Winter losses 2012/13

[TOBY-3652]

Lost one more today. Was not suprised dwindled 2 nothing no queen to be seen dead or alive. Thats 4 nucs and 2 colonies lost. The 2 colonies were only good nuc size going into winter.last year was one of those years that i should of united small colonies 2 make one large oneso now down to 11. Would think they will be a few more people losing a few bees before swarming time

 

[Pete D]

Spoke with a local commercial beekeeper today who took 200 hives into winter and is now at 120 !
He has been finding half a dozen a day and doesnt think he is out of the woods yet.
Pete D

 

[TOBY-3652]

what im finding is it is the 2 year old queens that are not there. well 4 out of the 6 ive lost were.maybe they tried 2 supercede last year and the young queens never made it. i just dont know and probably never will. i was talking 2 someone that has lost 14 out of 18 and someone else that has lost 3 out of 5 up 2 now.. mind you i did speak 2 someone that knew someone that went into winter with 28 and still got 28... ye right maybe still got 28 hives

 

[REDWOOD]

what im finding is it is the 2 year old queens that are not there. well 4 out of the 6 ive lost were.maybe they tried 2 supercede last year and the young queens never made it. i just dont know and probably never will. i was talking 2 someone that has lost 14 out of 18 and someone else that has lost 3 out of 5 up 2 now.. mind you i did speak 2 someone that knew someone that went into winter with 28 and still got 28... ye right maybe still got 28 hives

I also lost my 2 year old queen best hive last year, I found the supersedure queen cell and also found the old queen

 

[Teemore]

Lost three Nucs so far - looks like isolation starvation in all instances. Just not enough bees survived to maintain brooding temperatures.

Put pollen subsitute patties on all my stocks on Saturday past and whilst i didn't pull out any frames, at this stage it looks as if they are all brooding - saw a lot of pollen going in and had been seeing fresh pollen on the inspection trays these past couple of weeks despite low temps. Remaining Nucs are showing approx three seams of bees spreading across 6" to 7" of the frames and full hives are averaging out at 6+ seams of bees. Have a few boxes that are ready to super to give the bees space but that is the exception rather than the rule.

 

[telford_keeper]

I had one hive, Hobby bee keeper and opened them 2 weeks and they were looking very weak in numbers, put some fondant in (THEN LOTS OF SNOW!!) and uncovered them yesterday. Hadn't touched the food and all were starved or frozen by the looks of it, lots of bees head first into the comb. So that is one hundred percent loss for me, dissapointed as i loved my gentle AMM bees. A bit put off getting another nuc as I'm not too confident about next years weather. Bad times. If anyone finds a swarm of honey bees please let me know.

 

[beeno]

Heck!

I'm not a chicken or egg counter, but I've still got the four colonies I had at the end of summer. I haven't looked inside other than checking fondant etc, so whether they'll still be okay in another week or four is another matter, and that's why I haven't done the poll yet.

Hi BeeJoyful,
I felt the same as you, but still did the poll because of the late date! Maybe we should all do it as of a certain date otherwise it probably does not mean much.

 

[alanf]

......Highest is 98%, and no-one with more than a couple of hves reported zero. The carnage extends across beekeepers of all scales, and all husbandry types...

I'm wondering if it's too late to get some correlation out of this years losses. What I've heard since the beginning of 2012 is that there's a lot of variation; apiaries a couple of miles apart have either been struggling or had a resonably good year. What I can relate to is the way we had the warmest March on record in 2012 but the coldest for 50 years in 2013. Extremes at both poles will kill off all but those with most adaptable strategies and the suspicion is that it's the diversity of genetic lines and feeding sources that got many through. When there were odd feeding days available last year my bees were finding something, not always sure what but it's the variety in suburbia that means something could be flowering within range. Not so much in areas where regular sources didn't turn up and not in every location even within a couple of miles of here. Larger operators are at a disadvantage when they have regular plans that work well for 90% of the seasons but you get a 5% chance at one extreme one year followed by a 5% at the other the next. What I'm getting at is along some of the lines Keith Delaplane was following. That what works for eusocial insects is genetic diversity and anything done to reduce it has consequences in fitness to adapt to the unexpected.

 

[m100]

A snapshot at this time of year rarely reveals anything. Maybe a count at a fixed point such as brood minimum at oxalic treatment, or at the point of swarming would. So I see little point in counting right now.

But in general terms the colony count is lower than 12 months ago. In a few months it could be zero or 100% more

 

[Dusty Rhodes]

22 days left for this poll.


Reckon I'll wait 3 more weeks before declaring how my colonies have done.

Dusty

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Reckon I'll wait 3 more weeks before declaring how my colonies have done.

Dusty

If I can get into the hives that is!

 

[itma]

A snapshot at this time of year rarely reveals anything.

I think it should.
Normally.
But this year isn't the normal that we expect!

Normally, winter would be past and the full 'spring cleaning' First Inspection would have been done. A good time to stocktake.
But this year we aren't there yet!

 

[PBee]

....................
What I can relate to is the way we had the warmest March on record in 2012 but the coldest for 50 years in 2013. Extremes at both poles will kill off all but those with most adaptable strategies and the suspicion is that it's the diversity of genetic lines and feeding sources that got many through.
.....................

Our weather patterns may affect yield and queen mating at times but relatively speaking we don't have real extremes. Wintering has been normal here (West of Ireland) with good maintenance of cluster size and stores consumption on the low side. The only difference is a later start (to the rainy season).

 

[Robbie & Jans Bees]

Hi all I fed my 8 hives last weekend bees clustered in each hive on Saturday they were all bring pollen back to the hives, they have forcasted temps of 12/13 C this sunday I hope to check them all then lets hope all is well still cold in Cornwall only 7C today and its just started to rain. Robbie

 

[dpearce4]

not doing poll until end of april as I think may lose a couple before then.

 

[kristin..]

hive got nocked over y day

but so had to have a littel check think i got lucky tho as no obves signes of damage to frames + dont think it killed any bees :O
was back up in about 2 mins tbh o limted damage but bees dont look good with no bee suite on arfter being on its side :/
so wt does every one els think should i just leav well alone untill weather warms up then check all frames proply ? or do u think its better 2 open all up and look asap ?
its a polly hive so straped to geather but super moved as its on with bakers fondant
+ dog manghed to run into it thats how i no it wasnt down for long

 

[Baggyone]

5 out of 12 hives gone south so far. I have been invited by the local newspaper for an interview regarding this years situation.

Insufficient bee's is my situation. Nosema checks have been done on all hives. Not that. They have even been sitting right on top of stores.

Sad winter and we have no idea on queen mating's from late supercedures yet.

baggy

 

[Hivemaker.]

SOUTH Molton bee farmers have warned the industry is facing a crisis this summer due to cold conditions and dwindling bee populations.

Owners of the Quince Honey Farm are among those appealing for European funding to help re-stock UK bee colonies – or face a future of empty hives and an increased reliance on imported honey.

On Wednesday, the North Devon business hosted emergency talks with industry experts from the Bee Farmers’ Association and South West MEP Julie Girling in a bid to secure financial backing to boost colonies that have been lost or weakened due to six years of wet summers.

Paddy Wallace, who runs Quince with son Ian said they could be looking at 50 per cent losses this year.

He said: “It’s pretty much a crisis; this winter would not have been such a disaster if last year hadn’t been so bad.

“A five per cent loss is usual but last year we lost 15 per cent and this winter we have lost 23 per cent and are going to lose more because the weather is still cold and the queens have been poorly mated.

“We have 1,500 hives but as of this week we had 1,008 colonies. We need to try and split 500 hives from 1,000 which is not possible because the colonies are not strong enough to split.

“If we don’t replace stock and have another bad winter we will very quickly have no colonies at all.”

Son Ian said six consecutive poor seasons in the South West had hit honey producers hard.

He said: “Our biggest enemy is the weather; it’s been a horrendous six years.

“We had a bumper crop in 2003. It wasn’t great in 2004 but 2005 and 2006 were pretty good. Since then we’re had six really hard years.

“We have 24 tonnes of honey stored in the shed which is not a lot of honey for a business like ours. We have no surplus. If we have another year this year like last year we won’t have any honey.”

John Mellis of the Bee Farmers’ Association also appealed to Ms Girling, who has been selected as the Conservatives’ spokesman on agriculture in the European Parliament and has been leading the fight in Brussels against the decline of honeybees.

He suggested the industry needed a £1.4million injection to rebuild productive colonies, by importing queens from other countries such as Italy and New Zealand.

“It’s a huge logistic operation and we don’t have the money at hand,” he said.

“We’ve got a real problem with dead bees. Colonies have been weakened and because the queens have been poorly mated, half of our bees are not going to be viable this year.

“A five per cent loss is normal and 20 per cent would be a bad year. We could be looking at losing 40 per cent of our bees then suddenly we have a crisis – it’s a national issue.”

Ms Girling said she would speak to other MEPs to try to rally support.

She said: “All of the other European countries have similar problems in terms of stocking bees but I will speak to the minister to see if we can get any support for it.

“In terms of agricultural subsidies, £1.4million is nothing.”

Quince Honey Farm, established by Paddy’s father in 1949, employs 21 people and supplies honey to shops all over the UK although primarily in the South West.

The family business moved to the current premises in 1978, where it has since diversified become one of North Devon’s main tourist attractions. Last year, 42,000 people visited the honey exhibition.

Paddy said subsidies for bee keepers were no longer forthcoming and the business had diversified through financial necessity.

He said: “In the 1970s, bee farming was recognised by the Government as a viable agricultural industry and farm building grants were all available to commercial bee keepers. Now we’re not counted at all.

“Tourist trade accounts for 80 per cent of our business although we would prefer that a more significant proportion of our income came from the bees.

“We would like to do more with the bees, produce more honey and employ more people on the bee keeping side. There is potentially a very prosperous future for the industry.”

Ian added: “The industry needs help and it wouldn’t be to the detriment of anyone except for a couple of honey importers.

“We could easily keep 3,000 hives with some support. There are some well established honey farms and keen amateur bee keepers – we just need a little bit of support to help us restock.”

http://www.northdevongazette.co.uk/news/south_molton_bee_keepers_warn_of_national_crisis_1_2009304

 

[VEG]

Not good at all

 

[mbc]

£1.4 million would go a long way in developing quite a few regional bee breeding programmes which could sustainably offer restocking options to all beekeepers for years to come rather than a quick fix for some.