Bees doing too well?

[mystil]

Hello Guys

Did an inspection 2 days ago of our 2 national bee hives and we have abit of heather honey coming in.

But the main thing is that one of the hives has 9 frames of brood and 2 frames of food (we thought that they should have been slowing down by now! when in actual fact she is going great guns).

All we can assume is that when it gets abit colder she will start to slow down and the bees will fill the empty frames with food for winter.

On average how many frames of food will the hive need to keep them alive over winter?

Obviously we still have a honey flow going on.

Cheers

 

[drstitson]

"On average how many frames of food will the hive need to keep them alive over winter?"

40+ lbs = 10+ standard frames full.

 

[mystil]

hmmm Ouch. As I said hopefully they will realise winter is around the corner and slow down.

I have heard some people feed in bulk and that can curtail her breeding.

Im not keen on the idea myself.

What do you think?

 

[oliver90owner]

'On average' doesn't work!

Doing that, on average (by definitiion), you would lose half your colonies by starvation!

RAB

 

[Chris Luck]

.......and the other half "to make the average" wouldn't have a hive large enough....

....even worse when they only have 6 frames....

Nah, not that simple.

Chris

 

[mystil]

Okay "On average" was bad wording on my part.

So we just need to heft the hive closer to the time and see how they go. I just wanted a "rough" idea as to what we should be trying to achieve to get them through winter.

Although thinking about that bees just do what they want and leave us to pick up the peices.

Is that about right or am I still off the mark?

 

[Monsieur Abeille]

If that healthy a colony perhaps you should be looking to overwinter on a brood and a half?

 

[drstitson]

And should then consider changing to 14x12 for next year.

 

[mystil]

If that healthy a colony perhaps you should be looking to overwinter on a brood and a half?

If we did that now could we get away with undrawn foundation or would it have to be drawn?

We only have a super/half brood box with undrawn available.

 

[Skyhook]

Nice problem to have- the bees have a habit of knowing what they're doing, and a big, young population is good to take into winter.

If you want to add a super then given that the temperature is dropping, I might be inclined to put the super on top with insulation above the crownboard so they can draw it. You can then move it underneath so it gets emptied first in winter.

Having said that, you were right in your first post- when they sense it's time, they'll stop producing young and fill the frames with the 2:1 syrup you give them, but that could easily be another couple of weeks.

 

[Monsieur Abeille]

If we did that now could we get away with undrawn foundation or would it have to be drawn?

We only have a super/half brood box with undrawn available.

Ready to be contradicted, but I'd have thought it late to expect them to draw out a super, even with supplementary feeding.

Where are they currently storing their flow?

 

[mystil]

On the 2 frames they have for stores in the BB. They also have some stores around the brood frames (classic arch).

 

[oliver90owner]

I'd have thought it late to expect them to draw out a super, even with supplementary feeding.

Agreed, 'expected'. But we may yet have 2 1/2 months to do that, so perfectly possible with heavy feeding. Most only rush to prepare for winter because they can get caught 'on the hop'.

I wouldn't bank on it, but if September were to be hot all the way through, they might be full up by October.

That said, Somerset may not need more than a deep brood to over-winter (weather dependent, location dependent, etc).

RAB