Feeding bees

[ivashka]

How do you know to feed them during winter?  And how do you make a syrup.

[Michael Bush]

http://www.bushfarms.com/beesfeeding.htm

[Jerry/Judy]

To make syrup:

* Use a one gallon container
* Add 7 pounds of sugar (approx 14 cups)
* Fill container with water until sugar is dissolved
* Shake container as necessary to ensure sugar remains dissolved

Hope this helps.  ... Judy

[RayMarler]

for winter, I only use dry granulated white sugar. I stop feeding syrup around the middle of october
I feed when the hive is light of stores

[Michael Bush]

You can't really feed them in the winter.  They won't take cold syrup and you can't keep it warm easily.  You can give them sugar or candy for emergency feed and they can eat the sugar when it's too cold to eat syrup.  The time to feed for winter is fall, and really, from a beekeepers point of view that was probably the end of August.  If you, by some chance, still have some warm weather if you feed the syrup warm you can get them to take some.  Top it off with hot syrup to keep it warm and they may take some.

[sparks]

If the temps are getting up to the 70's during the day and they are taking syrup will there be any harm.  No telling how cold the bottles of syrup got during the night in the 30's to 40's.  All I know is that it is going away pretty fast.

Thanks

[Michael Bush]

Syrup in winter has it's risks.  Definitely you should have it thick, like 2:1 but even then there is a lot of water to evaporate and that causes condensation and condensation kills as many bees as starvation.

[Joelel]

You can't really feed them in the winter.  They won't take cold syrup and you can't keep it warm easily.  You can give them sugar or candy for emergency feed and they can eat the sugar when it's too cold to eat syrup.  The time to feed for winter is fall, and really, from a beekeepers point of view that was probably the end of August.  If you, by some chance, still have some warm weather if you feed the syrup warm you can get them to take some.  Top it off with hot syrup to keep it warm and they may take some.

Why will they eat cold honey but not cold sugar water ?

[bigbearomaha]

They aren't really eating 'cold' honey.  They move the cluster over the honey (which tries to maintain a very warm temperature) thereby warming said honey up when the cluster moves to it in good enough temps.

Big Bear

[RayMarler]

I could be wrong, but my thinking goes like this...
Bees need to add enzymes and convert the sugar water to a form they can consume, they don't consume sugar water directly as it is. Honey is nectar that has already been converted to a form they can eat, and dried out and stored for winter. They need to dilute the honey to eat it, which is easy enough because of all the increased condensation in the hives as the temps turn colder. Having sugar water syrup in the hives in this condition only adds to the problems of humidity and condensation in the hives, as well as creating more work to convert and dry out the sugar water in order to consume it.

Here in Northern California where I'm at, I stop feeding all syrup and change to dry sugar around the middle of October. This gives the bees time to dry out the syrup in time before the colder weather temps start in November. Each location is different as far as weather goes, and from my experiences here, I've chosen to stop syrup feeding in October. There are plenty of people here that do continue to feed syrup and that's fine for them, I myself have chosen not too.

[Michael Bush]

>Why will they eat cold honey but not cold sugar water ?

As Bear said, they warm it up first.  A baggie feeder might even get warmed up being over the cluster and on top of the top bars, but the bees still have to go around to the top to feed.  But they will do this when they won't feed from a top feeder because the trip is longer and the syrup colder.

[skflyfish]

Here is a FWIW photo. I have a couple of hives that are light on stores. This is my modification for easily feeding during the winter. My hives are 100 feet from my house, so it is practical for me. I am using a Honey-Run Apiaries All Season Inner Cover. I bought some 2 inch foam and 'beavered' out the center to 1 inch thick and put a 3/4 inch diameter hole in the center. The baggie of 2:1 syrup has been in there since early October. I also added sugar around mid-October. Since then they have hardly ever ate the plain sugar. The sugar gets eaten on really warm days. The rest of the time, they prefer the sugar syrup. The picture was taken today at 11:30 am with the outside temp at 48F and light mist. With the top entrance and the food above the hive I don't have to worry about condensation. This is my first season with this setup, so the jury is still out.

Jay

[Delmer]

You can't really feed them in the winter.  They won't take cold syrup and you can't keep it warm easily.  You can give them sugar or candy for emergency feed and they can eat the sugar when it's too cold to eat syrup.  The time to feed for winter is fall, and really, from a beekeepers point of view that was probably the end of August.  If you, by some chance, still have some warm weather if you feed the syrup warm you can get them to take some.  Top it off with hot syrup to keep it warm and they may take some.

At what point should I take the feeder off?  Or does it matter?  I'm in NC and still have a top feeder on (although they haven't really eaten any syrup 2:1 in quite awhile)  The activity around the hive is good on warm days, but I though I'd leave it on until they at least finished what little bit was left.  If they aren't going to use it, maybe I should try to save it for the spring?

thanks

sorry to hijack the thread :shock:

[ivashka]

NO PROBLEM!!!!
WE ARE ALL NEW AT THIS AND HAVE TO LEARN SOME HOW  :)

[Finski]

.
If you live here Thornton Colorado, you have real winter there

http://www.wunderground.com/cgi-bin/findweather/getForecast?query=80241