What are you going to do with winter losses?

[Finman]

Finman,


So, to my question again. What were your typical losses over winter for, say, the last 5 years? You have discusssed everyone elses, except yours it seems.

RAB

i have nursed now 49 years. my menthor said 45 years ago that he keeps 20% extra hives over winter to compensate losses. I have done the same and 20% has been a practical habit..

What are the losses?

I have 20-30 hives over winter. clear dead outs happen very seldom. One hive in every two year perhaps. The reason is mostly that the hive has brood the who winter.

Most common losses are nosema based which deminishes cluster. 2 summers ago I bought a mother queen and I reared 10 daughters. The mother queen got nosema sick last Spring that it stopped laying totally. It is bad luck and bad to do something. Sometimes I find hat a new commer queen has better resistancy to wintering. Clusters remain big the whole winter.

Second big loss is that I must weed off bad queens at once when I see that the queen has lost a good ability to lay. Evil and chalkbrood queens will go to busches too.

It seems practical year after year that I have 20% less hives at the beginning of summer compared to the Autumn.
As I told, reasons are many. The smallest problem is that some hive dies totally.
Bigger problem is if all hives are in good condition. Then I have too much hives. Short of boxes will appear.

Varroa makes every now and then big surprises. When I have a feeling that "varroa is under comntrol", then it hits back. Last autumn I lost 30% to varroa. Actully the hive number dropped to normal.

One problem is that furniture stores are limited. To invest more store rooms makes no sense.


Next big losses are swarming. You take care of hives the whole year and when the hive is ready to forage a huge yield, it flies to sky's blue. The reason is that all queens are not clipped.

Luckyly or after a big work, I got rid off chalkbrood. It ruined many hive's yield.

At bottom line, nosema is now my biggest enemy. For that reason I keep spare hives over winter that I need not cry after losses.

.

.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

So Finman, i take it your average loss is 20% per annum ?

 

[Finman]

So Finman, i take it your average loss is 20% per annum ?

per annum is missleading expression. Hives come and hives go. During productive summer it happens so much.
I have again too much hives but I have interesting queens what I want to see, what they do in real production.

In 20 hives 20% is only 4 hives.

 

[drstitson]

JBM - he says overwinter an EXTRA 20% to cover losses. So in my book 20/120 = 16.7%

But then states summer numbers are 20% down on autumn!!!

 

[Finman]

.
I have not calculated my losses, I just prepare to loose 20% hives or queens. Then I have afford to select weak hives or queens away.

However, when I look the hive number at the beginning of September and at the beginning of Summer, 20% spare colonies are enough to cover the losses. It is not "average number".

But many has losses not at all, dead outs or weak queens or what? I wonder how?

I renew my queens every summer. They reveal themselves next spring, are they healthy?
Are they good layers, or which is not a good layer, it reveals out at the end of May.
Many queens, which were able to lay over 10 frames, have lost their ability during winter.

In summer I allready cast away queens, which have clearly weak ability to lay. It is easy to see in 3-frame mating nucs.

 

[Finman]

.
how big are your hives in main yield?

surely many feel good when I have so much losses. Much of it is selection of weak queens away.

When we go to the half of June, hive number may be 50% more than in May, because I make false swarms to cut swarming fever.

When main yield begins, I join hive parts to make 6 box hives. Field bees and brood together to catch yield from rape fields.

Then it clears out, how many productive hives I actually have.

before that I have had 2,5 months to rear hives for honey production. And miracles will happen during that time or bad things will happen too. Escaped swarms are worst.

But when the main yield begings in the last half of June, those foragers and home workers had been layed in the first half of May.
The main yield continues to the end of July, and the brood for that must be in hives at the first half of June.

With Carniolans I had problems because they started to swarm when they they ought to lay for main yield. Reduction of laying is a big loss at that time.
Italians' swarming fever starts couple of weeks later, and it has not much affect on main yield.

 

[Finman]

.
Sensitive to diseases

chalk brood was a big problem in my hives over 10 years. Then I weeded it out from my stock.

I thought that everything was fine. Then I ordered 3 queens from Central Finland to compare what they are.

Next winter my bee clusters deminished quite a lot. There was no dead bees on floors but colonies were clearly smaller than in Autumn.

But, those 3 new colonies were same size as in Autumn. It revield that my bee stock was not OK not at all. There were cleacly hidden weakness against nosema or something.

"no losses and no dead bees on bottom" , it is not a final truth after winter. Compared to what?


Next miracle will be how Norton's superbee daughters will go over winter and what they are next summer.
I have about 10 daughters, more or less cross breeded.



To find out, how things really are, depends to where you compare.

.

 

[Hebeegeebee]

Hi Finman
My winter losses for the last 5 years have been 0% 0% 0% 0% and 0% (o.k only a few hives.) Some of us must be doing something right.
Cazza

No losses for the same period for me too. (SE Norfolk) Must be the East Anglian air!

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

JBM - he says overwinter an EXTRA 20% to cover losses. So in my book 20/120 = 16.7%

But then states summer numbers are 20% down on autumn!!!

You know the reason now why I moved from VAT to anti-smuggling

 

[Finman]

.
20% out of 3 hives?

- How many frames?