Bee Chronicles April 2012

What a wonderfully messed up spring. Who would ever think we would be complaining about beautiful weather. Welcome to the life of a farmer. No matter what the weather, you are obligated to complain. The bees are doing absolutely what they should be doing. Mysterious Die-off February ended early, hopefully allowing some of the smaller clusters to survive. The flowers started blooming a month early, and plentifully. I already have one super of honey.

So the complaint?? It is too early!!! What is going to happen next??? Remember 9 April 2009 – The great frost that killed all the blossoms and knocked the leaves off the trees. This created a nectar dirth that lasted almost 6 weeks. The hives were at the maximum full of bees and brood. If you didn’t start feeding you might have experienced some absconding, maybe swarming, or population die back. Farmers don’t like uncertainty.

My recommendation is grow your bees like crazy. Large healthy populations are what we live for. Make sure you are monitoring your hives, and be prepared to collect honey early in April. How early I can’t tell you. Each of us will be a little different due to our location and altitude around these mountains, but I guarantee you it will be early. Your bees know what to do and they will be ready to swarm early also. Watch for queen cells. This may be the year you want to divide your hives creating more hives or nucs that you can sell. What a novel idea to be able to make money off our bees for a change. If you are going to let the hive expand into a double deep and draw some queen cells for the new hive after you make the split, you are walking a fine line with swarming. Drawing comb and putting up more food stores is the easiest way to keep the hive from not swarming. Make the split and immediately place an empty honey super on the 2 new hives.

If you want to make nucs, start expanding the hive into a double deep. Once the queen has brood in both upper and lower chambers,draw off 5 frames from the original hive. These should bee 1 frame with queen cells, 2 frames with brood and nurse bees, and 2 frames of honey and pollen. This will make the nuc grow as fast as the new queen will allow, and put a big enough strain on the old hive to keep it from swarming.

The “big what if” here is: you do not want to mess with your hive the last 30 days before honey collection. Drawing comb can put a big strain on a hive. Once the comb is drawn the bees will fill it with honey first, before they start putting honey in the honey super. You might miss a good honey collection period because the bees are worried about brood food.

The best way to fight swarming as the big nectar flow approaches is to put on honey supers, possibly with some foundation mixed with the drawn comb. The bees will get the idea to work the honey super. Then when the nectar flow hits they will be going all out in the correct place.

When thinking about drawing honey comb, the more crowded the colony the faster they draw comb. Bees need to be shoulder to shoulder to make good wax fast. If all conditions are right, good nectar flow, high bee population, and moderate weather, a bee colony can draw 10 frames of comb, fill it with honey and cap it off in 7-10 days. The next honey super had better be ready! Once the hive is over crowded, and there is no work to do they will swarm.

Anticipate what the bees need and bee ready to do it. You have to know what is happening in the hive and know when to stop pestering the bees so they can bring in that honey. Some time before good nectar flow you might notice the hive trying to draw queen cells. Out of habit you kill them to manage swarming. Look closely at what is happening with the brood. Is the pattern large and dense? Are the bees large and healthy? Is the hive hygienic? The workers may have decided they don’t like the queen and are trying to supercede her. You have to make the decision to allow the supercession to occur long enough before nectar flow so the bees will be at there maximum capacity during the flow. A lot to learn and observe here, but it will make a big difference in the hives honey collection.

April-May will be May-June this year. You may need to rob the hives and sling out honey earlier than normal. How will that impact on the family vacation to Disney World? You won’t be able to leave your bees at the peak season without something going wrong.

When will sourwood season start? Heh, Heh, Heh!!! There may be no break in between spring flow and sourwood. The weather could snap back to normal and the sourwood could come at the normal time with a long dirth between spring flow and sourwood. They are taking bets in Las Vegas.

Extremely abnormal weather pattern usually change abruptly and violently. Anyone see any tornadoes lately. That could completely wipe out the entire honey collection for the year. This is not the time to buy a lottery ticket.

Happy Bee Keeping.

Glen