Preparation for winter - question rehashed ...

[folieadeux]

I posted a while ago asking what to do to get our 2 hives ready for winter. After reading the responses, I realized I hadn't done a good job of describing what was worrying me. After opening the hives today I decided to have another go at getting the answers I need. I apologise in advance to all those who find over enthusiastic over anxious new beekeepers exasperating & tedious.

So ... starting with hive number 2 ... the package of bees that went into a 10 frame box in October, & are now 3 deep boxes high.  The first couple of times we opened them there was a little bit of moisture & some grey mould stains on the inside of the hive lid, which we wiped off (the moisture) with paper towel. Then the next few times we opened the hive there was no moisture there - everything looked good. But the grey mould stains remained, & the question of why the water was there was always on my mind - especially given that the other hive (the swarm) which we got just a week before is only a few feet away from this hive & it has never had a drop of moisture nor any sign of mould.
So this number 2 hive is a couple of feet away from a gate post that always has a round disc of ice on the top of it every morning over winter. The ice generally melts about morning tea time, sometimes  later.  And I have always worried that if the number 2 hive had water inside the lid, it would freeze overnight, & drip down over the bees during the day, & by spring I will have a dead hive. So I have thought a lot about insulation of the hives, in an effort to come up with something that causes them to have a constant internal temperature & therefore avoid the condensation build up that occurs when warm moist air comes in contact with a cold surface.

Fast forward to today. When I took the lid off hive number 2 water actually splashed down from inside the lid & onto the top of the frames! And even then, there was still enough water left in the lid that when I leaned it on its side against the hive the water that ran to the bottom formed a pool deep enough to threaten to drown a couple of bees 

So ... what I found was a brood nest in the bottom box only, with a full deep of capped honey in the next box & a mostly filled & capped deep on top. I cut & ate a piece of honey comb with capped honey from the top deep. It tastes like very sweet beer. This is not a good thing is it? :(

I dried out the lid & when I put it back on I propped it open slightly, given it was sunny & warm. I'll go down in a minute & close it now that the sun is going down.

Hive number one is in an eight frame box, hive number two is in a 10 frame box.
Hive number two gets the sun about 20 minutes earlier in the morning & they lose it at the same time in the afternoon .
Hive number one has always been stronger & more vigorous than number two,  number one was a decent size swarm, number two a modest package with a caged queen.

What now?

[D Coates]

What now?

What's your actual question?  Where are you out of?  "Mid-Nth-Coast & Southern Highlands NSW"  I'm assuming Australia.

[cao]

I don't know if there could be a difference between 10 frame and 8 frame hives but I would assume that it has to do with the bees themselves.  Was there more bees in one hive verses the other?  I had moisture inside my hives the year before last. This past winter I put styrofoam insulation between inner cover and top cover.  It seemed to help.

[Flycaster]

Hi, last winter i made a quilt box for my hives here in tasmania.

It was basically an ideal box with some hessian sack stapled to the bottom. I drilled 2x 1inch holes in either side and covered those with fly screen.

Then put on top of the hive and put 2inch of wood shavings inside. Then i put my telescoping lid on top of that. Dunno what your winters are like up there but here in tassie we had snow and frosts down to about -5?c . It wasnt very wet though last winter.

It seemed to work quite well and i didnt find i had any noticable excess condensation in there.

I'll be doing the same this year.

[BeeMaster2]

As replied before, insulation in the top of the hive is real important.
There is another item I would check. Is this box sitting on the ground or almost on the ground where the moisture is coming up from the ground and saturating the hive?
IF so raise it up.
Some bees seem to create more moisture than others. All of my hives are basically built the same but several years ago I had one hive that every time I opened it the lid was soaking wet. Then again, it too was next to the edge of a roof but so were the rest of the hives at this site.
Another thing you can do is move it.
Jim

[Rurification]

I second the suggestion to use a quilt box, with good venting above it [or on its sides].  Made a huge difference for me here over winter.  We have damp and extremely variable winters.

[Oldbeavo]

We use 20mm foil board ( 20mm polystyrene with foil glued on each side) between the tin cover and the ply of the lid.
The lid has 2 x 20mm vent holes in each end, once we started using insulated lids the condensation almost disappeared.
Are you using a queen excluder?