Winter losses

[Monsieur Abeille]

For those of you that don't mind sharing, it would be interesting to have an overview of what losses we experienced last winter. Divided very simplistically into those with more or less than 5 hives

 

[BobsBees]

Losses

Here in Sunny Rainham Kent.
Going into winter with 11 Hives in three separate locations, all BS National.
Lost two hives due to bees just dwindled, not starved.
Probably due to queen not laying enough to support through the winter.
Bob.

 

[Foxylad]

I wintered with three strong hives lost one in Feb and nearly lost another in March. But donated brood and bees from the hive next door.

I believe it was due to Nosema, even though i treated all three hives in autumn.

 

[TOBY-3652]

I overwintered 1 hive come through great must be beginners luck ive now got 3

 

[Chris Luck]

No losses, all colonies now going extremely strongly including one that was very small going into winter and I had my doubts about, (now on swarm watch with OSR in flower, could be early this year where I am).

Chris

 

[TOBY-3652]

Talking to the spray man on the farm he said a week and osr will be in flower here.. On the plus side he said when he sprays the rape here he will spray nearest fields 2 bees early morning or last thing at night

 

[Mrs Soup]

we had a very weak nuc which needed a fine dry winter to stand a chance of going through, so as or only hive survived, I've ticked the no loses box.

 

[itchyhives]

2 hives overwintered well and now looking good so happy to report no losses.

 

[Bcrazy]

I put down 28 hives in Oct last year for the winter. I came through with 28 this spring and i put it down to leaving a super of the bees own honey on top of the brood box Minus excluder.

Mo

 

[MrB]

1 went into winter and 1 came out.
And must say, looking good!

 

[Nellie]

3 into winter, all three looking pretty good at the moment.

 

[Chris Luck]

I put down 28 hives in Oct last year for the winter. I came through with 28 this spring and i put it down to leaving a super of the bees own honey on top of the brood box Minus excluder.

Nice thought but I would have thought it was total conjecture on your part...

I went into winter with a similar number, did nothing as usual and all are doing well..

I could speculate that it's because I didn't do anything at all except leave the bees in the brood box....

not exactly science based eh?.

Chris

 

[Bucks_Boy]

11 going into winter ( 8 hives 3 nucs), 10 coming out ( inc all 3 nucs)

Lost one was an August collected swarm with a very black bee producing very white comb so I didnt re-queen -- it was too late to raise a daughter so I kept my fingers crossed -- sadly she must have been an old girl as plenty of bees but no queen this spring

the 3 overwintered nucs are ahead of 3 of the hives already -- hived them a month ago and they have gone crazy ...unfortunately one has gone "defensive" as well and is on probation for a few weeks .

 

[Hebeegeebee]

11 hives, 2 nucs, 2 large mini-nucs. All through.

 

[susbees]

Six hives into winter, all appeared to be coming out....but one going through the floor now. Q- or nearly so and no spare queens. They were the only colony with visible varroa last Spring (same queen) so maybe not so sad after all.

 

[Nellie]

Been trawling the UK beekeeping forums out of interest to see what the numbers look like.

Not done any split by geography or hive type past Full colony or Nuc (not least because I have no meaningful figures on the only hive split that might be interesting, i.e. TBH/Warre vs Conventional)

291 Colonies counted so far, 39 Losses (13.4%)
23 Nucs Counted, 6 losses (26.1%)
Total 14.3%

I'm still trawling and searching and will continue to update it. I wouldn't read too much into it, especially with the low overall numbers so far, but I thought it might be interesting.

 

[Budge]

3 went into winter, 3 came out strong and looking to split asap as all have 2 supers on already!

 

[Bcrazy]

Hi Chris Luck

Nice thought but I would have thought it was total conjecture on your part..

Chris what I wrote was not conjecture at all it was FACT.

Sorry mate.

Mo

 

[Moggs]

Budge - 2 supers? I assume that you are way down south and keep your bees in the middle of a field of OSR! Oh, and welcome to the forum!

 

[Chris Luck]

That you did what you did is not in question Mo, whether or not there was a direct relationship between doing what you did and all your colonies surviving is conjecture and speculation with out a long term control side by side study...

...as I said, I don't treat or do anything, simply remove supers in late August / beginning of September and leave them to it....

...however I don't claim this is the reason why they all survived, which they did.

..get it?

Chris