Honeybees bringing in pollen in February in Michigan!

Record temperatures in West Michigan this week have honeybees bringing in pollen like it was a summer morning! With temps hovering in the sixties and then breaking seventy with sunshine yesterday, the Silver Maples could not hold back.  They burst forth in bloom.  Skunk cabbage and Willow may also be blooming.  The bees were bringing in a variety of pollen until sunset.  Pollen means brood rearing and the bees will have to keep that brood warm.  More brood puts a higher demand on the colony. A demand I hope they can keep up with in the coming months.  A true Michigander knows we have not seen the last of snow even if he/she won't admit it. Hang in there Honeybees! I am checking my colonies regularly to make sure they have enough stores. If they are low, I am replacing with sugar bricks or frames of honey I saved from last fall.

Silver Maple bloom, February 22, 2017. Honeybees working these flowers, too high up for me to get a good shot of them.

Incoming with pollen loads, February 22, 2017.

Lost loads of pollen I gathered from "front porch" where the bees land. February 22, 2017. West Michigan. The yellow pollen may be Skunk Cabbage or willow. Tan to grayish green may be Silver Maple.

Unbelievable! First Crocus bloom on February 22, 2017.

INCOMING!! Twas like a summer day!! Silver Maple flow I guess :-) February 22, 2017.

Having trouble with pollen load staying in corbicula "pollen basket" I opened up entrance more after seeing what they were losing while flying in.  February 22, 2017, West MI.

Sweet Honeybee landed on my finger.  This was actually taken February 17, 2017.  I don't believe this was true pollen. We live near a lot of farms and the bees will gather what they can from animal feed and bird feeders if no real pollen is available.

Spying on Honeybees during a Michigan Winter.

My husband has tools, lots and lots of tools.  The Snap On tool guy loves my husband.  I never really took an interest in the tools until my husband told me that he owned a Bore Scope, a long flexible tube with a small lighted camera on the end.  He says to me, "Ya know you could stick that in the top-hole of your hives and look at your bees."  Of course I could.  He also recently brought home, on loan for a jar of honey, a thermal imager.  I played with the thermal imager first.  Because of the wraps on my hives it is harder to see where the cluster is, however it would show heat coming from the top entrance hole.  Heat from a live cluster of honeybees.  I tried it on a friends hives who had no wrap on his hives and it was much easier to identify where the cluster was.  The thermal imager was exciting, but the Bore Scope was thrilling.  Thrilling enough to get me out poking it through the top entrance holes of my hives in nine degree weather with a windchill below zero.  Gotta love Michigan! 
Between the imager and the Bore Scope, I think I can confidently say with ninety-five percent certainty that a large majority of my hives are alive!!  That is much better than last year at this time, they had all met their demise except for two sick stragglers who died a couple months later.  I took a couple of pictures of the screen of the Bore Scope, I took video too of the bees but have not yet figured out how to get them to play on this blog!  The Scope was very helpful to see which hives had enough sugar brick and who could use some more very soon. You could get it down in between frames and see how much honey was left on the sides of the cluster.  A couple hives that I thought were down in the bottom box had moved up to the top box.  All useful information this time of year.  If we get a little warmer weather soon, I will be able to give bricks to those who need it without popping tops of those who have enough yet.  Saves me time and energy.  Energy I need to get through this Michigan winter!

Honeybees on top of their sugar brick inside the hive. Viewed on the screen while end of bore scope is in the hive.

Honeybees in Michigan winter staying cozy in their hive.  Seen through the tiny bore scope camera stuck in through the top entrance hole of the hive.

Baby it's cold outside!!! Nine degrees, below zero wind chill. Nine out of eleven hives in this yard alive :-)

Bore Scope came in handy to peek inside the hive without having to disturb them or pop covers off.  Able to check food stores and where the honeybees are at.

Michigan Overwintering Honeybees

It is December 11, and Old Man Winter has finally hit West Michigan. My hive tops are laden with 8 inches of snow cover.   As I stand basking in the warm light and heat of my kitchen baking cookies, I look out at the hives adorned in their black cloak of tar paper and I smile. The thought of them all clustered together to maintain life and keep their queen at a balmy 90 degrees is nothing short of miraculous.  God, our and the honeybees creator, is to be praised!!  Such detail, intricacy and wisdom!!  To walk out into a snow filled apiary and place your ear up against the cold hive box and hear the low hum of bees vibrating their wings muscles collaboratively to maintain heat and life is amazing!!  I took a few winter pics of some of my hives and a fellow beekeepers. Enjoy.

Quickly peeked in on this cluster Dec 4, 2016.

Honeybees on sugar brick. December, 2016

December 11, 2016.  Yes, hundreds of thousands of Honeybees alive in those boxes! I can hardly stand to be outside in the whipping wind and snow.  The Honeybees are clustered down, maintaining the required temperature for survival and consuming the honey they had stored over the summer.  These hives have a barn for a wonderful  windbreak.

The snow actually helps insulate, but you need to make sure you have ventilation, somewhere for that warm air rising from the cluster to go so it doesn't condense on the underside of top cover and drip back down on the bees.  Honeybees can do cold, they can't do WET!

Can't get enough of awesome apiaries! Just to know there is life in those boxes in the dead of winter gives me hope for spring!

Goodbye Summer, Goodbye Nectar Flow, Hello Fall

This summer was a whirlwind of honeybee activity.  I started late spring with ten nucs.  Seven nucs were given to me by a generous beekeeper. Two others I worked for by assisting another beekeeper to make splits and one was the swarm I hived on that cold June morning.  How did it get to be almost the end of October?  Well since June,  I worked with and split the ten into thirty-three hives using the OTS queen rearing method by Mel Disselkoen.  I sold two,  and am forging into the fall with thirty-one hives.  I did not even take a lick of honey from the bees this year!  I focused mainly on making more bees.  Now the focus turns to keeping them alive for the winter.
Because of last winters losses and the probable varroa mite infestation, I did mite counts this summer.  If the mite count was high, above threshold, greater than two mites per 100 bees, I treated.  I used the oxalic dribble (medium strength) per guidelines on Scientific Beekeeping website. I did the dribble while there was no capped brood in the hive, that window where all the brood from the old queen  had emerged and the new queen had not started laying or was just beginning to lay.  Treating during this window of time means there are no mites hiding beneath the capping and all mites should be phoretic, hitchhiking on the bees in the hive.  So all the mites in the hive are exposed to the oxalic acid.
I didn't want to treat, but I do not wish to lose my bees again either.   The brood breaks are an excellent way to knock back varroa and keep there numbers to a manageable level, BUT even if your bees are "clean," drones carrying varroa mites from any hives in your surrounding areas can enter your hives uncontested and re-infest your hives.  Many beekeepers have done mite counts in July and August and find them to be below threshold and then suddenly in September their hives are inundated with mites.  Beekeepers call this a Varroa Bomb.  Getting nailed with drones infested by Varroa or your strong hive robs a neighboring weak hive that is full of Varroa and your bees unknowingly carry Varroa back to your "clean" hive.  It is a sad state of affairs and one must remain vigilant.
This summer was so busy with the bees, my son's graduation open house and a trip out west, I didn't get many "in the hive" pictures but I did manage to catch them foraging here and there.   Enjoy the images of summer 2016.

Honeybee on Anise Hyssop

Honeybees water color at hive entrance

Honeybee on Lemon Queen sunflower

Home Apiary with splits

Honeybee on Basswood bloom.  Right in my own back yard! The smell of this tree in bloom is intoxicating.  Love standing underneath it and listening to the happy hum of busy bees!

Honeybee alighting onto Basswood bloom.

Honeybee on Sunflower bloom

Honeybee on Buckwheat bloom

Honey bee gathering nectar from Buckwheat bloom

Buckwheat blooming in my backyard.

Honeybees on top of frame

Honeybee on Anemone bloom

Honeybee on Japanese Anemone bloom

Honeybee on Anise Hyssop bloom.  See the pollen she has started gathering in her "pollen basket" on her leg?

Honeybees on Japanese Anemone bloom

Honeybee on Zinnia bloom

Honeybee Swarm on a Chilly June Morning.

The morning started out like any other work day. I got up at 0500, went to the pool, swam 30 laps  and then headed the short distance to work.  I pulled in the drive of the parking lot at work.  It was 45 degrees, quite chilly for a June morning, but the sun was shining. As I turned towards the parking lot, I noticed a patch of brown in a small tree on the landscape.  I wonder if I am scanning subconsciously  for swarms all of the time??  I pulled off onto the grass and walked a few feet to the tree. It is now 0650 and my eyes behold a small oscillating mass of golden, sparkling ( the morning sun was shining directly upon them) honeybees!  It was a swarm!  Not just any swarm, a swarm within reach. All I needed to do was lop off one small branch and place them in my box.  I watched in amazement as one or two scouts broke off the small shining mass and flew off in search of a new home.
As I stood there gaping, my co worker pulled up, rolled down her window, and questioned, "What ya doing?"  I pointed and said, "Honeybees!"  She, knowing I'd not be able to focus on anything but the bees, said, "Are you gonna get them? You should run home and get your stuff, we'll be alright here till you get back."  I issued one, "Are you sure?" She replied, "Yes!"  Thanks Nikki!  That was the only encouragement I needed.

My bee buddy Mary came to be the branch cutter and be the courier to transport this sweet little swarm back to my place.  She also ended up being the photographer, thanks Mary!

The tightly clustered swarm (remember it is 45 degrees!) just about to go into my nuc box. I had already placed some frames of empty comb and honey in there for them. June 8, 0720 AM!

Now how easy was that!  One small branch within easy reach! Wish all swarms were so simple. I transferred these girls into their new hive body later that evening. Found the queen and the bees filled out the five frames nicely.  It will be fun now to watch her start laying and build up brood. 

Booming Brood and Blossoms!

The nucs I have that have 2015 post soltice queens are building up nicely! Some of them have seven to eight frames of brood already with new bees emerging all the time. Around 4:30 on sunny afternoons they seem to have their orientation flights.  They have also been on the Dutch clover, Buckeye tree, Catmint, Dogwood and the Black Locust has just started to bloom here in West Michigan. I have yet to get a picture of them on the Black Locust bloom.

Honeybee alighting on Red Buckeye bloom. May 2016

Red Buckeye Bloom

Honeybee coming on for a landing on Dogwood bloom, May, 2016. I had watched my Dogwood tree bloom and did not see honeybees on it until the  white petals started to brown and then they were all over it for a few days. The flowers within the big white petals had popped open and they were gathering pollen and possibly nectar from the green little mass of flowers you see in the middle.

The honeybees love this Catmint perennial. I love it too as it starts blooming in May, splits well, does well in poor soil and does well with minimal water. Requirements for most plants in my yard!

Honeybee on Dutch Clover.  June, 2016. 

Honeybee on Dutch Clover, early June, 2016.

Honeybee on the Catmint blooms.  Hummingbirds and other pollinators love this also.

Honeybee orientations flights on a warm sunny June afternoon.

Honeybees, don't they just make you want to smile.

Honeybee on Autumn Olive Bloom, a species on the "Invasive list."

Honey bee on Autumn Olive Bloom, May 24, 2016.

Honeybee gathering nectar from Autumn Olive. May, 2016.

I couldn't resist putting this pose in here, Honeybee on Autumn Olive bloom. May, 2016.

Honeybee on Autumn Olive. May 2016. These flowers give off a heavenly aroma in the spring!