Winter Prep 2018

[riverbee]

just wondering how all are doing with your bees?
QUESTIONS:

1.  how many hives do you have going into winter months?
2.  what have you done or what are you doing to get them ready for your winter months?

for me here in wisconsin, hives all very strong going into our cold weather months. doesn't mean i will come out on the top side in spring, but that's beekeeping.

entrance reducers have been on for about 2 months, and hardware cloth over them to keep the mice out. i have placed on insulation on the top, under the outer cover, temps can drop down here and have in the river valley. i typically wrap my hives around thanksgiving. our weather has been relatively mild, some snow but mostly rain. 

the most important practices any of us can do, is having healthy hives/a good queen, and providing extra feed on top for our bees to get them through winter months. my hives do have extra stores but i do provide sugar bricks and have on top the frames for extra insurance.

my setup is double deeps. i use a 2"shim above the top deep (already on) underneath the outer cover (with 2" of insulation underneath the outercover); and sugar bricks already in place, and will check these periodically. my top deeps were pretty heavy with honey (did not have to feed), but i also like to 'heft' a hive throughout cold weather and winter months to sort of 'gauge' the weight of the stores left on, even though i have sugar bricks on top.

i got tired of mixing up fondant/boiling sugar and making a mess in the kitchen and stressing over this a long time ago.........
i went to a simple sugar recipe.
recipe here:

SUGAR BRICKS

i do large batches, but have sort of refined 'drying' down the bricks. i have tried all sorts of things, huge cookie sheet, wax paper, roll/press sugar in, oven on for hours. letting it set, cutting squares. i finally went to mashing the sugar recipe in 20 ounce bowls, and starting early, i might give them a head start in an oven for a few hours initially, but we have this old antique 'desoto' oven taking up kitchen space in our house and i just store them in there until they are dried and put the bowls in zippys. the bowls are easy, hold a lot of sugar and easy to dump in the hive without breaking up. sometimes the squares in a large cookie sheet broke up and being as anal retentive as i am, didn't like it...... want to get in and out of hive quickly.

the squares i used to do:


20 ounce bowls, fill them up to the top of the rim, no wax paper, and dump in the hive quickly:


the desoto:


so just wondering what everyone else is doing?

[Some Day]

I do basically the same as you.

However, I treat for mites starting in August right after I pull honey supers.  I rotate treatments using Apivar, Apiguard and OAV through out the year.  I took a sample of bees and sent it in to the USDA lab for testing for viruses and mites and got a clean bill of health.  So, I am hoping for an 80% to 90% survival rate going into spring.  We shall see what happens come April.

The only good mite is a dead mite.

[riverbee]

thanks someday, neglected to mention mite treatments! i too think changing it up is a great approach.

"I took a sample of bees and sent it in to the USDA lab for testing for viruses and mites and got a clean bill of health."

wow, very cool!

[Wandering Man]

Not a lot of prep going on yet.  We've got three hives out on a friend's property, off the road, and we are having to hike in to get to the hives.  The rains have been too frequent since August for me to drive back to them.  We've got one hive that 3Reds is feeding.  We put robber screens on a couple of weeks ago because of the wasps.

Going forward, we hope to be able to eventually start making weekly trips out, I'll be putting up some kind of storage box to make distant beekeeping easier.  I need to do a mite check. 

I anticipate feeding more sugar water as we get into winter.  The girls are still bringing in a lot of pollen, so I don't anticipate having to add pollen substitute.  I've seen tiny beer cans and television remotes laying around the front entrance of the hives the last two to three weeks, so I know the girls are cleaning house and kicking out the drones.

The girls are fighting off ants, wasps, and spiders.  Nevertheless, the BeeWeaver's bees are doing really well and appear healthy.  I am tempted to move the bees and frames into new boxes just to get rid of any nesting ants (little tiny black ants) and spiders.

Sounds like I'm rambling, so I think you can figure out I don't have an organized plan.

[gtrr4]

I went into winter with 19 hives.  8 frame hives with just two deeps, some had a super on them.  1 5 over 5 over 5 nuc.  Also have 2 double nucs.  All of them were treated with the Thymol gel after the last honey harvest.  All are wrapped with roofing felt and upper insulation.  I make up sugar bricks with some water, vinegar and lemongrass.  Sugar goes into a premade spacer with hardware clothe on the bottom....keeps bricks from breaking when handling.

[SoulflyUA]

Kiev, Ukraine. Balcony beekeeping)))
Went into winter with 5 hives. Mite treatment in August and October. No sugar bricks, because left enough honey (+/- 20kg)

[neillsayers]

Going into winter with six hives. I "think" they have stores enough. Depends on severity or mildness. Bees are flying today, which concerns me as they will be using energy to fly when no nectar is available. I'll just keep checking hive weight and if it looks like they are getting light, will add sugar feed.

[Lburou]

...I took a sample of bees and sent it in to the USDA lab for testing for viruses and mites and got a clean bill of health...

I would like to hear all the details on how this is done...Please tell us sometime. 

[Some Day]

...I took a sample of bees and sent it in to the USDA lab for testing for viruses and mites and got a clean bill of health...

I would like to hear all the details on how this is done...Please tell us sometime. 

I just followed the instructions in this link:
https://www.ars.usda.gov/northeast-area/beltsville-md-barc/beltsville-agricultural-research-center/bee-research-laboratory/docs/how-to-submit-samples/

[PappyRick]

I managed to get 3 hives this far this year.  Last year both of the hives I had failed in November. 

I had to treat for EFB this summer after the State Inspector did an inspection on my hives.  I split one hive shortly after the EFB treatments, and all three are still alive.  The split seems a little scrawny.

I have given two of the hives a no-cook candy board because they seemed light to me.  Hefting for estimating stores is still a work-in-progress for me.  High temps have been hovering in the upper 40s for quite some time now.

I'm figuring I can't really claim to be a beekeeper until I get at least one hive thru the winter.

PappyRick

[tecumseh]

winter! what is that?

[Lburou]

My (ten) hives are all double deep or higher now.  I go through them in the late fall and put the brood nest in the bottom hive body and leave capped honeycombs above the brood nest.  In this location, that is ample stores for winter.  I do have one hive straggling the rest, I'll keep an eye on it.  Fortunately, several 70+ degree days are common here in winter and it will be easy to look in on them soon. I'll add a candy board to that one if it needs it. 

I'll probably do a prophylactic OAV treatment before Christmas (because this is the time of year with the smallest brood nest, sometimes there is no brood at this time).  I treated once in November with OAV.  Will do another in early spring.

I go through each hive in the spring and fall to remove & replace woodenware needing the attention of a coat of paint or repair.  I like to have fairly clean bottom boards and not so much burr comb building up and sticking the boxes and frames together.  Going through the hives box by box and frame by frame is the most enjoyable beekeeping process for me.  I stretch this process over a week or two so it lasts longer.