All We Can Do

Here we are, then; the clocks have gone forward and I am reminded of an old rhyme from my school days: “Spring is sprung, the grass is riz, I wonder where the lawnmower iz?!” However, this month, as beekeepers, we have more important things to do than cut the grass. Hopefully the temperatures are now consistently high enough for us to open the hives and carry out the first inspections of the year. We did everything we could do to help prepare our colonies for the winter, and so now we are looking forward to finding that it was all worth the effort and our bees are fighting fit, ready to face the challenges ahead.

Recent years have seen greater colony losses over the winter due to environmental problems, so if our bees survive then we can be sure they are of good genetic stock. As you might remember from last month’s issue, all we could do was to protect them from cold and damp, ensure there were enough bees to keep the colony warm, provide them with a healthy laying queen, monitor their food stores and keep varroa mite infestation levels as low as possible. Nothing is guaranteed but good preparation for the winter months will have helped our bees to survive.

Bees can withstand cold temperatures most of the time provided there are enough of them to cluster together and produce enough heat. This heat in itself can result in issues of excess moisture. The warm air produced by the bees vibrating their bodies will rise to the top of the hive where, if there isn’t adequate insulation, it will condense if outside temperatures are low. This moisture then drips down onto the bees. Cold and damp bees are dead bees. The way to get around this problem is to ensure the hive is ventilated (mesh floors and eco-sumps are often used) and insulated, plus we have modified an idea first used by Abbé Warré which is to place a ‘quilt box’ above the brood box on our France Dadant hives. This is a super (shallower box) with a hessian base and filled with straw. Regular checks to replace any damp straw mean that excess moisture is ‘wicked away’, keeping the hive dry.

Starvation can also be a cause of colony death, and at times this is especially distressing when the colony actually had good stores. Normally the winter cluster will remain in contact with the honey supplies, moving gradually as the food is consumed. However, if the cluster is too small, it won’t be able to summon up the energy and warmth required to move and so ‘isolation starvation’ can occur.

So, we did all we could at the end of the autumn, we have hefted our hives throughout the winter, monitored damp levels, checked varroa counts, and ensured we had good numbers of bees with laying queens. Providing we have thriving colonies coming into spring, we now need to roll up our sleeves and set about swarm management, preparation for swarms, and (very selective) Asian hornet trapping. There’s no rest for the wicked – or beekeepers!