why would my bees leave?

[Flint]

I started my have in the spring my of this year, they did well all summer. the 2nd weak of oct i pulled about 25lbs of honey from my bottom supper, leaving the top super there because they were still working it and it wasnt full.  i went back to it last week just see how the top super was doing and there was yellow  jackets and ants all around, i started looking in the hive and all my honey bees were gone! why would they leave this time of the year?

[BeeMaster2]

Flint,
Sounds like you answered your own question.
Yellow jackets alone can kill your bees. Once they get past the guard bees they kill the queen.
Ants also can kill your hives. I have had to build ant proof stands to stop them.
Jim

[Flint]

no dead honey bees tho? there was a few but not the hole hive?

[Flint]

i have pics but there to big to post.

[little john]

Dzierzon once wrote about a form of swarming he called "Pauper Swarming", which you won't find described in any modern beekeeping book. 
'Pauper' of course refers to poverty - and Pauper Swarming can occur when the quality of life within the beehive becomes so impoverished and unbearable that the bees consider that they have nothing left to lose by moving home - even if this risks the demise of the colony by abandoning their home at an undesirable time of year.  Perhaps that's what happened to your colony ?
LJ

[Flint]

That may be. The  hive seamed healthy  brood boxes full of honey . You may be right tho. I plain on getting more bees in the spring, like to find out while so don't lose another set of bees.

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[divemaster1963]

you may want to get with some locals.  sounds as if you pulled honey late for your area. was there open space between the top unfinished supper and the brood camber?  if so they may have consider it a loss cause to defend and just moved out. i find pulling spring flow and leving fall flow. I pull in late july to august he in ga. then give them the fall flow to over winter on. ( same rule we used in Va. back in the days).


john

[little john]

... like to find out while so don't lose another set of bees.

Sure - that makes a lot of sense ...

If it'll help - the cure for the ant problem in your neck of the woods appears to be to make hive stands with legs which either stand in containers of oil and/or water, or have some form of grease-band fitted to them to stop the ants from climbing up.

Wasps (I assume yellow-jackets are similar, if not the same) are much trickier to deal with.  Traps work well when placed downwind of the hives - which is the direction marauding wasps approach from, as they follow the scent plume given off by the beehives.  So if the wind direction changes, the traps then need to be re-sited, as the aim is to trap scouts rather than the workforce.  NEVER put traps close to your beehives - that would only be advertising their presence.

Best of luck for the coming season.
LJ

[FlexMedia.tv]

Flint,
I'm close to you in Michigan. Mine swarmed but left 1/2 the bees. Never heard of all of them leaving. I'm pretty sure the Yellowjackets killed the rest. I found them dead outside the hive. Then, the wax moths took over and everything. I have one hive left. I left the honey for them and hoping for the best. Do you have two hives? How is that one?

[tjc1]

This exact thing happened to me last year this time - all the bees gone. It turned out that the symptoms matched exactly with a research report posted somewhere here - the real culprit was too many varroa. The bees get sick from the viruses and start to leave the hive - soon enough they are all gone. I was careful to check and treat earlier this year, so hoping not to have a repeat.

[Flint]

Thanks for all your input, its a learning process.  No i had just the hive. Should i start 2 next spring?

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[Flint]

I would like to post some pics of what the hive looks like but says files are to large how do I make them smaller? What do I do with the honeycomb?  It's all dark colored now.

[little john]

I would like to post some pics of what the hive looks like but says files are to large how do I make them smaller?

I use Irfanview [http://www.irfanview.com/] to view and modify graphics.

Once the graphical image is displayed, use the mouse (left button held depressed) to select the area of interest, then select 'Edit' and 'Crop Selection'.  To further reduce the size, click on 'Image', 'Resize/Resample', when you're offered several options for Resizing.  Unless there's a special reason to do otherwise, I just use the 'Percentage of Original' option, when 50% usually gets me to somewhere around the 100k size.

I then use Tinypic  [http://tinypic.com/?t=postupload] to convert that graphic into a link which can be pasted into a forum post.  I prefer Tinypic to any other graphic storage system as it doesn't require any form of registration.

What do I do with the honeycomb?  It's all dark colored now.

If the combs are usable, then pop them into a freezer for a day or two to kill any wax moth eggs or larvae.  Then store them somewhere cool for the winter.  I keep my spare combs inside an unheated utility room in brood boxes stacked 4 or 5 high, with a cotton dust cover thrown over them, and tied near their base with a strap.  This keeps any wax moths out, and yet still allows some movement of air, as I found that storing them in plastic bags caused grey mould to grow.
LJ

[FlexMedia.tv]

Thanks for all your input, its a learning process.  No i had just the hive. Should i start 2 next spring?

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Might be a good idea. I'm glad I did, otherwise I would have nothing taking me into the winter.

[Acebird]

I would like to post some pics of what the hive looks like but says files are to large how do I make them smaller?

In order not to lose any resolution and go through the hassle of resizing everything I use a photo hosting site like Photobucket.  You upload the photos to the site and then copy a link to paste into your post.  The only thing you can't do is move the photo to another folder or delete it because it will break the link.

[Flint]

OK I am going to try this photo bucket thing. Hown do I get the pic from phote bucket to here? Sorry not to savy at these things.

[tjc1]

If the combs are usable, then pop them into a freezer for a day or two to kill any wax moth eggs or larvae.  Then store them somewhere cool for the winter.  I keep my spare combs inside an unheated utility room in brood boxes stacked 4 or 5 high, with a cotton dust cover thrown over them, and tied near their base with a strap.  This keeps any wax moths out, and yet still allows some movement of air, as I found that storing them in plastic bags caused grey mould to grow.
LJ

Hey LJ - I thought of doing this, but was afraid that there could be wax moth or beetle eggs laid in the brood boxes that would then infest the comb. Fortunately, I did not have any molding problems.

[little john]

I've just pulled a couple of old combs from the 'waiting year after year to be melted-down' bin to show you how grim this mould problem can be ...




I suspect this was due to 'operator error' in that I failed to spot some nectar in the comb which should have been cleared out before freezing and subsequent plastic-bagging.

I guess like all things beekeeping-related, it's a case of finding a method which works ok for the individual beekeeper.  If plastic bags work ok - then that's a much simpler solution.

LJ

[Dallasbeek]

OK I am going to try this photo bucket thing. Hown do I get the pic from phote bucket to here? Sorry not to savy at these things.

You may be unable to post photos until you've been on the forum longer.  This is protection built into the program to prevent newcomers from getting bad stuff past the system.

[Flint]

Ok thanks

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