A beekeeping friend who also lives in western Massachusetts bought 8 frame equipment. This is his first year keeping bees.
Will the bees be able to store enough honey with 8 frame equipment to survive the winter? Everyone I know in this area uses 10 frame.
Sure, just go higher. Might even be better since they don't have to go as far sideways to reach all the stores.
I read somewhere (and someone please correct me if I'm wrong) that an average-sized colony here in the North Carolina mountains needs between 30 and 35 pounds of honey to get them through the winter. A single medium 8-frame super will hold that and a lot more.
Up north where you are, the bees may require more honey than that because your winters are longer - but I've also read that they may even need less because your winter will also be colder than mine and so your bees will be less active.
Either way, my uninformed opinion would be that an 8-frame hive would be fine.
I send my bees into winter with 3 mediums. I've seen the stores completely exhausted at the end of winter and I've also seen them still having an entire super full of honey at spring time.
Quotebut I've also read that they may even need less because your winter will also be colder than mine and so your bees will be less active.
I can buy that. I think the problem comes when you have periods of cold and then warm up again for a period of time before getting cold again. They will use those stores more when it's warm. Last year would have been an example of poor wintering conditions, IMO. This year...I have a feeling we are going to have a long nasty winter.
>Will the bees be able to store enough honey with 8 frame equipment to survive the winter? Everyone I know in this area uses 10 frame.
You need to have the number of pounds of stores, which will require more than one or two boxes in your area. In my experience, they winter better in eight frame equipment with less stores left behind them.
Two eight frame mediums is exactly the same volume as one ten frame deep. So four is exactly the same volume as two ten frame deeps.
I overwintered 2 late summer splits in a 2 tier medium depth nuc. That's the same as 1 10 frame medium, but by double stacking it I was able to let the bees make the most of their resouces and confine their cluster space verses unattended space. Both cluster's were soft ball sized. Unfortunately, due to a winter that lasted into May, I lost them as they were just starting to build up good, putting all their resources into brood production, when the winter extention hit so I lost them due to starvation.
The upshot is that the shape of the hive is more important than quantity of hive when it comes to overwintering bees. UP is always better than Out, so if you hive is limited in size it would be better to go to 2 or 3 nuc boxes rather than wider framed options.
>That's the same as 1 10 frame medium, but by double stacking it I was able to let the bees make the most of their resouces and confine their cluster space verses unattended space.
Exactly.