Just chillin in NY

[jxbeeman]

Newcomer just trying to figure out how to keep my bee's like "ALIVE".  Love beekeeping but have a very pecular habit of killing off the bees in the winter.  I'm in upstate NY just below Ithaca and man is it cold out.  Today i think we've made a record low for March of like 15F out.  Hopefully it starts to warm up in the next couple of weeks.  Just ordered some Nuc's because the swarms that i catch don't seem to be so hot and tend to crap out, well maybe that is just me idk. Looking foward to getting some great info---> which i've been doing lately.  Hopefully I can break my 4 yr tradition this year.  hehehehehe

[Horns Pure Honey]

Wellcome aboard!!! bye :D

[beemaster]

Hi JXBeeman:

We all know what you mean - it's easy to get caught up in a bad slump, where no matter how well you prepare, your bees just don't survive the Winters.

I hope the forums help better that streak.

The decades of combined experience is well worth tapping and just think, there are many members with Winters exponentially more brutal than ours - so you should have plenty of help in next seasons preparation.

Please post as often as you feel like - sharing images, sound files, etc., are a great way to interact and this forum software allows for some creative communication :)

Also, on March 20th we have Howland Blackiston (author of Beekeeping for dummies) live in our chatroom - try to make that gathering and post about any issues that come to mind.

I think we all need to do EARLY SPRING REASSESSMENT - as we enter the following months of pollen and nectar flow, we have to make the conditions THE BEST for the workers to prepare for NEXT Winter.

We can all put our thinking caps on, but strong queens, early morning flights, sunny locations, good venting, sugar syrup feeding and schedule inspections, proper medication treatment and agreeable weather all make for a more successful season in our beeyards.

Welcome to the forums - great to have you here with us :)

[leominsterbeeman]

Glad to see the Northeast represented so well!    Ithaca is a great town.

[jxbeeman]

who else in this forum is close to the Binghamton NY area.  Interested in meeting

[Robo]

jxbeeman,

Another NorthEast guy here,  I'm down around Kingston.  

Please don't take this personally, but loosing your hives 4 years straight is surely an indication that something is wrong with your hive management. Assuming it is not AFB (you should be able to identify that), the next thing I would consider would be mites (tracheal and varroa).  What type of mite treatment have you been using?

It can become very disappointing (and costly) if you keep loosing your bees.   Your not the first to have issues like this and you surely won't be the last.  The bottom line is that you CAN keep health bees even in cold climates and just need to drill down and determine the root cause of all your failures.

[peggjam]

From Steuben County, about 100 west of Binghamton.  We're getting back into bees after an eleven year abscence.  I hope everything works out the second time around.

peggjam

[jxbeeman]

Robo,

No offense taken, first year the guy that was helping me out well lets just say didn't inform me well on winterization.  the second year i caught a really late small swarm-->august.  i tinkered with them but figured i'd loose em which happend.  last yr was a temp problem and this year was a stores prob with condensation.  those are my guesses.  they were all small feral hives which i had caught localy.  at the time i also wasn't checking for mites so they could have played into the equation as well.  

question->  do bees eat more honey when they are cold or less.  i've heard that it is better that they are cooler in the winter that way they eat less food.  i've also heard that if it is cooler they eat more honey to keep warm.  is it either or neither.  thanks

[leominsterbeeman]

The bees eat more when it is warmer - less of them die off.  So it's more likely they will starve in a mild winter.  

But again,  Ask 4 beekeepers a question and you will get atleast 7 answers.

Last year (03-04) was the coldest winter in years, deepest temps recored in 100 years and my bees survived.

This winter is exceptial bad, becuase it started out warm until January and then the cold came - so the bees ate like kings in October, Nov and December and now have to eat like pesants or worse starve.   And when there is no food in the cells,  they don't move around to much to find their stores of honey/syrup.

[amymcg]

Hey Robo,

I used to live in Kingston. . .small world.

[Robo]

Hey Robo,

I used to live in Kingston. . .small world.

Yes it is.  I actually grew up in Rosendale,  but now live in Olivebridge, up by the Ashokan Reservoir.  

Your not an IBM kid by any chance?

[jxbeeman]

I'm an IBM kid.

[Jerrymac]

It's going to be around 85F here tomorrow :P

[Robo]

I'm an IBM kid.

Ahhhh,  Owego.    I wasn't paying attention I guess,  I was thinking Oswego.

So was that the Glendale lab that was in Owego?  

My sister-in-law use to live in Johnson City.

[jxbeeman]

well i'm not sure which lab it is.  there is one in endicott which has been there for yrs and yrs.  then there is/used to be one in owego.  they sold it to loral who in turn sold it to lockheed martin a yr later.  that was a couple yrs ago maybe 7.  but the one in endicott is still up and running.

[HilltopDaisy]

Hey guys, I'm just north of Binghamton, in Upper Lisle.  I'm getting bees for the first time in May, from Dadant in Waverly.  I'd love to corespond with you, jxbeeman.

[jxbeeman]

HilltopDaisy
hey no prob.  would love to.  send me an e-mail or something and we can get together.  maybe this spring we can go chasing swarms.  later

[BigRog]

PROGRAMS
CORNELL COOPERATIVE EXTENSION with Anne Frey, president of the Southern Adirondack Beekeepers Association present "Beekeeping, Spring Management," 7-8 p.m. April 5 at Cornell Cooperative Extension of Albany County, 24 Martin Road, Voorheesville. The cost of the program is $7. To register call or email Billie-Jo at 765-3512 or [email protected].