dead hive

newguy · March 27, 2008, 10:44:45 PM

im out of town this week and i got a call from my wife saying that my hive looks really bad. i asked what she meant,she said there was a pile of freshly dead(vs a pile of old looking dead bees) bees in front of the hive. i had her open the hive and she said there were more dead bees inside and only a few live very lathargic bees. im thinking that they must have starved. i was around the hive over the weekend and they seemed fine without looking in. my question is when bees starve do they typically crash in a very short period of time? ill check them this weekend to see what the problem may have been but what a downer!

tillie · March 27, 2008, 11:29:23 PM

When my hive starved last year, I was told that bees are very democratic - they all starve together. If there's a little food left, they divide it equally until it is all gone and every last bee is dead. Thus you often find them clumped together on a frame, all dead, all head first into the cells.

Linda T sad for you in Atlanta

Scadsobees · March 28, 2008, 09:19:50 AM

Well, if there is a fresh pile of bees outside the hive, they had to get out of the hive somehow. Either a mouse is doing some housecleaning (and they aren't notorious for that) or the bees did.

How did your wife look in the hive? Pop the cover and peer in? If so, it is possible that the cluster was down below, and only a few stragglers above, and if cool out they would be lethargic.

I'm with Tillie on this one...if they go they all go. It would only be a matter of a couple of days. And inside the hive, not out front.

Rick

newguy · March 29, 2008, 10:01:32 PM

yup they starved, i was amazed at how many bees were in there. this hive had one deep and two meds. and every drip of honey was gone. this was the best queen i have ever had and i blew it. i feel really bad for those bugs. if i had checked them one week ago they would be fine. i have a few frozen frames of honey i saved for this reason. what a jack!#@!

Pond Creek Farm · March 30, 2008, 12:44:30 AM

You are not a jack!@#, just a human trying to care for bees. This is not something that comes intuitively, and only by experience will we learn. In the spirit of vicarious learning, how do the rest of us avoid, or at least minimize, such an experience? I use two deeps as the brood chamber. Is there any disadvantage to simply leaving an extra medium of honey on top for the winter? Should a beekeeper remove that extra medum and feed sugar syrup? IF so, when? This starvation thing seems to be a common afflication of bees and their keepers, so it would seem we would all be well-advised to learn a bit about how to avoid it. As for me, I have no idea and appreciate any advice/

tillie · March 30, 2008, 09:20:46 AM

I was so scared of having to go through looking at the sad fate of the starved bees again, that this year I kept Ziploc baggies of sugar syrup on my hives all winter - checked it every week and replenished when needed. I think they can still starve even with that effort in that if a sudden deep freeze comes and the bees' cluster is not near the supplies, they'll starve anyway.

Linda T in Atlanta

MustbeeNuts · March 30, 2008, 09:55:31 AM

Well as a new guy myself, question is just how much/often do you HAVE to feed the bees, I was under the impression that you supply food all the time? sugar syrup, and or pollen subsitute cakes. Doesn't it augment the bees during a honey flow? Or is it reccomended to stop feeding during a honey flo? My thoughts where to always give some food for them. ??

buzzbee · March 30, 2008, 10:39:52 AM

You need to feed bees when you are starting a new colony and they need rapid growth,n the spring if there hives are light on stores,in the fall to be sure they have enough for overwinter.
You do not want to feed when trying to gather a honey crop. If there is a flow of nectar,let the bees make there own stores.
Sometimes if you have a long dearth,you may need to feed.

CapeCod · March 30, 2008, 10:50:25 AM

How is the ziplock baggie used?
Is this 1:1 syrup with holes poked in the side of the bag????.
Is it stored in the frig or freezer till needed??.
What size baggie ??

Michael Bush · March 30, 2008, 11:05:11 AM

>Is there any disadvantage to simply leaving an extra medium of honey on top for the winter?

Only that the queen will probably start laying in the medium come spring. Once it's full, she will probably move down.

>Well as a new guy myself, question is just how much/often do you HAVE to feed the bees, I was under the impression that you supply food all the time?

Absolutely not. You'll just end up with sugar syrup stored in your honey.

>sugar syrup, and or pollen subsitute cakes.

Pollen substitute will not be taken by the bees when there is fresh pollen. Substitute is nutritionally deficient anyway.

> Doesn't it augment the bees during a honey flow?

Bees gather pollen. Bees gather nectar and make honey. During a flow they do it at an amazing rate. Why would I augment them?

> Or is it reccomended to stop feeding during a honey flo?

By everyone. Always.

> My thoughts where to always give some food for them. ??

Honeybees store food. It's what they do. It's how they survive. It's why we keep them.

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

tillie · March 30, 2008, 11:27:37 AM

I agree with all above - you don't feed at all during the honey flow - your honey then is messed up because it isn't purely from nectar and none of us want that. But in the early spring, especially with a new hive, feeding the bees allows them the extra Umph they need to make wax cells and to build up brood.

It's easy to feed in a Ziploc baggie - it's all they use at the University of Georgia. You fill a gallon bag about half full with 1:1 syrup (4 cups sugar mixed with 4 cups water, brought to a boil and then allowed to sit off the heat until cool enough to put in the bag)

You lay the bag flat across the tops of the frames and cut several slits in the side facing up with a sharp knife. The bees can then drink the syrup, but not drown in the bag. If the bag lies anyway but flat, you will find drowned bees. I built a 2" shim to put around the bag under my inner cover.

Here's a picture of one in a hive:
http://beekeeperlinda.blogspot.com/2007/12/checking-on-bees.html

Linda T in Atlanta

Kathyp · March 30, 2008, 01:54:06 PM

it began to stick in my mind this year that i had, in the past, read a lot about late winter and early spring loss. sure enough, when i looked back, this seemed like the highest loss time. most hives seemed to make it through winter. then people saw bees fly on a warm day and figured they were out of the woods. in fact, when the bees got active and didn't have sufficient food, they starved.

with that in mind, i opened and really checked my hive on the first day i saw bees fly. that was mid February as i recall. this was against what i have been taught, which was to leave them alone until March or April when the weather was warm and the bees were really flying. sure enough, there were little or no stores left. if i had left them alone another 1 or 2 months, i probably would have lost them all.

so i learned that i was a poor judge of hive weight :-), and that sometimes you have to adjust what you are taught to the circumstances in which you find yourself.

i observed something in the two cutouts i did last week. each hive coming out of winter, had about 25 lbs of honey still stored. the center of the hives were cleared and the queens were laying a bit. i can't imagine how much honey they must have stored going into winter. 25 lbs is a conservative estimate of what was left. there probably was more that i wasted in getting it out of the wall.