My hive is probably dead . We hear no gentle humming when we put an capitulum up to the beehive and the body of dead bee outside the doorway is throng up to alarming proportions . I suppose I made a heap of tiro beekeeping error and those rookie errors wipe out my hive but I wo n’t know until Spring .
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Why I Think My Bee Hive Is Dead
It ’s January 13 ( hubby ’s natal day ) and we take a face at around the hive because it is a nice day and we are solve out how tobuild the 2nd hive . He used a piece of drinking straw and scrap alotof deadened bee from behind the hive entrance excluder onto the ground . I matte up gut - wrenchingly bad that my beehive is dead .
There are several reasons why I recall my bees are stagnant and are all novice mistake so I ’m write this station to avail other beekeeping novices learn from my misplay . I was n’t able to photograph the dead bee pile since the poulet came and make a quick meal of the drained bee so at least nothing was wasted . you could watch my short YouTube video below :
Before the concentrated frost , we wrapped the hive in tar composition and invest straw bales around 3 side of the hive as insulation and a tarp over the top to keep the straw dry . Perhaps we over insulated , my information was from Montana not Utah wintertime . On drive about over the weekend we spotted a hive in a orchard locally . Other urtication in our arena just have the tar paper so we may have cause the bees to freeze to expiry .
Right up to Thanksgiving we had a wasp problem . Those yellow and black , wild stinging , wing arseholes normally mistakenly called “ bee ” were all around the beehive .
I watched guard bees fighting them in the minute entrance and I watched wasp bite worker and carry them off to consume of feed the wasp hive . Around Thanksgiving I visualise white Anglo-Saxon Protestant under the hive entrance and few worker bees to stand them off so there is a possibility that wasps overran the hive .
Our bees were Italians , patrician creatures which were not an uproar when we scrutinize the beehive or opened it up to fertilize the bees . We bought them from a local store but found out after purchasing that the bees were raised in California , not really acclimatized to our winters which may kick in to them not coping throughout wintertime , you desire cold hardy genetics in your bees for frigid winters .
The beehive itself was fallible . We were constantly feeding it with bee food for thought ( sugar syrup ) because they were not filling frames with enough honey to last the winter . By September , they had not even begun on the top deep super frame we had added in high summertime and the hive needs two mystifying box full of frame to make it through the winter here so we did n’t reap any dearest this year , we wanted to be sure there was enough nutrient available for the bee to eat throughout wintertime .
This job also brought an perceptivity to me of my local area : there was not much for bee to forage and eat up , starvation is one of the most mutual causes of colony death in urtication over wintertime .
My Next Moves
Unfortunately , I have to wait until Spring to corroborate the situation of the beehive . Opening up now will likely cause the death of the hive in the moth-eaten temperatures if the hive is still live . But , there are some other thing I can do in the beggarly metre and a loss of my hive does n’t mean I ’m go to stop beekeeping , especially when the benefits to the garden are so great .
The permaculture excogitation course I took has given me the pecker to start designing for bee eatage on my property . I get wind in my permaculture inquiry that :
Diversity is n’t just in the planting of flower for bee forage but from a human view , radiate the breed of bees you have and where you purchase them from . This year , if we have altogether recede the hive , we ’re pass to buy a karyon settlement again and a software program of bees with a queen in a nance cell but from different suppliers with different types or breed of bees .
If we have n’t lost the hive , we will get a dissimilar breed of bee in a nucleus colony or package and set up the second hive with that .
I ’m depend for bee raised in cold hardy arena to be able-bodied to make out with an unpredictable Utah winter .
I ’m go to use thefake white Anglo-Saxon Protestant hivesaround the place and hive to deter the wasps from setting up menage . I ’ll also beactively trapping them with a lying in wait which does not entice bee , they have a tough time without being trapped !
Trapping is particularly important during late summer and fall with meat to lure them away from the bee hive and the protein bite they are after . Spring caparison will be most efficient with sugar pee .
If you are a regular lector , you will know I’mexperimenting in my garden with biodynamics . I am taking the wintertime lull in the garden to bump out more about biodynamic beekeeping and working more on developing my permaculture aim by researching aboriginal plant to Utah and what to grow as the English cottage gardens of my homeland are not quite right for the arid climate here in Utah !
For more entropy on beekeeping and clause you may find the follow useful :
Backyard Beekeeper : An Absolute Beginner ’s Guide to Keeping Bees in Your Yard and Garden by Kim Flotum
Carolina Honeybees : Dead Bees In Winter
The Beekeeper ’s Bible : Bees , Honey , Recipes & Other Home Uses
Initiation and Practice in Modern Holistic Beekeeping : Alternative Beekeeping Methods in Multi - stratum Hives
Toward Saving the Honeybee Book
Wisdom of the Bees : Principles for Biodynamic Beekeeping
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