Episode 5 is up! This week, I talk about what I learned while looking into how to prepare my beehives for an Ohio winter.
You can find that here
References for this episode:
‘The New Starting Right with Bees’ Kim Flottum & Kathy Summers
‘The Backyard Beekeeper’ 4th ed, Kim Flottum
‘Beekeeping For Dummies’, Howland Blackiston
‘The Beekeeper’s Bible’, Stewart, Tabari, & Chang
‘Honey Bee Biology and Beekeeping’, Dewey M. Caron & Lawrence John Connor
When it comes to winter prep, it turns out that things are relatively simple. The complicated part is timing; leave things too late, and your hive is at a disadvantage. Fall/Autumn is the time to prepare.
In states with a late summer/early Fall nectar flow, such as Ohio, one must be careful not to over harvest honey. We are lucky enough to have a plant called goldenrod, which produces a heavy, strong-flavoured honey. I was warned that I’ll know when my bees are harvesting goldenrod nectar as the smell can be a bit off-putting in the hive. I actually love it!
Anyhoo, if you are fortunate enough to get a Fall harvest, be mindful to leave enough for your bees. If you’re not sure whether they have enough food left, offer a 2:1 heavy syrup while the weather is still mild/warm so that they can build their stores.
And assessing a colony’s stores is a big part of winter prep.
A general Fall check list:
treat varroa as needed
assess amount and position of honey stores
assess extent and pattern of brood area
assess size of adult population
check brood and adult bee health (signs of disease or weakening?)
check condition of comb and equipment
To really understand how to assess the above, let’s talk about how bees over-winter:
Overwintering bees are physiologically different from summer bees. They have large hypopharyngeal glands and more fat body reserves that secrete large amounts of vitellogenin, which is pivotal to their winter survival, as it appears to be responsible for increasing their lifespan (from 3-5 weeks, to 6 months or more). You can see now why it is so important to treat for varroa mites as these nasty parasites feed off these fat stores, thereby reducing the amounts of vitellogenin that a bee preparing to over winter can produce.
Randy Oliver at Scientific Beekeeping has a great article on this.
As the temperatures drop, adult bees cluster around the queen, forming a ball. The adult bees will vibrate/move their wing muscles to generate heat, which is supported by brood metabolism (brood and queen being at the center of the cluster, which is kept the warmest). This maintains the temperature of the hive through a process called thermoregulation.
The basic hive temp is 57F/15C. When broodless, the center of the cluster is about 70F/21C. With brood present, it can be as hot as 94F. Early on in winter, the bees are gathered around the brood and their queen but at some point, all that brood will hatch, and the cluster will consist entirely of adult bees (this is when the hive will be at the lower temp mentioned above). As the day light hours length, usually in January or February, depending on where you live, the queen resumes laying eggs, and eggs need higher temps to hatch, and so the cluster must be heated to 94F at the center, even if the temps outside might be at their lowest for your region.
So you can see that this cluster is the key to maintaining colony temperatures. But how do these bees feed? Well, part of this spherical cluster must be in contact with honey stores at all times. The constant movement of the wing muscles to generate heat is caloric intensive; the bees need to eat! They will also need to bring food to the brood, nurse bees, and queen.
This cluster starts in the lowest box of your hive and steadily moves up, consuming honey as it goes. However, the cluster will not move in temps under 40-45F so if there is a gap between a cluster and their honey stores, they risk starving, even though the food is technically within reach. Having an overlap of the cluster to stores is an ideal situation.
The more bees, the stronger the cluster, so assessing the size of your adult population going into winter is important to give you an idea of how your bees might fare. It also allows you to eye their stores and decide if they have enough. More bees will need more food.
According to Honey Bee Biology, “while colonies in the Gulf Coast states survive with 30 or fewer pounds of honey reserves. . .. colonies in more northerly areas need up to 90lbs”.
Now, if you’re a newbee like me, you likely have no idea what that looks like. I was always taught that you want a 50/50 ratio: 50% population to 50% food (pollen & honey) stores. So if you have one deep super full of bees, you want one deep super full of honey. Or, if your colony is small, you might have 5 frames of bees to 5 frames of stores.
What if your bees don’t have enough stores? This is why we check our hives regularly! If you have been doing regular inspections, you likely have an idea of how the colony is progressing. If you are in your hives in early Fall, you have more time to feed a 2:1 (sugar: water) syrup. This heavy syrup encourages storage, as opposed to a light syrup (1:2) that encourages brood production and wax building (which is why we feed it in the Spring).
Heavy feeding through the Fall season might be necessary, and could be the key to a colony’s winter survival. Feed as much as they’ll take.
Another option is to take honey frames from a large hive that can spare them, and place them into the smaller hives that needs additional stores. Make sure to brush off adult bees. Also be careful if taking honey frames from other hive sites or generous keepers; remember to consider biosecurity and the possibility of introducing potential disease or pathogens.
Hopefully, this gives you an idea of what you are looking for when you assess the adult population, and the amount and position of honey reserves. But how do you assess the brood?
From what I have read, you’re looking for a few things:
the brood area becoming more central and lower in the hive (assuming it wasn’t before), as opposed to being dispersed throughout the hive
you might find that the brood pattern becomes spotty for a while as the overall brood space is being reduced/compacted
this leaves less room for the queen to lay so you’ll eventually see a decrease in eggs, usually around Oct-Nov
signs of disease; indication of wax moths tunneling beneath the brood; chalk brood (caused by a fungus); or European Foul Brood (EFB).
What if you find any of the above? What if your brood isn’t diseased but there’s just not a lot of it, nor is your adult population numerous? What do you do?
One of your options is to combine hives (assuming you have more than one). You can either combine two weak hives to hopefully produce one strong one, or you can combine a weak hive to a strong one.
When combining hives, you can use the newspaper method that I have discussed previously. This is where you place one hive (the weaker) on top of the other (stronger) with a few sheets of newspaper between. By the time the bees have removed the newspaper, they’re all buds.
But in the Fall, you want that nice condensed brood cluster so placing one colony on top of the other is going to stagger that brood, as you’ll end up with the strong brood area in the lower super with a small, weaker brood area above. This could potentially cause issues if temps are dropping fast as bees will be reluctant to abandon the brood that is in the upper boxes, breaking the cluster. So an option is to muddle up the frames. By this, I mean take out the brood frames from the weak colony and insert them in the new colony, spaced between the strong brood frames. Also mix up all the remaining frames so you’re alternating old and new colony frames together. This will cause some fighting but it also causes confusion that gives the bees time to figure out what the heck is going on. By the time they decide things are okay, they have usually united. I don’t have any personal experience with this method but I have heard that it does seem to work.
With both these options, you need to first find the queen from the weakest colony and kill her, as you don’t want 2 queens in the same hive.
Is there anything else that needs to be done before winter hits?
In terms of preparation, most sources I read recommend the following:
close open-ventilated bottom boards (if using)
apply mouse guards
remove queen excluder (if using)
make sure any varroa mite treatments have been removed
remove feeders
put candy board or vivaldi board in place, if desired
make or buy fondant
tilt the colony so moisture will drain out the front
prop up inner cover to allow better ventilation
make sure there is a top entrance/exit for the bees
secure outer cover with a weight on top
put up a windbreak to protect hives from Northern wind
insulate hives (if you want)
1/ If you have an open/screened bottom board, insert some kind of solid material (wood, insulation, plastic) to close off the bottom and prevent snow getting in or heavy drafts.
2/ mouse guards can be plastic, metal, or wooden (although I’ve heard the wooden ones might have too large a gap). Mice are attracted to the warmth of the cluster and can cause a huge amount of damage so don’t overlook this step. The above pic/link is a multi-pack of guards on Amazon, which I’ll be trying out this winter.
3/ queen excluders should be off at this time of year but double check it is gone. Worst case scenario, your cluster moves into the top box and is forced to leave the queen behind, killing her.
4 / if you used a varroa treatment that goes in the hive bodies (like Mite-away quick strips or Apivar), they should be removed before winter.
5/ liquid feeders will just attract pests at this time of year. Make sure they’re out.
6/ candy boards and vivaldi boards allow you to feed fondant to your bees over the winter. Bees need more solid food at this time of year as removing water from their food requires too much energy. You can make your own fondant or buy it. You can also sprinkle dry sugar around the hole of the inner cover but bees may or may not take this.
7/ when propping up the inner cover, aim for about ½ to 1 cm. You don’t want a big space for drafts to get in but you do want to encourage the warm air to rise up and be vented out the top. Humidity is a killer over winter. Much like with chickens, bees generate a lot of warmth and moisture, this warm air rises and then cools rapidly when it touches the cool/cold sides of the hive, turning into water droplets and dripping down. If this cold water hits the bees, it can kill them. This is also why it is recommended to tilt your hives.
8/ if the bottom entrance is covered by snow, your bees will need another way to get out on mild days to do their cleansing flights. Make sure they can exit the top of the hive.
9/ adding a weight to the top cover prevents it from being dislodged during heavy winds and/or storms
10/ windbreaks are anything that helps keep the direct force of the wind away from the hives. You can use straw bales, a temporary fence, shrubbery, a secured tarp; basically anything. Figure out which side of your hives face North and put the windbreak there.
11/ insulation! Some people don’t insulate/wrap their hives, even in Northern states. If you're considering adding insulation, you have some options. Historically, people have used tar paper, old blankets or quilts, and tarps. A number of places offer insulated wraps that are UV and waterproof.
Winter checks
So your hives are all snuggled up with their candy boards, and you just have to wait until Spring. Can you check on their progress?
You do want to keep an eye on your hives, even when snow is on the ground. Watch the lower hive entrance; you’ll likely see dead bees over time. A dozen or so is supposed to be okay but 100s or more indicates a problem.
If the daytime temp is above 50F, and the wind is mild, you can peek inside the hive. If the bees are already in the upper box, you should feed. Don’t be in there long, and don’t pick up any frames; you don’t want to break the cluster. Try to get a look at the cluster population; if it looks much like it did in Autumn, things are going well. If it is much smaller, consider feeding and brace yourself for a potential loss. This isn’t a guarantee, mind, but small clusters struggle.
You might see brown/yellow streaks on the outside of your hives. This is bee poop and is normal. If the hive is covered in it, or you see it inside, your bees might be suffering with Nosema, which is a fungus that is harbored in their digestive tract. You can’t treat it during winter but you can be prepared to help your bees deal with it in the spring. Because Nosema is a risk over winter, some beekeepers provide a preventative treatment of fumagillin in the Fall. It’s up to you. I did not do this so we shall see how my girls fare.
Some people recommend lightly tapping on the side of the hive and listening for the buzz of the bees but I’ve also heard this can stress them out and/or cause them to use more calories so I’m going to try not to do this. Instead, I’m buying a stethoscope to listen in without disturbing the girls! Yes, I am crazy. Yes, it’s okay.
A tech friend told me about a monitoring system called Hive Genie. They use sensors to monitor the hive, including internal and external temps. It looks really cool but it’s expensive, and it might be too late in the year for some people to install this system. For those who have the money and time, maybe check it out and let me know what you think! I’m very curious about it.
For some of you, you might need to install a bear fence, which is basically an electric fence. If you know you have bears in your area, it is recommended to tightly strap down your colonies so that they cannot be opened. If you strap them to a heavy stand, they won’t be tipped over, either, which is deadly in the winter if it breaks the cluster or allows snow into the hive. An electric fence is the best way to keep bears away, however.
And that’s basically it! Do all your prep and then anxiously await the Spring. I am a nervous wreck about getting my girls through the winter. I know I will be fretting all through the cold weather, and sitting out by the hives with my stethoscope like some kind of hard roasted nut. But such is life! I’m a beekeeper. I keep bees, and it makes me a little crazy.
As always, thanks for reading and listening! Please feel free to email me at: homesteadhensandhoney@gmail.com
I'd love to hear from you!
My next podcast episode will be about honey harvesting since this is something I know almost nothing about. I got into this to keep bees and assumed I wouldn’t get any honey my first year so I put learning all about honey extraction on the back burner. Now seems like a good time to tackle the subject! I’ll also have an update on how my winter prep is going. So stay tuned!
Until next time! Remember, hug your hens, and then wash your hands.
