Beemaster's International Beekeeping Forum
BEEKEEPING LEARNING CENTER => GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. => Topic started by: Mason on December 19, 2009, 02:39:54 pm
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Oh man what a bummer......................
I am new so must have done something very very wrong. I was at my hives 2 weeks ago. Both had healthy queens, honey stores and capped brood. They had stopped taking syrup so I put a couple of bags of sugar on top of the inner cover and buckled them down for winter. One was reduced to a deep and a medium and the other one deep. Today after a long period of rain and cold temperatures at about freezing at night I went out and all my bees are dead.
It's a bummer but mainly interested in what I did wrong. I have plenty of built out comb, equipment and packages on order for March delivery. I feel like I have let the bees down but anxious to learn what I did wrong and get back at it. I think I was doing pretty good but this was my first winter and must have done something very very wrong out of ignorance.
enlighten me...............
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I don't have any advice as I am a newbie, too but I wanted to tell you how sorry I am for your loss. :(
I hope someone here can shed some light on your situation.
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That sure is a bummer....
My first guess would be mites. Did you inspect the bottom board for varroa? Any chance they weren't tracheal mite resistant bees? Were the queens from a quality breeder? This is the time of the year that separates quality queens from supercedure queens...
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that sucks, but it's not necessarily because you did something wrong.
i have lost one and one is sure to go. they just were not strong enough to make it. numbers were good, but for whatever reason, they didn't hang on through our cold snap.
one other thought. are you sure they are dead? i have had the unpleasant experience of bringing cut out comb with dead bees on it into the house for extraction, only to have a massive re-animation of bees in my kitchen.
in addition to what robo suggested, might they have gotten wet?
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One of the first things we were taught in Paramedic training is that you can do everything right and the patient still dies.
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Were there alot of dead bees laying around in front or no bees at all?
Were there cappings and wax bits laying on the bottom board?
Did they still have capped stores?
Was there any brood left or was it all gone?
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I treated for mites with Apiguard a couple of months ago.
they did have capped stores.
still had capped brood.
wax looks fine.
There were a few dead outside but most were laying on the bottom board.
Could it be, and I hate even suggest this........I had screened bottom boards and they got too cold?
It only got under freezing for a very short period of time.
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i doubt it. we were down into the teens for a week and mine have come through. i know for sure it wasn't cold that killed the one i have lost. it is helpful to close the SBB when it's going to be cold, but there are those who live in colder weather than yours and do not.
your bees are used to warmer weather, but short temp drops should not have killed them.
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I don't think cold was the problem if they were strong enough to have more than a frame or two. It's froze here a few times already and my bees haven't even really clustered.
I'm assuming that you started with package bees on bare foundation??? If that is the case I would rule out mites as it takes an overwintered mite population to kill them outright and I doubt that mites would kill them both at once except as sheer coincidence. If it's not the case then it's still odd to have two go at the same time.(i'm not mentioning treatment 'cause just 'cause you treated for mites don't mean you killed the mites :evil:)
If I had to make a snap decision based on what information I have I'd say it warmed up some one afternoon and they got sprayed. That explains dead bees in a pile with plenty to live for.
If they had plenty of feed and you did what you could to knock down the mites then don't beat yourself up over it. EVERYONE loses bees if they do it long enough. :-D
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Mason,
What do you mean by "It's a bummer but mainly interested in what I did wrong. I have plenty of built out comb"?
How much is "plenty"? DId you just throw in a couple of drawn out frames hoping that the bees would fill these out? Perhaps you didn't have enough frames to let them survive the winter???
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I treated for mites with Apiguard a couple of months ago.
they did have capped stores.
still had capped brood.
wax looks fine.
There were a few dead outside but most were laying on the bottom board.
Could it be, and I hate even suggest this........I had screened bottom boards and they got too cold?
It only got under freezing for a very short period of time.
I have SBB on both my hives and we had a freak snow storm a little over a week ago and it got below freezing for a couple of nights. I didn't even have my entrance reducers on as it took me by surprise. I have them on now with the 4" opening. Bees were fine when I checked them on Sunday (although hardly any stores in one hive and I started a thread on that). We also had a week of fog and rain and drizzle with highs in the 40's after the freeze so I don't think your bees got too cold.
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some of the things i find Interesting are- that they stooped taking feed-(syrup) and you also felt the need for emergency provisions of sugar to be made available
when bees go off feed but clearly need to extra stores -it is sometimes a indicator of nosema C,
the other thing i find interesting is you say that the dead bees where on the hive floor and that perhaps they did not die on or in comb-another indicator of nosema C.
cold wet weather is a trigger mechanism for nosema C out breaks -if this was the case there was nothing that you could have done
not even a combine would have helped -just some thoughts
RDY-B
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Any chance the feeders leaked?
Mites and most diseases would have been a much slower decline in your climate, I think. CCD usually has empty hives, no dead bees.
If you are sure that a couple of weeks ago there was a healthy queen, brood, and a decent size cluster, I'd say that there was some external catastrophe that killed them. I really do hate to say it, but one of the leading causes of bee death is beekeepers at least from my own experience :roll:.
I am sorry for your loss and I do know how you feel.
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I have open SBB on all 4 hives and we have had some truly freezing temperatures the past couple of weeks. It doesn't seem to have affected my hives as they were all flying out today. I agree that the cold doesn't kill the bees. It has to be something else.
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Sorry about your losses. But as stated above, you still have the most valuable commodity you need in beekeeping (at least to me), the comb. Freeze the comb to kill anything that might be livining in the comb. Use them on your bees this coming spring to get a good jump start.
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Mason,
Did you check the inner cover and (inside ) of the outercover to see if it is wet. Mine is. I lost my first and only hive today. I felt something was wrong. We had a cold spell here and then the rain came. I new they were alive last week. I checked with a stethoscope. This morning I could not hear them. I looked inside and found them all dead. There were a few head first in cells ( only a few inches from capped stores on the same frame. ) Some were still in a cluster. Most of them were on the screened bottom board. I have tons of stores and I also gave them a frame feeder full of Baker's sugar awhile back. I did see a lot of mites on the bottom slideout.
I wrapped my hive in tarpaper in October. I have the entrance reducer in and a vent at the top. Could I have made it too warm for them ? Should I have vented it more ? Should I have not wrapped my hive ? I'm just a novice not an expert but I feel my hive became damp from the condensation and they were chilled.
Any ideas what might have happened ? :'(
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BC,
Wrapping the hive is a matter of choice and there are pros and cons to this.
Proper ventilation is the key. Cold might not kill bees but stagnant moisture will.
Check out the following link and read up on "ventilated upper covers". Check out the pics that are posted for a vented cover. You will also notice that I also "wrap" my hives.
http://forum.beemaster.com/index.php/topic,24380.msg188869.html#msg188869 (http://forum.beemaster.com/index.php/topic,24380.msg188869.html#msg188869)
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Yes,
my frames were very moist. I did have the inner cover on top of the deep, then a medium wit sugar in it topped with the outer cover. My entrance reducers were on but think the screened bottoms would have been enough circulation.
Do you think my inner cover configuration would have caused leaking?
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Mason,
Your inner cover configuration might have leaks but I don't think this was the cause of your problem. By the way...what type of area do you have around your hive. My yard is surrounded by a high water table and wetlands. I had to pick a spot that was protected by wind, had a good sunny location and away from open stagnant water.
Several things to take into consideration: 1-Wind direction and wind break to prevent heat loss within the hive. 2-Type of surrounding area. Is the hive surrounded by wetlands? Moisture blowing towards the hive could be too high for the bees to regulate.
For many years I only used the regular inner covers with the small vent hole at the front of the hive. I used to seal the oval hole inside. I never did have problems with excess moisture control all those years but ever since I discovered "ventilated inner covers" (2 years ago) I swear by them.
If you notice the ventilated inner covers discussed on the previous link you will see that the center hole is quite large (3"-4" dia.). Some prefer smaller holes, I like my 4" dia. hole. I don't worry about heat loss. Heat rises up through the "center" hole, carries moisture out with the flow and the bees remain in the "center" of the hive. I do have a 6"-8" mouse guard at the bottom for air circulation and my screened bottom board usually has the sliding tray all the way in (completely sealed). Some folks have the bottom of their hives totally opened to the elements with good results.
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I would look for dead Varroa as well as white specs (Varroa feces) in the brood cells. Varroa is a most likely cause. Treating doesn't mean anything. I lost them all to Varroa last time I treated...
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i am not a fan of upper entrances/ventilation. that aside, i do not think it would make any difference if the cause of your loss was water actually running or dripping on the cluster. even if that had happened, i can't see it happening on two hives.
i am with robo. i think you had something going on and the stress of winter did them in. could you have done something about it? maybe, but you had treated for mites, which would have been my first guess.
they might have gotten into something. garden dusts like 7 dust might be collected as pollen and brought back to the hive.
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Michael,
Here is part of the slideout under the screen. I hope the picture comes through. Alot of mites.
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Maybe mites but the frames were definitely wet.
We have had an incredible amount of rain this year and have had no problems with the frames getting wet. The only thing that was changed was the configuration so I am not ruling that out yet.
I did go back and re-read the instructions on the Apiguard. It says to seal the bottom board before treating if it is screened which I did not do.
I really appreciate the feedback and will be thinking about this for a long time. I have a couple of calls in to some local experienced beeks and looking forward to getting their take on this and will let you know what they say.
Looks like I will be a former beekeeper until March. The kitchen is a freekin mess with frames all over the place and me trying to crush and strain 1 tiny bottle of honey.
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Mason,
I feel your pain. My first hive and I screwed it up. I will be back ! This time with two. One might be a Top Bar. I'm going to try more ventilation. I'm also going to use foundationless frames in the old hive. I'm going to let them build their own comb. I would like to see if I can control the mites without chemicals.
Good luck with yours !
Happy Holidays
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"they might have gotten into something. garden dusts like 7 dust might be collected as pollen and brought back to the hive. "
Is it possible for the bees to collect something like 7 dust at some point in the summer then not get around to eating it till later on in the winter?
Joan
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Beekeeping to me is almost as stressful as it is joyous. I just want my bees to live..and don't mind not getting a big harvest. I thought I was in good shape a month ago with 7 colonies, but today 2-3 are very quiet and way too cold to look. Good luck with it!
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Hi
Hopefully somebody can look at it and see what happened. There are so many things that can go wrong, as mentioned.
Sorry, you mentioned bags of sugar and I read that as baggies (as in baggie feeders) but it sounds like you did dry sugar.
As far as the Apiguard goes, I think that only part of the action of Apiguard is vapor, the rest is spread bee to bee. Even if you didn't close the sbb it should have helped. Unless you had a really huge mite load, I doubt mites would kill the whole cluster, more of a gradual weakening, and then failure, especially if they don't have food nearby. And even then the dead bees maintain cluster, heads in the comb, not fall to the bottom. But then again there are many variables any way you look at it.
We've all been there and it is rough going through it for sure! Discouragement, thoughts of throwing in the towel, wondering what we did wrong....it gets better though!
Rick
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I would be lying if I didn't say I was bummed out to see my bees dead but not looking for sympathy just knowledge. The bees are the easiest things to replace in this endeavor. I still have my equipment and experience although it was not enough experience to prevent the collapse.
I think it was cooler temperatures and more importantly moisture. Somehow my hives got damp. Maybe it was the configuration of the boxes or maybe that I did not have proper ventilation. We did have an enormous amount of cold rain last week. All of the frames and covers were damp. I even had what looked like the start of some mildew forming on some of the comb and frames.
Mites- I don't think it was mites because both hives died suddenly and simultaneously, there was an attempt to control them and I do not see any sign. Two weeks ago my hives were jamming.
Pesticide- there is no way of knowing on this one. We did have one windy day last week about 55 degrees that the bees flew a little. It's not really a time of year people would be treating plants for pest but maybe. It was also suggested they may have brought the pesticide in at an earlier time but why would both hives eat the poison on the same day?
Here was my layout exactly starting from the bottom..............
ground
cement blocks
screened bottom board (with entrance reducers)
deep brood box (capped brood and honey stores)
medium super (capped brood and honey stores)
inner cover
dry sugar
medium super (no frames)
outer cover
bricks
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I have been watching this thread with great interest because I have a similar layout and want to avoid your outcome.
My layout:
Ground with landscape cloth to keep down the weeds
Cinder blocks
Hive stand (only one hive)
Screened bottom board
Deep with no brood or honey stores - just drawn out comb
Deep with capped brood and honey stores (very light one one hive)
Inner cover
Outer cover
Several large rocks
I propped the outer covers with a stick this summer when they were bearding and have been trying to get hubbie to build me a ventilated top for my hives. The sticks are gone and I added entrance reducers last weekend on the 4" opening side. I didn't notice any mildew on the frames or excess moisture but it has been dray for a few days - first time in several weeks.
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One other thing - are your hives out in the sun?
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Yes my hives are in the filtered sun. Although we have not had very much sun in a while. Just rain.
I had the same configuration but the only thing I really changed was when I put the inner cover over the bees to accommodate the dry sugar.
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Mason,
Sounds like you had about the same type of weather as I. We had a drop in temp , below 0 and then it warmed up. Then the rains came. Alot of it. My telescoping cover is still wet inside. Innercover has mildew. I know it wasn't leaking because I had a double layer of tarpaper on top of it. ( Bottom of second layer dry. ) I said before I'm not an expert. I think with the drop in temp , the quick warm up and tons of rain. I didn't have enough ventilation.
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Dear Mason and BC,
Sorry to hear of your losses, it sounds like your bees may have got wet and frozen. Do you know if the bottom boards were bee free before the cold snap?
SH
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Slaphead,
During the cold snap I checked the hive with a stethoscope.I could hear them. I checked again when it warmed up and after the big rain. I didn't hear anything. When I did open up the hive the other day. I could see they were all dead. Some were still in a little cluster on the right side. A lot were on the screened bottom board. I don't know how long they were on the bottom. I did pull out a lot of dead bees when it warmed up. I use a piece of wire with a hook on the end. I pull them out through the entrance reducer. Like I said before in the other posts. The innercover was damp. Inside of the telescoping cover was wet.
You live in the Pacific NorthWest. You know how this weather can be. I'm originally From California. I'm not used to 22 F one week and then back to 45-50 F the next. I still think I should have vented more. I won't make that same mistake next time. I feel terrible but I'll get over it. You learn from your mistakes.
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unless water was dripping on the cluster, moisture probably wasn't it. your boxes are tipped? and you had sugar on. use care venting. you tend to vent heat before moisture. if it's raining or high humidity outside, venting does not reduce moisture in the hive. it does let heat out.
i live in the PNW also. it is damp inside my hives all winter. as long as the cluster does not get wet, the damp does not seem to bother them.
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Kathyp,
Boxes tipped. Plenty of stores. Plus a frame feeder full of Baker's sugar. I have the telescoping cover in my garage. I checked it today and it is still very wet inside. Do you think the condensation froze up in the cold snap and then melted and dripped down when it warmed up ?
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maybe, if your cluster was to small to keep the space warm. i have seen the bees melt the snow off the top of the hive with the warmth of the hive. if they have to much room, that heat is wasted.
i question moisture in masons case, in part because he lost both hives. to have a moisture problem in one hive that kills the bees is believable. in both and to have them both die suddenly? seems unlikely.
i think one of two things happened. either they got into something and it killed them, or they had some disease or parasite that weakened them and the cold snap finished them off. in the second case, moisture could have been an issue. if they were already diminished in health or size, it would not take much to push them over.
truth is, we'll probably never know. all these things are things for us all to consider so that we can fix what is fixable in our own hives.
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i question moisture in masons case, in part because he lost both hives. to have a moisture problem in one hive that kills the bees is believable. in both and to have them both die suddenly? seems unlikely.
It would seem to me that because both hives were identical set-ups and both died simultaneously to reason moisture as the cause or contributor. What are the odds that both hives would eat the same poison on the same day or both hives have the same parasite or disease and both die on the same day?
There is also no denying that everything was wet. I know there was plenty of moisture but not if that is what killed them. Most likely it was a combination of errors. Maybe they had mites, ate poison and it is was cold and moist.
What do you mean by "tipped"?
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Mason,
Hives tipped forward for drainage. Not standing staight up.
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Well that is one thing I was doing wrong. My hives are level. I did notice a pool of water on my outer cover where the bricks had sagged it in. I don't think I was leaking but it was terribly damp in the hives.
You know I was really hoping that there would be a smoking gun. I would have preferred if someone would have said, "you stupid idiot everyone knows you were suppose to "blank"". It would have been better to have been called out as to making a mistake then mysterious circumstances. I am going to be so nervous next year going into winter.
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I'm with you Mason. I'd rather be called and idiot and know what killed my bees so I could fix it. :-(
I took a weekend beekeeping class before I got bees that was taught by the President of our local beek club and he told us to level the hives. I was also given a SBB by a guy who was making them to try out and he also told me my hive needed to be level. Since I don't have solid bottoms the water can't collect so I am not sure what the benefit to tipping the hives would be, unless BC has solid bottoms.
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Since I don't have solid bottoms the water can't collect so I am not sure what the benefit to tipping the hives would be
any moisture drops that collect on the top or sides will (hopefully) run off rather than dripping onto the cluster. in masons case, pooled water might have run onto the cluster.
just remember, none of us have the bees we started with. it would be nice if we could learn everything from others and never have to make a mistake, but it just doesn't seem to work that way :-)
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Since I don't have solid bottoms the water can't collect so I am not sure what the benefit to tipping the hives would be
any moisture drops that collect on the top or sides will (hopefully) run off rather than dripping onto the cluster. in masons case, pooled water might have run onto the cluster.
just remember, none of us have the bees we started with. it would be nice if we could learn everything from others and never have to make a mistake, but it just doesn't seem to work that way :-)
Ahhh.. ok, that makes sense. I'm guessing you guys that tip your hives don't have to put trays of oil under your SBB to trap SHB 'cause that would get a bit messy.
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Masson; how many frames of bees where in the hive last time you looked-RDY-B
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You may never know exactly what caused your bees to die. From all the input here you can see that there are numerous possibilities most not involving beekeeper error. One thing is certain based on your comments- you're going to start over this spring. What a great opportunity to increase your chances for success by getting the best genetic stock- bees with natural varroa resistance, tracheal might resistance, bees that are able to better tolerate hive beetles, bees that winter in smaller numbers requiring less stores and build up quickly in the spring. USDA Russian bees are the best stock available and are no more expensive than the run of the mill hybrids that are available. My advice is to contact Carl Webb or Hubert Tubbs or any other of the members of the Russian Breeders association and buy nucs, queens, or hives this spring. I made the switch three years ago.
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Nosema ceranae causes mysterious dead outs in these days.
Lets see that boath of your hives have robbed a weak nosema hive and they have got a good load of spores and died at same time when weather is bad.
Just idea.
http://cba.stonehavenlife.com/2008/09/nosema-ceranae-and-honeybee-colony-collapse/ (http://cba.stonehavenlife.com/2008/09/nosema-ceranae-and-honeybee-colony-collapse/)
In Spain: "For first time, we show that natural N. ceranae infection can cause the sudden collapse of bee colonies, establishing a direct correlation between N. ceranae infection and the death of honeybee colonies under field conditions. Signs of colony weakness were not evident until the queen could no longer replace the loss of the infected bees. The long asymptomatic incubation period can explain the absence of evident symptoms prior to colony collapse. Furthermore, our results demonstrate that healthy colonies near to an infected one can also become infected, and that N. ceranae infection can be controlled with a specific antibiotic, fumagillin. "
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Maybe mites but the frames were definitely wet.
We have had an incredible amount of rain this year and have had no problems with the frames getting wet. The only thing that was changed was the configuration so I am not ruling that out yet.
The rain cannot go inside the hive if it has a cover on.
But I have seen myself that frames have water drops if the inner cover has too weak insulation. The respiration moisture condence onto inner cover and fall down on frames and on cluster. Moisture condensate on cool surfaces. The inner cover insulation must be better than sidewalls. So moisture condensate onto sidewalls and drills out.
Adding ventilation makes things worse. If hive is warm, warm air can have more moisture and it is realitive humidity which keeps the hive dry. However, like you see in car windows, the warm moist air makes cool surfaces misty.
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Finski,
Could that explain the mildew and dampness on my innercover ? You said too weak insulation. What would you do to fix it.
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Finski,
Could that explain the mildew and dampness on my innercover ? You said too weak insulation. What would you do to fix it.
I live at the level of Anchorage Alaska. We just had whole week -22C.
You live too quite north.
Internal heat keeps the hive warm and dry.
* Insulated winter box / I have all brood boxes poly in winter.
* Deminish the hive room according to bees as small as possible before winter feeding
* I have solid bottom + upper entrance.
* I have 10 mm wood panels in inner cover + 70 mm foam plastic matress (recycled)
When snow is permanent, I put geo textile in front of hive and it protect entrances from snow and wind.
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So the theory is that the condensation is on the least insulated part of the hive and we want that to be the sides not the top. My covers were wet. I also had a heavy brick on the top for protection against raccoons. The brick had caused the top to sag slightly in the center. If I had condensation on the cover it would have collected in the middle and dripped directly into the cluster.
Masson; how many frames of bees where in the hive last time you looked-RDY-B
They had reduced their numbers significantly. I had about 5 deep frames covered with bees last time I checked with what appeared to be healthy queens, some brood and plenty of honey. It looked good to me but I'm new so I have no real perspective.
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So the theory is that the condensation is on the least insulated part of the hive and we want that to be the sides not the top. My covers were wet. I also had a heavy brick on the top for protection against raccoons.
You should have ventilation between inner cover insulation and rain cover.
You should have an air gap too that moisture which comes through inner cover, can ventilate away.
Even in summer my aluminimum rain cover has water droplets inside the sheet. It shows that my inner cover structure breathes. If rain cover and inner cover touch each other, the water will make the inner cover really moist. That happens in summer too. There will be litres of water if that moisture cannot dry out from loft.
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Hello,
Sorry to hear about your hive losses.
I'm only asking this out of curiosity. We don't need to 'winter' hives here. But does it make a difference to condensation if you keep the hives under a cover, like a carport or a shed, over winter? Going back to the car analogy, you don't get frost in the first place that melts in higher temperatures, if the car is under a carport. Obviously you can't do anything about external temperature variances. (Unless you move to queensland where it's either hot or very warm).
I'm just wondering if it would help to stabilize conditions a bit?
Lone the beesitter.
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five frames should have made it fine - four frames is a wobbler in ten frame box-can you tell me what the bees looked like -when you first discovered them -where they shinny-almost sticky looking or where they dried out with the look that the color was washed out-makes a difference 8-) RDY-B
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They had reduced their numbers significantly
in your neighborhood, i find this suspicious. makes me think you already had something going on.
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Rdy-B,
I think they were dried out washed out looking. They were not wet. There was a small cluster in the right side of the hive which quickly broke up and fell to the bottom screen when I lifted up the frame next to them. There were a lot of dead bees spread out over the screened bottom board.
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But does it make a difference to condensation if you keep the hives under a cover, like a carport or a shed, over winter? Going back to the car analogy, you don't get frost in the first place that melts in higher temperatures,
The beehive itself must made so that it stands rain.
The moisture comes from bees when they use the food.
We have 15 kg sugar in the food and 3 kg water in the food = 18 kg. (water 17%)
We have photosyntesis formula 6 CO2 + 6 H2O = sugar and molecular weight 372
We have cell respiration formula C6 H12 O6 + 6 O2 = molecular weight 372
Sugar + oxygen --> water + carbon diokside.
30% of sugar will be returned to water. From 15 kg sugar we get 4,5 kg water.
We had allready 3 kg water in food solution , so we have together 7,5 kg water source in the food 18 kg store.
So winter food has about 40% water potential which is released via respiration.
If the hive has 25 kg food stores, it generates 10 litre water via respiration.
That is the water which you arrange out from the hive during half a year.
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They had reduced their numbers significantly. I had about 5 deep frames covered with bees last time I checked with what appeared to be healthy queens, some brood and plenty of honey. It looked good to me but I'm new so I have no real perspective.
There are several explanations
* varroa
* tracheal mite
* nosema
The colony was not much size. How big it was in August?
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when you first discovered them -where they shinny-almost sticky looking or where they dried out with the look that the color was washed out-makes a difference
I would say shiny almost sticky looking.
Back in August they were thriving. I had shortages of honey stores pretty much all year and was feeding. They were late season package bees in a very wet climate. When I checked them a couple of weeks before the collapse they looked healthy. I do have 9 frame spacers even in the brood box. So about half of the frames were covered with bees.
Mason
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when you first discovered them -where they shinny-almost sticky looking or where they dried out with the look that the color was washed out-makes a difference
I would say shiny almost sticky looking.
Back in August they were thriving. I had shortages of honey stores pretty much all year and was feeding. They were late season package bees in a very wet climate. When I checked them a couple of weeks before the collapse they looked healthy. I do have 9 frame spacers even in the brood box. So about half of the frames were covered with bees.
Mason
What are "9 frame spacers"? Do you mean you only had 9 frames in a 10-frame box, or is this something else? And what is the advantage of it?
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. I do have 9 frame spacers even in the brood box. So about half of the frames were covered with bees.
In this situation first of all, you should take extra frame away and give them movable wall.
Cluster looses heat and respiration moisture condensates onto cold frames.
(http://bees.freesuperhost.com/yabbfiles/Attachments/tiny.jpg)
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THE washed out dried up bees expired from to small of a cluster to over come the elements and probably got caught off or away from food -happens when sun comes out and bees gravitate to warm side of hive -then snap its cold bees cluster and burn up there reserves and cant break cluster till temps rise they give there all to keep the queen warm cluster degrades with a hand full of bees left- and the queen in the center of the bees left on comb-
the shiny sticky bees have a moisture problem-what i find interesting is that many people who feeding dry sugar will say that one plus to it is that the sugar will absorb alot of excess moisture -when you put extra empty supper over inercover did all the sides flush out -if box is even slightly to one side or the other there will be a small ridge or lip that water will hit when it runs down the sides-then will seep in to the hive this extra supper probably would not have been propolsied and sealed by the bees like the hive bodies -because it was above the iner cover and thats where your propolise seal would have stoped-this may or may not have happen but it is something to think about-RDY-B
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Try running duct tape around the crack between the hive bodies(supers) if they are not propolized to seal them.
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Take out the iner cover and set up like this- :lol: RDY-B
winter feeding (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZYtGNa6S6c#ws)
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In my latitude hives will die with that winter feeding.
I feed hives with syrup in September and hives are totally in peace 6 months.
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In my latitude hives will die with that winter feeding.
I feed hives with syrup in September and hives are totally in peace 6 months.
Most pepole doing this as a last efort or bees are dead any way-I agree with you colonies have to be heavy for long sleep-RDY-B
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OK. the last meal...
In my country bees are feeded in time and dry sugar is used in April and in May.
Of course if I have brood in December, the hive is already dead. The hive consumes so much food that we cannot do nothing.
I have noticed such hives and feeded in the middle of winter , but however they will be in bad condition, which means practically dead.
I do not inspect my hives in winter, and still they all are alive in Spring.
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Did I understand that you have a empty medium box on top? I wonder if that would make it harder to heat? Would it hurt to put a piece or foam insulation on the top to keep the heat in? .I have a piece of glass 30x30 on top to keep the top dry. We got down to 16 degrees last week which is colder then we usually see it in northern ca. I have a loquat tree that was flowering today 56 degrees out the bees were having a ball.
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I feel for you Mason. I checked my bees today and found both hives dead. I couldn't believe the level of emotion I felt as I stared at the little cluster and some of them just emerging from the cells. I don't know what happened, nor how I lost both of them. But unlike you I have had trouble with these bees from the day I received them and doubt I will deal with small cell again. I am so sad that I lost them as they were the most gentle bees and not once this season did they sting me even when I was clumsily moving frames.
I, too, wish someone would call me out on a mistake I made instead of going over and over again in my mind what might have gone wrong. I had an awful season and now wonder if its all 'operator error'.
My condolences to you as I know what it feels like.
mary
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This is my first winter with two hives. The worst thing I did was to not notice a mite problem in time. One hive went from very healthy to almost gone in just a couple of weeks. That was in October so it was a little late for them to catch up. I've got myself mentally prepared to loose that hive so I won't be so disappointed if they don't make it. I did take 4 gal of honey off that hive and left them 2 deeps full. There still hanging in there. Yesterday I was bummed cause 5 bees drowned getting a drink out of a plastic container I can't afford to lose any bees out of that hive. The second mistake was someone said if you don't feed them your just being Cheap so I fed them to much for too long.