Alaska Bee Keeping

[MudSongs]

This is what two of my black-painted hives look like.  I think my bees would have benefited from this earlier in the summer.



I painted them near the end of the day when the bees were done foraging.  The paint dried overnight.  Painting hives while bees are in them is not something I'd normally consider, but I was careful not to leak any paint into the hives or paint any of the supers together.

This feels like one of the most out-there things I've done with my bees.  Painting the hives while the bees are in them and using black paint.  I'm pretty sure I'm the first beekeeper in Newfoundland to do this.  I'm a pioneer.

I'm curious to see how it plays out.  If it doesn't work, I still have plenty of green paint.  But so far, just laying my hands on the black supers, compared to the green supers, I can feel the difference in the heat.  If I can feel it, I assume the bees can too.  I hope it helps.

[yukonjeff]

Looks Good. And yes you can feel the warmth on the face of a black painted hive on a winter day too.

PS I have painted with the bees inside too   

[MudSongs]

With a thermal imaging camera, I measured the difference between deeps painted black and deeps painted my usual dark green.  The surface of the black deeps was about 5°C warmer than the ones painted dark green, measurements taken in direct sunlight with hives full of bees.

Not sure how much warmer that is in the Fahrenheit scale.  But if the surface temperature of the green deep was 40°C and the black one was 45°C (which are the ballpark measurements I got), in Fahrenheit that would be 105°F and 113°F.

I don't know how much of that extra warmth translates into the hive, but I'll take it.

[yukonjeff]

That's a interesting experiment with the heat imager. Thanks for posting the results. I always thought it was a bout a 5 degree difference. I notice they fly on cooler days in the black painted hives. Than they did when they were painted white.

Also don't forget to paint the bottom board and entrance reducer, it helps melt the snow and ice from the entrance in winter.

[Bakersdozen]

I notice they fly on cooler days in the black painted hives. Than they did when they were painted white.

That is the reason we don't wrap hives here in Kansas.  It usually doesn't get cold enough here to do that winter prep. The bees fly out and chill then drop to the ground.  It's a false sense of temperature.  I always place a wind break, if there isn't a natural windbreak, between the hives and the North wind.

[yukonjeff]

BD I believe those bees your seeing spiral down after leaving the hive are the dead walking, and going to die anyway. I don't worry about them, and just hope my cluster is big enough to last until spring. I think the wraps save them stores and help keep the wind out.

[yukonjeff]

I thought my bees were bringing in pollen, but nothing blooming after several hard freezes last week. Turns out they are bringing in mold from the underside of the Fireweed leaves.







Getting things set up for winter.
Here is my first mated queen I made here. I hope she makes it.



Got them fed up



Pollen patties on.



I have to treat yet, I don't think I have mites anymore, but will hit them with OAV and see what drops.

[yukonjeff]

Well I did two rounds of OAV and had a mite drop of 50 each treatment, So even though my four hives, were from one hive that was treated with MAQs and two rounds of OAV last year, and the year before, still has mites. All four do. I might try and get in another round of OAV yet.

I have my quilt boxes, and sugar bricks on, and wrapped.



This is my first mated NUC. they are a little small, she didn't start laying until the last week in August when my other hives were already shutting down.



Good luck to everyone wintering their bees.

[MudSongs]

I may be the only person on the Isle of Newfoundland who pants their hives black, but I'm doing it, along with switching to all-mediums, and so far so good.  I've posted the details here for anyone who might be interested:

https://mudsongs.org/black-hives/

Next spring will be the final test, to see how well the bees come through winter without wrap and only black pant.  I didn't wrap my black hives this past winter and it seemed to work out okay, but it's hard to judge from just one season because every season is different.

Gotta say, though, I love the switch to all mediums. I wish I'd done it when I started beekeeping.  We'll see how that plays out too.  This is my first summer with mediums.

[Bakersdozen]

Keep us posted, Mudsongs. 
Sounds interesting.

[Zweefer]

Great to hear from you MudSongs! 
I too made the switch to all mediums a number of years ago, and haven’t looked back! 
Now the trick is getting rid of your deeps so you aren’t tempted to use them.

[yukonjeff]

Greetings.
Been awhile. I tried logging in this spring but could not find this site ? Might of been down that day. IDK but glad to see its still here. lol

Well anyway ...sadly I lost my four hives last winter. I underfed and we had a very cold winter they all starved.

So during the covid pandemic I had to get packages shipped out to me in the bush and all the flights were canceling and our local airline went bankrupt.

Through the determination of some kind package sellers, and some kind city beekeepers in Anchorage, they were able to hold my two packages until a cargo flight could fly them in. The young beekeeper was able to take out the feed can and put on a feed jar and they kept like that just fine for a week ! no more dead bees at the bottom than normal, even less I would say.

They were double queen carni packages and I split them into four hives put on drawn comb.

I treated all four with OAV the first 10 days of installation, and my last OAV in September I got no mite drop on two hives and put apivar on the other two. I think I am mite free now. No other bees here to to reinfect them.

I got a little honey from them and had a fun summer beekeeping. I got visited by a brown bear twice. Once it knocked over a Nuc and got stung and left. When it came back it got 10,000 Volts. It got shot at the neighbor's by the police.

 I managed in single brood chambers and liked it so much I decided to try winter in them. Yes maybe I am crazy but I have a good feeling it can work. I did keep one as a double just in case..

I am adding a bigger sugar brick and another inch of insulation under my wraps, actually its drop ceiling material.

Still using the grass stuffed medium for a quilt box , I have the three inch screened feed jar hole in the inner cover.  No upper entrance.

They are fed well all ten frames pretty much full of capped sugar and I will be quick with the feed jar in late February if needed.

Hope you all had a great summer, and good luck with your wintering set up.







 

 

[iddee]

Welcome back, Jeff. Bittersweet story there. I hope they make it through the winter well and produce a big crop next year.

[Wandering Man]

Good luck! Managing bees in cold climates has to be difficult.

[efmesch]

Following your story is not so much a tale of success as one of determination.  There's no doubt in  my  mind that you have greater expenses than income.  BUT, who cares ---  showing that you can keep going on and meeting your goal of raising bees in Alaska says a lot about you being a man of great determination.  People with your strength of character are what make America great.
Carry on.

[yukonjeff]

Thanks for all the words of encouragement folks.

I cant imagine a summer without bees. That would be terrible. I do keep busy with chickens and quail too and summer fishing of course.

I will do my best to keep this bunch alive. I sure hated to lose them especially the Mike Palmer queen nuc.

I figure a little better insulation should slow down the honey consumption some. I learned that my bee hives are like my wood stove. The colder it gets the more I need to feed it.

I want to be fast with the feed jar when it looks like they are getting light, and hope they are able to take enough to keep them alive in our cold pre-spring weather.

[Wandering Man]

Some folk down here will keep their hives under a cover for shade when we get extreme heat. Do you think a lean-to would help them?

[yukonjeff]

I would rather they get all the sun they can . Hives are on the side of a hill and pretty windy there, a wind block would help no doubt but they are nestled in a patch of alder bushes that block wind pretty well on three sides, and will catch the snow and hopefully it will bury them singles.

I considered pushing them together probably would of helped but I have them strapped down pretty good spaced like that and need to be secure from the wind and bears.

 

[Bakersdozen]

I see some posts in your picture, yukonjeff.  Do you have some tarps you could stretch between those posts?  I would guess that the wind comes whipping around from all directions.  That would slow the wind down some.  Also, if you have access to bales of hay, those can help too.
Alders are a great, early spring source of pollen.

[iddee]

Along with the feed jars, you might want to consider sugar blocks for spring emergencies.