Roles in the Hive
Queen-Lays the eggs-The Queens are the only normal female. There is normally only one per hive.
Workers- All Female-Work the hive make decisions. Nurse bees run the colony-bees that are 3 days old to 15-20. Respond to cues. (Only bees that are able to consume and digest pollen.)
Drone-Males- Propagate the genetics of the hive.
Varroa Mites-They are like ticks the bees will get that will spread viruses in the bee colony
Year in the Hive
(In the California Foothills)
January
It is cold and wet. 50 degrees and below the colony clusters with around 10,000 bees. They don't tend to fly above 55. The bees keep the cluster warm at 70 degrees if not brood rearing, 93 degrees if they are brood rearing. 41 degrees the bees will get chilled if they break cluster. The outer shell of the winter cluster “shivers'' to maintain these temperatures. To fuel this consumption of energy by the bees the bees need honey. They will feed on the honey that they collected in the fall.
2nd week of January Alder bloom gives the bees their first pollen source for the year. This incoming pollen cues the queen and nurse bees to start the colony buildup to replace the winter bees. If the bees have a continuous flow of resources coming in, they will continue this buildup. They need to build up to replace the older bees that made it through winter.
Management:
If the weather is junk, during this build up, they will eat through their store quickly, and supplemental feeding will be required to prevent your bees from starving. Supplemental feeding is pollen substitute, and or sugar syrup depending on what your bees are telling you.
Colony Buildup Phase
The continuous supply of incoming resources allows the colony to build up. Once a colony has enough resources the bees will start rearing drones (Male bees). Drone will eventually mate with the queen bees that hatch out, but not from the same colony.
About April the colony is getting congested with around 25,000 bees (20 Frames of bees). So, in order to relieve the congestion, the colony wants to swarm. A swarm is when the original queen leaves with roughly 50% of the bees in the colony in order to find a new home. To swarm the colony needs to make a replacement queen for the original colony. Once they start growing replacement queens, the original queen will swarm. The new queen in the original colony will hatch out, get mated and be the new queen of the original colony.
Management:
Beekeepers want to prevent swarming as that is 50% of the colony that just went up into the air. To prevent this, we will make an artificial swarm by means of a split. You will see the colony start making queen cells and then you can take the original queen and 5 frames and put it in the nuc. Depending on what your goal is you can recombine the colony and split before the honey flow, or you can use it to make another colony. The nuc can be sold or used in your own yard.
This is the time of year you will pick up your nuc/package
Honey Flow
Late May early June, the bee colony population is about 50,000 bees. The colony is past swarm season, now you have the honey flow starting Late May into June.
Management:
8-10 Frames covered with bees means is the cue to give more room (add: Honey Supers)
40,000 bees in the colony by August 1
· If it is a nuc’s first year and you have foundation- you will not get a as large honey crop than you will in the following years.
Summer Dearth
Honey flow dries up and they are going into August. Since there are no resources coming in it cues the nurse bees to slow down on brood rearing.
Fall
Around 30,000 bees by mid-September. They are starting their winter preparation. Incoming pollen will be used to make bees that will comprise the winter cluster. Incoming nectar will be stored for winter. Sustained temperatures of 50 degrees and below the colony will make a cluster.
Feed 2:1 if they need to get their winter weight up
Enter Your Bees
Like raising chickens, beekeeping is not a hobby. It takes time to work your colonies. If you leave them and forget them, they will die.
Rules to Beekeeping
- Warm, Dry Home
- Need food.
- Control Parasites
Mite
Feed on larvae, and fat bodies of adults. Double in population when the bees are brood rearing. During the winter, if there is no brood rearing the mites can’t reproduce.
As the bee colony builds up, Mite loads grow as the bee colony does. As bee populations cap out and start declining late summer during dearth. Mite populations are still growing.
Example of year cycle without treatment: Mite count of
- 1 in April (250 mites in April 25,000 bees)
- 4 by June
- 19 in Sept
- 30 October
- Crashes November
If you don’t monitor your mites your colony will die. Infestation level is determined by mite drop. (Sample 300 bees and you see 6 mites=2% infestation level of the colony
Sample mite levels monthly.
Sugar Roll
Mite Wash-If you keep your colony healthy, they will have no problem replacing the 300. During spring buildup about 1000 bees are going to die every day starting in mid-March.
Don’t wait until you see mites on the bees!
Mite Count Threshold
3 mites per half cup prior to July 1
Intervene in early July if mite counts exceed 4 mites!
6 mites from July 1 through late fall.
Treatment
Synthetic Pesticides:
Apisan/Apivar:
Bio pesticides:
Formic
Thymol
Oxalic (Acid Dribble method the amount used is equivalent to that in a 3½-oz serving of spinach, the same as Popeye would have gotten)
Rotate treatments!