I lost half of my hives over the winter

[hoxbar]

For some reason I have lost 14 out of my 21 hives.  WE had a great spring and had a really good honey crop. We had a really horrible summer, it was extremly hot and dry.  I had to feed my bees during the summer, I fed a 2:1 syrup.  I didn't feed them as much as I should but they made it into the fall with poor honey stores.  I was afraid to feed syrup with it getting cold, so I put about 15 pounds of dry sugar on eash hive.  I misted the sugar with water. 

They bees started feeding on the sugar and I thought all was good. 
I was wrong.  They first warm day in January I opened my hives and found most the the 14 hives that ended up dying completely empty!  There was no brood, pollen, dead bees, there was nothing!  It was a mild winter and only getting below freezing a couple of days.  On most of the hives that were empty the sugar was still there like they left the day i poured it.  Where did I screw up?

I don't think mites played a roll.  I purchased these bees from an old beekeper and the hives had not been treated for mites in about 12 years.  They seemed strong and very healthy when I bought them.

I'm now trying to build up my bee yard by splitting and cut outs.  I just need to learn from my mistakes.

[scdw43]

Dry sugar did not work for me. I don't use it. It took one winter to make a believer out of me.

[kingbee]

I could be wrong but I doubt that dry sugar is much of a substitute for sufficient stores, be it sugar syrup or honey.  Dry sugar in my opinion is only good in very cold areas, and then only as an emergency insurance policy to stretch out "just maybe enough" honey stores long enough to stave off late winter or early spring starvation.  In warmer areas I think feeding dry sugar creates muscle bound bees by requiring them to tote all that dry sugar out of the hive before feeding it to the ants.

I doubt any beek successfully winters his hives on nothing but dry sugar, but I could bee wrong.

[Finski]

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In winter feeding quick feeding s important. Otherwise bees start again brood rearing. Those bees which feed larvae, will not live up to winter cluster.


When I start to feed my hivs, they normally have stopped brood rearing a while ago and last frames are merging. Young ueens lay longer. I feed my hives during one week. Then bees need 2 weeks to cap the food.

The hives must be full of food. Otherwise they do not cap cells. So the hive needs allways maximun feeding.

Dry sugar is impossible stuff to winter feeding. Bees need to carry tremandous amount of water to dilute the stuff.
Then it keeps the larva rearing one, which mean that the wintering bees hit themselves out. New bees with sugar feeding will not succeed because new bee rearing needs most of all pollen.

One frame brood = one frame pollen.
One box pollen= one box winter cluster.
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[Michael Bush]

>I opened my hives and found most the the 14 hives that ended up dying completely empty!  There was no brood, pollen, dead bees, there was nothing!

You have an entirely different problem than starving.  This sounds more like CCD.

[hoxbar]

I don't think they starved.  All the hives that I have seen that starved was full of dead bees.  With lots of dead bees head down in the cells searching for food.  I really don't think this was starvation.

[Finski]

I don't think they starved.  All the hives that I have seen that starved was full of dead bees.  With lots of dead bees head down in the cells searching for food.  I really don't think this was starvation.

It is starvation. Food is finish when they go into cells to die.

[hoxbar]

I don't think they starved.  All the hives that I have seen that starved was full of dead bees.  With lots of dead bees head down in the cells searching for food.  I really don't think this was starvation.

It is starvation. Food is finish when they go into cells to die.

The hive was empty.  There was nothing inside.  This hive did not have any bees inside, it was completely empty.  Hives that have starved, will have dead bees in them, these were completely empty.....

[kingbee]

... I thought all was good. I was wrong.  They first warm day in January I opened my hives and found most the the 14 hives that ended up dying completely empty!  ...  It was a mild winter and only getting below freezing a couple of days....

A mild winter eh.  Do you think that your bees tried to forage on a nectar less landscape on warm days and drooped dead in the field from starvation.  I know that it takes longer for us humans to die from starvation if we sit down and do nothing, than it does if we are up and about working and exercising. I think the same is true for bees.

[hoxbar]

I guess that could be possible, but wouldn't there still be some bees left behind.  I mean there was absoutly nothing in the hive.  The sugar was still there but nothing else.  Not even a dead bee.  It was like they moved out.

[AllenF]

When feeding dry sugar, you have to get to them before they are too weak to move the cluster up to the sugar.   I had some week hives and they did survive without honey, just dry sugar until I put honey to them in the early spring.   When you find a bees dead inside cells, they starved.   Also, a hive can starve with lots of honey still in the hive, just on frames outside of the cluster.   The bee numbers were too low to heat the cluster and move over to the honey.   But no honey in the hive, they starved. 

[hoxbar]

When feeding dry sugar, you have to get to them before they are too weak to move the cluster up to the sugar.   I had some week hives and they did survive without honey, just dry sugar until I put honey to them in the early spring.   When you find a bees dead inside cells, they starved.   Also, a hive can starve with lots of honey still in the hive, just on frames outside of the cluster.   The bee numbers were too low to heat the cluster and move over to the honey.   But no honey in the hive, they starved. 

Where did my bees go?  Why did I not have any dead bees in the hive?  They didn't seem to be too weak when I put sugar on them.  I can see where putting the sugar on top of the hive in an empty box could be a problem, now that you mentioned it.

[BlueBee]

It sounds to me like the bees absconded for reasons we'll never know.  I've watched one nuc abscond its home before and try to take over an adjacent nuc.  Always a surprise when you see a marked queen walking around on a landing board!  When the bees abscond, there is usually no dead bees.  If a hive is robbed, there will be a lot of dead bees on the bottom board.  Hence my guess is abscond in your case.  

Would they abscond because all they had to eat was dry sugar?  Trying to think like a bee for a minute, would it make sense to leave a hive in the winter on the account of your beek dumping in dry sugar?  Seems a bad idea to me (to abscond due to sugar), but I'm not a bee.  My guess is something beside dry sugar caused the bees to abscond.  Like Michael says, CCD sounds like a distinct possibility.

[Finski]

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How varroa makes hives empty

2 winter ago I lost  30% of my hves to varroa.
4 hives were compldtely empty when I stared to give oxalic acid. They were biggest hives in my yard
. It was new to me but how it happens.

The big hive has a huge mite load even if it does not suffer for it in summer.

Then came a brood brake and new queen started to lay again. All mites rushed onto new brood.
They will be violated badly. Quite few bees emerged normally. They were not able to keep brood alive: feed and keep harm. Frames had here and there brood which had not emerged.

Then summer bees die and those bees which had feeded dead winter bees.

There are various stages in accident. Some hives loose all bees, some 80% and some 50%.

Last winter I did not lost any hive, but degrease in winter clusters were too big.

I realized that when using only oxalic acid, that is not enough to good treament. I must treat them in August too.

One reason is viruses what mite infection carries.

[BlueBee]

Good point Finski.

Do you trickle oxalic acid in August too?

[Finski]

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We have a new mite problem in Finland now

Mite has been 25 years in Finland . It seemed that the problem is under control but in recent years it has bursted out and more hive has been lost to varroa.

Our main adviser wrote couple of years ago that he stops the writing about varroa, because things are OK

Now he told to me in phone that he is going to look an experienced beekeeper. He has 130 hives but every single is dead after winter.  Huge losses happened last winter and already much in Autumn.


Hives do not stand any more varroa like they did 20 years ago. I may see mites like porridge in hives 20 years ago. I trickled Perizin onto bees and they were in Spring OK. Now I do not see much mites but they destroy badly bee colony.

It is said that reason is viruses. They assist mite violation and make they own job.

WHAT I SHALL DO...


If I see mites in drone pupaes, the contamination is quite bad.
1) False swarm- treat them with oxalic acid
2) if the hive has no brood, make a false swarm onto clean foundations and trickle bees. Return them to the honey combs.

4) make a brood brake to the hive before winter bees laying and trickle the bees
5) Formic acid and thymol treatment when hive rear winter bees.


look the count:

10 mites in frame in June
200 mites in 20 brood frames

In July 400
August 800
September 800... critical level
October 1600

[hoxbar]

If they would have died from mites, wouldn't there be some dead bees in the hive?  There wasn't any dead bees in mine. 

[Finski]

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In my case, when 4 biggest hives died for mites, it happened during Autumn before winter cluster.
Wingless new bees were carried out and birds eated them.
Violated were short living and went out to die.

In this case the do not die in cluster. they die one by one like summer bees do in autumn.