The temperature today reached the upper 60s and this might be the last chance to open up the hives until spring. Hopefully this winter is mild and has plenty of warm days in December that will let me feed the bees. The inspection of both hives was very quick. The bees were very calm and I didn’t need to smoke them, but the smoker was going strong just in case. Both hives had lots of activity at the entrance and the bees were bringing back an orange pollen. I’m not entirely sure what it is from, but I do have dandelions and camelias blooming in my yard.
I only inspected the top box of each hive and only a few frames. I could see many frames of capped honey and was relieved to see that Hegemone is much stronger than I originally thought. A few weeks ago I was worried that the hive was weak because I could see any bees through the bottom screen. I placed a sheet of newspaper over about 2/3rds of the hive top and poured 1 lbs. of dry sugar. I moistened the sugar a little with a spray bottle and covered up the hives. I flipped the inner cover to give more space. I’m not entirely sure this was a good idea, but I’ll figure it out the next time I open the hives. I hope that they don’t build any bur comb up there or seal the inner cover to the outer cover with propolis. The top ventilation hole of the inner cover is blocked by the telescoping top. The sugar should add a bit more insulation to the top of the hive and will absorb moisture. I’m a bit of a pessimist and think that the bees will probably consume the dry sugar before the cold weather really sets in and then suffer moisture problems.
My wife and I plant lots of plants to attract beneficial insects and it seems to be working. Our inspection started with seeing a pair of assassin bugs mating.
I remember being told by a few beekeepers that no matter how friendly a hive may seem during a honey flow, when the winter is looming they will be quite grouchy. Both of my hives were very friendly during the summer, but recently I have to suit up to refill the entrance feeders, or I get stung. Nothing like having tens of thousands of miniature food critics that are not happy with the free service. I’m on crutches, so I am not as quick or graceful with the changing of the food as I was a few months ago.
To avoid alerting the hives to my presence when I remove the bottle, I tried leaving them a plastic bin filled with 2:1 sugar water. I placed it on a concrete block next to the hives because I didn’t want them to have to fly to far to get to it. I even put a bunch of small sticks in it so they would have a nice place to land without the risk of drowning. They never noticed it. Instead, it turned in to the most popular club for ants. It was packed with the little red bastards with a hundreds more waiting for their turn to climb up the block and in to the bowl of sugary goodness.
I made a second attempt to feed the bees and was not going to give another free meal to one of the many ant hills squatting on my property. This time, I placed a small bowl of moist sugar on the water fountain that the bees frequent. There was no way that they would not notice this and the bees would have to ford two bodies of water to reach the sugar.
My other concern was yellow jackets. They like sugar as much as bees and one vs. one wasps are tougher than bees. A strong colony of yellow jackets can invade a bee hive, kill lots of bees and rob them of their honey. When I went back out to check on the bowl of sugar a short while later, the bees found it and there was a lone yellow jacket. The honey bees politely informed the yellow jacket that the sugar had already been claimed.
I took this opportunity to try and get a few good shots of the bees in flight. It took many tries, but I did manage to get some in focus shorts of bees flying.
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