Inspection Frequency through the Season

[Cole lynch]

I hope I’m speaking for other Beginners here...
I know that most folk entering the art this year have lacked the usual mentoring and intro courses. For obvious reasons I’ve spent Probly 100s of hours on YouTube etc.
The thing is, we have all been told to inspect our hives religiously on a weekly basis. That anything less than a 7 day inspection is poor form and irresponsible hive management. I’ve seen no caveats attached to this apart from not opening the hives up in winter apart from feeding. I presume that’s Oct-March when temps are 15 deg minimum.
However I have read in a couple of threads recently that inspections and swarm control should NOT be undertaken during “honey flows”. Am I reading this right?
It’s just that as a Beginner and a semi-urban Beekeeper, I don’t really know when a “flow is on” or not.
I’ve certainly been taught by painfully that they didn’t want to be messed with on given days but haven’t seen a pattern. Just put it down to weather conds.
I haven’t noticed any difference in my bees activity, just the regular orientation flights and steady stream of pollen coming in, and they’re both newly installed colonies so are they exempt from “The Inspection Rules”?
I love doing inspections, it’s obviously when we learn the most and gain the pleasure of seeing the beauty and awesomeness of the mystery buzzing aromatic boxes. I get scared and excited in anticipation of witnessing the magic taking place.
So, to inspect the bees or not inspect the bees. This is the question. Weather....permitting

 

[pargyle]

The only reason to inspect your bees are:

1. To check for queen cells during the swarm season (usually May to July - yes there are exceptions but that's the likely time they will swarm if they are going to). You do it on a 7 day cycle (~ max 10 days) because you will then have time to do something about it if you find queen cells.

2. To check for disease (if you are lucky you will never see any ! - but you should look).

3. To check if they have enough space - are the brood box frames full - is there room for the queen to lay - are they filling the brood box with honey and need a super on.

4. To check for brood and eggs .. to be sure the queen is laying.

5. To check they have enough stores to survive for the next three weeks ... on the basis that during the season that is the most time they are likely to be confined to barracks and can't fly. I usually like to see at least a couple of frames packed with stores and an arc of honey over the top of the brood nest.

Inspections should be regular but you get a feel for what your bees are up to and the 7 days does not need to be a hard and fast rule. Decide what you want to know from your inspection and only inspect as far as you need to get your answer. Every time you tear the brood box apart it sets the bees back several days in their endeavour. Make your inspections quick and light - you often don't need to lift frames right out .. you don't need to inspect every frame of stores - you DEFINITELY do not need to find the queen. If there are brood and eggs .... she's there. If you find something that concerns you - close them up and THINK about it - too many beginners see a queen cell and panic. Thinking about what you have seen is as important as the inspection - photograph things that don't look right - you can often see more on the computer screen than when you are ferreting around and up to your neck in bees.

 

[B+.]

The thing is, we have all been told to inspect our hives religiously on a weekly basis. That anything less than a 7 day inspection is poor form and irresponsible hive management. I’ve seen no caveats attached to this apart from not opening the hives up in winter apart from feeding. I presume that’s Oct-March when temps are 15 deg minimum.
However I have read in a couple of threads recently that inspections and swarm control should NOT be undertaken during “honey flows”. Am I reading this right?
It’s just that as a Beginner and a semi-urban Beekeeper, I don’t really know when a “flow is on” or not.
I’ve certainly been taught by painfully that they didn’t want to be messed with on given days but haven’t seen a pattern. Just put it down to weather conds.
I haven’t noticed any difference in my bees activity, just the regular orientation flights and steady stream of pollen coming in, and they’re both newly installed colonies so are they exempt from “The Inspection Rules”?
I love doing inspections, it’s obviously when we learn the most and gain the pleasure of seeing the beauty and awesomeness of the mystery buzzing aromatic boxes. I get scared and excited in anticipation of witnessing the magic taking place.
So, to inspect the bees or not inspect the bees. This is the question. Weather....permitting

Doing anything without knowing what to look for and what to do if you do (or don't) find it is asking for trouble. You should really only open them if you have a purpose and the knowledge/skills necessary to carry it out. In these difficult times, beekeepers may not have the practical experience, or a mentor to call upon, so it really isn't a good time to be learning beekeeping.
Let me try to explain why they say inspections should be done weekly. You see, everything in beekeeping is linked in one way or another to the development cycle of bees . You should know this as it will come back time after time in almost everything you do. Now, most people usually work weekdays and can only tend their bees at weekends (perhaps that has not been the case for most of this year). So, if a colony can make a new queen in 16 days (3 of those being as an egg), you really don't have time to miss one of those time-slots. If you do, your bees may swarm - especially during the "active" season (March-July/August depending on where you are and the nectar sources there). Outside of that time-frame, you can breathe easy. If you've prepared them properly, they will survive winter and thrive the following year.
Having said that, I realise that beginners will open colonies just to see what they're doing. We all do it. It's part of learning and, if you're lucky, you won't do any harm. Unfortunately, learning also means you may not realise if/when you've done something that harms the colony - and not having a mentor to guide you makes that more likely to happen. So, what's the worse that could happen? Well, you could inadvertently damage/kill the queen. If this happens, you'll see emergency cells on the brood comb the next time you inspect the colony (assuming you do this weekly). If the colony grows beyond its available space, you might see swarm cells - do you know the difference and do you know what to do in either of these cases? That is why a mentor is so important.
As we come to the end of the main flow, the bees become quite focussed on winter preparations. This is another area where beginners may need guidance. The surplus honey can be removed and extracted in good time to allow the colony to arrange its stores for winter - but they will also need space to continue rearing brood - all the way through to autumn (~October). You may need to supplement their stores with sugar syrup before this. It can be a delicate balance between feeding and allowing space for brood rearing.

 

[ShinySideUp]

As we come to the end of the main flow, the bees become quite focussed on winter preparations. This is another area where beginners may need guidance. The surplus honey can be removed and extracted in good time to allow the colony to arrange its stores for winter - but they will also need space to continue rearing brood - all the way through to autumn (~October). You may need to supplement their stores with sugar syrup before this. It can be a delicate balance between feeding and allowing space for brood rearing.

Further to the above part of B+ post, I take my honey at the end of July/early August, once the honey cells have been [mostly] capped. I then put a super back on top and whatever the bees bring in and store they can keep for the winter when I will nadir each one. That way, come the Spring, you will have a nice empty super that with little to no preparation that is ready to be put back on top for refilling in the coming season. I might add that I use 14 x 12 frames, add to these magnificent beasts a half-filled super and you will be unlucky to have to feed the bees at all during the winter or following Spring.

At this time of year I restrict my inspections to checking for room in the supers and checking they are capping the honey cells. I generally don't open the brood box as there's not a lot of point and there is then no danger of the queen being accidentally squished. The next time I open the brood boxes will be soon after taking the honey and at this stage I will insert mite treatment strips which I will remove some 8 to 10 weeks later, as per the instructions. At Christmas, usually on Christmas Day, I will open the brood boxes and give the frames a squirt of oxalyic acid before rapidly closing them up again.

And at this time of year, is all I do.

I reiterate from other posts I've made...I am coming up to my fifth winter as a beekeeper and I have yet to lose a colony unintentionally so whatever it is I do, it appears to work.

 

[beeno]

Hi Cole, Pargyle has outlined Hooper's five reasons for inspection. The only caveat is that you only carry out a full disease inspection 2-3 times a year when you shake the bees off the frames, but you keep a keen eye out for disease at all the times of course and if you blow gently on the comb the bees will move for you. To get an eye in and learning to read the combs it is important for beginners to carry out a 7 day inspection schedule - weather permitting. That's how you learn and get experience. It is very important to inspect the brood box during the honey flow as this is the time that swarm preparations often ensues and the brood box may get honey bound which leads to swarming as there is no room for the Q to lay. You do not need to inspect the supers though (unless you are foundationless and they are drawing them out) they can be lifted off and the weight of them will tell you if there is any point in looking to see if they are capped. With this fine weather we are having work slowly and carefully, take your time, there is no rush, keep the frame you are inspecting over the brood box in case the Q falls off. The bees will tell you when they have had enough - enjoy and good luck!

 

[B+.]

If you feel that contradictory advice is being given, that's because you won't feel the need to "inspect" the colony so much as you gain experience. You will (or, perhaps I should say "should") learn to "read" the bees behaviour. I don't mean that to sound like a "dark art" but if you understand the life cycle, you will understand that there are things the bees may do at certain times of the year, and not at others. Your attention should be focussed on the things that require it. This implies that your workload may change throughout the year.

 

[enrico]

The only caveat I would put on the above is that some new beekeepers find themselves saying, I leave my bees to their own divices, she what they really mean is , I am afraid to go in and upset them. If it gets to that point then there are different questions to be answered.
Feel free to check out my blog on this site if you think you may be going down that road!!!!
E

 

[madasafish]

I cease inspections on production colonies end June. They are not swarmy bees, there is LOTS of room - usually 4-6 supers.. and lifting weights is bad for my health



As for losing colonies over winter, it happens-usually badly mated queens...which turn drone layer early spring.

 

[pargyle]

If you feel that contradictory advice is being given, that's because you won't feel the need to "inspect" the colony so much as you gain experience. You will (or, perhaps I should say "should") learn to "read" the bees behaviour. I don't mean that to sound like a "dark art" but if you understand the life cycle, you will understand that there are things the bees may do at certain times of the year, and not at others. Your attention should be focussed on the things that require it. This implies that your workload may change throughout the year.

Inspections should become less frequent (over the season) and less invasive as you gain experience. B+ is right - learning to read the bees and THINK about what they are doing and when/why they are doing it is the key to good beekeeping. Beekeeping by the book and by rote is practised by many (and is often taught as a 'safe' way of keeping bees) but I think at least half of the enjoyment of keeping bees is in recognising, interpreting and acting upon what the little beggars have in store for you !

 

[drex]

A post above mentions inspecting the brood box. That does not mean you have to look at every single frame. When you get a feel for it, looking at 2-3 frames from the brood nest will tell you what is going on, and you can look down the seams between other frames from the top to see if they are brood or stores or whatever. I often do tip inspections. I run double brood and just tip up the top box and look at the bottom of the brood frames. I can separate frames if needed by swinging them apart and can then see most of the face of both frames

 

[Levitt53]

It can be confusing I know. Beekeeping is just one of those things that don't have many exact rules although there are some obviously. Just think it through and try and decide. During swarming season 7 days are a must. Sods law if you leave it they will go (it's happened to us all). If you need to, go in quickly and do a quick check for QCs. For instance I had a nightmare angry and big colony that I needed to split but the weather was just not being kind. I looked quickly on day 7 and aware that it was so rammed with bees I added a BB underneath to alleviate the situation. I sorted them all out a few days later. Later in the season you can just check supers more often if you feel you need to. I am in my 5th year but still like to look in and see what is happening but this time of year if it goes past 7 days I'm a bit more relaxed. They will always confound you though so never feel like you've got it all sussed, I just find that I just get later into the year each year before I tear my hair out and swear at them!!

 

[B+.]

There is an old saying: "If all you have is a hammer, every problem begins to look like a nail" so, it's ok to give beginners guidance on what works in the majority of cases. However, this should be tempered by a word of caution: these are living creatures and the guidance you've been given may not always be reliable. You may come across colonies that don't behave the way we've talked about here. They may be docile rather than aggressive. They may not swarm. They may be disease and/or pest resistant. However, the vast majority won't be. That's why this advice is given. Just don't take it as definitive.
I've kept bees for over 30 years and have seen the good, the bad and the outright ugly (to borrow from a Western film title ;-) ). For much of that time, I accepted the perceived wisdom as a statement of fact. Why? Because that's what I saw (it was undoubtedly all my mentor had seen too). So, if all you see is a particular behaviour, you may be tempted to believe it is universally true (Janis called this "groupthink" - but I don't want to get off the point). It isn't. It's just a good "rule of thumb" like much of beekeeping "wisdom". The one thing you can take from this is that if someone tells you something is definitive, it's probably wrong.