. I have yet to hear from him.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Gallon jars or similar sized plastic containers make great feeders. Drill some 1/16 holes in the tops and then put the container on top of the inner cover hole. Put a super box around the feeder and then put the top cover back on. This type of feeder is easy to check, easy to refill, available 24/7, reduces robbing of weak hives and is out of the weather.

    Dave

    ReplyDelete

Leave a comment. We like comments. Sometimes we have even been known to feed Trolls.