How much bakers fondant to leave on?

[MikeT]

I whole heartedly agree with Oliver90Owner. I am back into bees after some time. I was originally told to feed in the autumn, check hive weight monthly and only feed when necessary and leave well alone until spring unless there's an emergency. Using this advice my stock of bees survived the winter of 1962/3.
This advice was given to me by my old Rural Science Teacher in Wiltshire in 1962, I still think its good advice even nowadays.

Mike

 

[Hivemaker.]

Most of the above shows that many UK beekeepers just get it completely wrong in the autumn?

Seems that way.

yet many UK beekeepers cannot leave the them alone for two months, let alone four or six.

As ROB Manley once said, the poor creatures are ceaselessly tormented until winter brings them respite. Seems that nowadays there is no respite from this torment, even in winter.

 

[oliver90owner]

Steady on, Mike T! There are not a lot of us on here that remember the winter of '63.

I was not keeping bees then, but I do remember having to break into the potato store with a pick axe! I do remember the diesel fuel in the landrover freezing into a solid lump. I do remember my elder brother making an igloo in the orchard. I do remember my youger brother disappearing through a snow drift and re-emerging about 30 yards down the hedge after walking along the ditch.

Weather conditions that Finman (and his bees?) has to endure for long periods in most winters.

 

[MikeT]

1963 was not as cold as Helsinki, I worked in Northern Russia on the same latitude as Helsinki some 500 km East of St Petersburg. That was cold!!

 

[Goran]

Don't worry, not just UK beeks are in panic with premature - or too late feed ( depend on colony status). We can compete with you in this .
But what is determined for our place and our carnies ( which mostly don't have brood from october) - approx 1kg per month till January they spend. In January little increase, then in February usually doubles or some more. But that is when "engines are warming" for new season.

 

[Finman]

1963 was not as cold as Helsinki, I worked in Northern Russia !!

Are you too old to nurse bees and cows? .... 50 years ago you worked in Russia?

 

[MikeT]

No 25 yrs ago

 

[drstitson]

as o2o will confirm, a FULL 14x12 box (i.e. brood and a half equivalent) or dandant or LS jumbo will be fine over winter.

a half empty national brood box will need emergency feeding.

why haven't people been feeding adequately this autumn? lack of confidence or poor advice?

even with increased consumption proper feeding september through october will have been adequate, assuming enough given for stores and consumption.
it may seem a lot but we're talking at least a couple of GALLONS of thymolated 2:1 per hive, not a couple of £1 feeder's worth.

that's why the experienced are concerned with finding best source of sugar - not for the satisfaction of getting x 1kg bags at less that tesco but because for a pallet's worth (for only a small apiary) , the saving is more significant for those on a budget (remembering to factor in petrol etc etc). Remember each hive may take at least 10-15 kilos of sugar in feed.

 

[Gilberdyke John]

Steady on, Mike T! There are not a lot of us on here that remember the winter of '63.

I was not keeping bees then, but I do remember having to break into the potato store with a pick axe! I do remember the diesel fuel in the landrover freezing into a solid lump. I do remember my elder brother making an igloo in the orchard. I do remember my youger brother disappearing through a snow drift and re-emerging about 30 yards down the hedge after walking along the ditch.

Weather conditions that Finman (and his bees?) has to endure for long periods in most winters.

That was the year one of my Yorkshire Aunts went to bed with a hot water bottle. The following morning she woke up and found the bottle had frozen solid, still under the covers. They bred em tough in those days!

 

[pargyle]

That was the year one of my Yorkshire Aunts went to bed with a hot water bottle. The following morning she woke up and found the bottle had frozen solid, still under the covers. They bred em tough in those days!

I was there in Yorkshire ... as a kid of 13 building tunnels in the snow in the back yard to the outside toilet. The cast iron high level toilet cistern was kept running by a candle suspended in a jar underneath it. The frost fern patters on the inside of my bedroom window had to be seen to be believed ... only heating in the house, generally, was the black leaded range in the back room and on really cold nights my Dad would carry some burning coals up to the fireplace in my bedroom to warm it a little as I went to bed. The lino on the floor was so cold you could not stand on it without your slippers on ...

(And yes - we had slippers not shoe boxes tied on with string !!)

And I can't ever remember the school being closed or me not getting there !!!