Gifts from the Bee Hive

 December 21, the winter soltice, the "shortest" day of the year, is two days away.  After this date, the days "lengthen" a few minutes every day until summer soltice, June 21.  Winter officially begins on December 21, but for me it is encouraging just to know the daylight hours are lengthening a little each day as we face January and February.
  It was 27 degrees fahrenheit today and my bees are all in their winter cluster.   I am restricted from checking my hives or doing anything with the bees at all, so what is a beekeeper to do in the winter. Well, many things actually; plan for spring, assemble new hive bodies, repair old equipment, make sugar bricks for emergency late winter feed, render wax.....
Speaking of wax, if you have some beeswax you rendered, you could make some gifts for Christmas which is six days away.  A small amount of  beeswax can go along way. I made some lip balm and lotion bars using 3 oz. each of beeswax, shea butter and coconut oil.   A very simple recipe, just equal parts of each. Heat them together in a double boiler, then simply fill your containers or molds.

Beeswax, shea butter and coconut oil.  A small kitchen scale is very helpful for accurate measurement. This recipe is equal amounts of each item depending on how much you want to make. 

Lip balm, lotion bars and bottled honey.  Easy and fun Christmas gifts.   I bought the lip balm tubes on amazon,  You can use any mold for the lotion bars, even a muffin tin will work great. 

Wintering Honeybees in West Michigan

Two weeks ago, the temperatures were in the seventies. Today, November 21st, reality settled upon bare branches, harvested fields, roof tops and the top covers of my hives.  Snow.  It came quietly during the early morning hours and we had been expecting it.  So much so, that four nights ago my husband and I wrapped our thirteen hives with tar paper. Their winter screen boards are on, top entrances are accessible and all have ample honey stores. The one task  I would like to accomplish yet is to put up a wind break.

The first snow in West Michigan this season. Hives wrapped with tar paper. Would like to get a windbreak in this yard yet before winter really sets in.

Robbing in Fifty Degrees, at the end of October, Really??

I became an eyewitness to one of my worst fears in beekeeping, robbing. I seriously was so very, very careful to avoid this from happening. I noticed it on October 26 when I went to place my winter screen on the hive. This particular hive sits by itself more that 500 feet from five of my other hives. The reason for the different location is irrelevant. It was sunny and 58 degrees. As I walked up to it I noticed  a lot of activity and a louder buzzing than what would be normal. Honeybees and Yellow jackets were flying up the sides of the hive, hovering at the joints between boxes and trying to gain access under the telescoping cover.  This hive already had an entrance reducer on and was reduced to four small holes.  I had placed a queen excluder and top winter shell on Oct 20.(I use the exculder to set my winter sugar bricks on)  The top shell had a single small hole for a winter upper entrance and ventilation. Yellow Jackets and honeybees were pouring in and out of that hole. I grabbed a wad of grass and stuck it into the hole. I ran back to the van and grabbed my trusty  Duct Tape.  I wrapped the tape around the seams even though they weren't getting in there. I taped shut all but one entrance hole on the reducer at the lower entrance.  Then I stood back and just shook my head.
There wasn't much more I could do.  I do not have robbing screens nor did I have the materials to make one.  Later I spread Vicks Vapo Rub on the entrance.  I had read that it confuses the robbers and placed a screen in front of the hive entrance.
I checked the hive today and found Yellow jackets sauntering in and out of the single entrance hole uncontested.  They are just so wicked!  I waited till dusk to investigate the inside of the hive. In the pictures below you'll see I found only a handful of bees surrounded by wax cappings on the bottom board.  A very small amount of capped brood was in the lower hive body and on a brighter note I found about five frames of capped honey that the robbers had not gotten to yet in the top box.
From my notes, this hive appeared strong on September 17, lots of bees, enough honey for winter.  I did not do a thorough inspection on that day.  When I placed the winter shell (shallow box) the week before there were not many bees in the top box, but  I figured they were down in the bottom at this time of year. Soooooo, not quite sure what happened here. Was robbing alone to blame for its demise or had the majority of the colony already left and hence the robbers were able to gain access because it was so weak?
  I picked through the dead honey bees on the bottom board and did not find the queen. I did see evidence of Varroa mites.  A few  dead Varroa mites scattered among the cappings. This hive had a break in the brood cycle in July, but no chemical treatments for Varroa.  No evidence of small hive beetle or disease.

The sad sight when I removed the entrance reducer

The bottom board, dead honeybees, yellow jackets and wax cappings



The dead defenders.  If you zoom in you can see tiny red ovals among the cappings, those are dead  varroa mites, the Honeybees and beekeepers worst enemy.

Capped honey frames from the top box. I can add to  other hives for extra feed. 

You can see where the wax cappings were carelessly ripped away by the robbers to obtain the honey stored beneath.

A frame of partially capped brood and honey from the lower box. in top left corner you can see evidence of robbing. 

The hive that was robbed.  It is one at my off site.  Noticed it on October 26.  Not sure when it started.  More looters/robbers on other side of  the hive, I should've gotten a better picture of that. I plugged the upper entrance with grass. 

The other hives some five hundred feet away.  All precautions being taken to prevent the start of robbing in this yard. I can't believe I'm hoping for lower temperatures and some good hard frosts!

Autumn Asters, Mouse Guards and Enemies

We are almost midway through October here in West Michigan.  We are still enjoying seventy degree days on occasion and have been basking in the warm autumn sunshine.  Asters are still blooming for the bees, but nights are getting chilly with temperatures down in the forties.  Time to put mouse guards on the hives.  Not only do the mouse guards keep out mice, but they also reduce the entrance  to help ward off  yellow jackets and other pests that are trying to gain access at this time of year.

Honeybee on white Aster

Honeybee on white Aster

Honeybee on light purple aster

This forager is older, see her frayed wings. 

I like these mouse guards from Dadant because you can slide them open or closed and make the entrance smaller or larger. As it gets colder you can reduce the entrance to only four holes.

This is my smaller hive that had a late August queen. I am going to pull some frames of honey from another hive and place those frames on the sides or I could place the frames right above the brood frames in a box above them.  I am feeding them syrup right now until they can't take it down anymore because of the cooler temps.  People have had a decent amount of success overwintering nucs, which is really what this hive is going into winter.  I will have to wait and see how it turns out. 

This is how I am feeding syrup to the weaker hive, Mason jars inverted over the hole in the inner cover. 

This is a gallon of feed I set outside my door before bringing it to the hive to feed. It was not even open and these girls plus the nasty yellow jacket found it within minutes. Do NOT leave any open syrup  and or honey out this time of year.  With decreased forage around, honeybees are very susceptible to robbing either by yellow jackets, hornets or other honeybees. I have not yet witnessed robbing and I don't want to! Watching you tube videos of it is horrible, I can't imagine seeing my own bees in  a worked up, frenzied state of robbing.

Bearding in the Hot Humid Weather and Buckwheat is Blooming!

These first few days of September have been in the nineties with high humidity. The bees are as busy as ever bringing in massive amounts of pollen and Goldenrod nectar.  My July starts have built up so quickly I've worried about them swarming out of their two deep boxes. I removed two frames of honey and replaced them with  a couple empty frames to give them more space.

Sept 1st, 7:30 pm.  I had a feeling I should drive over and check on my hives. I was glad I did. The hive three deep boxes high has an OTS queen from the beginning of June.  The smaller one bearding facing you in the picture is a hive from a July (OTS) On The Spot Queen.  See Mel Disselkoens website www.mdasplitter.com for more on raising your own queens and the OTS method. 

July start with OTS Queen. I love how they made their stopping point the crack between the two hive boxes, a perfect line.  

Bearding tall and thick on this hive. This hive has a June OTS queen.

On the left side of the box, the bees were wash boarding. A rhythmic almost rocking back and forth behavior that the bees perform.  I think it looks like a great big honeybee line dance when you see it in person.  No one has figured out why they do this, but it has been labeled wash boarding

Hi girls. These are the girls who were "holding on to the ledge" at the crack where the two deep bodies meet, forming a perfect line in their bearding. You can see how layer on top of one another.  

My Buckwheat that I planted is now blooming.  I planted it in between my rows of strawberries and Zinnias. When it is finished, I will till it in as a green manure. They honeybees are enjoying if very much, One beekeeper friend said it should make for some interesting honey, the mixture of goldenrod and buckwheat. 

Honeybee on Buckwheat bloom.

Honeybees on the Buckwheat

Honeybees Savoring Summer

Nectar flows, blooms, high pollen counts and honeybee foragers are waning like a summer sunset.  Yes, the Goldenrod flow is on now, but at its close the only significant honeybee plant will be asters. You can try to extend blooms and nectar flow by planting a garden full of buckwheat like I did, but the frost will still come and there is nothing me or the honeybees can do about it. So I will enjoy each happy, buzzing honeybee day we have until frost does come! Below are some pictures of honeybee plants and honeybee foragers at work.

Honeybee forager on Rose a Sharon bloom. 

Multiple honey bee foragers collecting nectar and pollen from Sunflower

Honeybee forager on Sunflower

An old Honeybee forager, look at her frayed and torn wings.

Honeybee in flight

Honeybee forager with load of pollen from Ragweed

How can you not love this little darling with her face full of pollen?! She is serious about her work!  Loaded down and time to go back to the hive. Ragweed plant. 

Ragweed and Goldenrod in the forefront. Not where you want to be if you have seasonal allergies.

Honeybee forager on Ragweed.

Some of my hives surrounded by Goldenrod! 

Honeybee Heaven.  Loosestrife, Goldenrod, Jewelweed, Joe Pye weed all along a creek 20 feet from my apiary.

Cosmos.

Goldenrod, Jewelweed and Loosestrife.

My Last OTS Queen of 2015

On August 27th I opened up the hive to see if I had a laying queen.  It was a start/split  from June 23 whose queen never returned after her mating flight.  I gave it a notched frame of brood on July 28. A week later I checked for queen cells and there were two.  I have been waiting since then. My patience was rewarded as I found eggs and a new OTS queen.  This start will overwinter in a single deep.

New post soltice OTS queen!

Another OTS Queen! On The Spot Queen Rearing by Mel Disselkoen.

Goldenrod hanging down near hive entrances. These girls don't have to travel far from their front porch to find some nectar and pollen.

These July splits/starts with new OTS Queens have built up incredibly fast. They have also had to draw out many frames of comb as each split had only 3-4 drawn frames to begin with.

Drawing out new comb, so beautiful clean and white.  I like using the black foundation as it makes the eggs and larva easier to see.

Honeybee Forage

August already? I saw Goldenrod blooming today!! We could definitely use more rain. It has been pretty dry in West Michigan. From morning till dusk my honeybees are frequenting the bird bath for water.  We do have a pond nearby, but as my bird bath is only about fifty feet from the hives, it is convenient for them to tank up on water there.

I checked my queenless hive yesterday and found a queen cell where I notched.  Patience is now needed as I will have to wait to the end of August to check for a laying queen.  The other hives have beautiful brood patterns and are building up nicely.

I went to the Honey Festival in Frankenmuth, MI last Saturday. One of the vendors was selling plants for pollinators and  I purchased an Anise Hyssop plant. When I got home that night, I left it outside the garage. The next morning at 0830, the Honeybees had already found it.

They have also been working my Zinnias, Purple Cones, Japanese Anemone, Lemon head Sunflowers, pumpkins, squash and pickles.  Tomorrow I plan to sow about three pounds of Buckwheat seed. It should bloom early to mid September for the bees.

Honeybee on Japanese Anemone

Honeybees on Purple Cone Flower

Honeybee with pollen on white Zinnia

Honeybee on Anise Hyssop flower



Honeybee on Anise Hyssop

Water! At the bird bath.