Bright Bright Snow

mtnb · November 15, 2015, 12:52:35 PM

I have a question. We have had snow on the ground for a few days. Each day I found about 20-40 dead bees in front of my hive. I asked a beekeeper I know and he said that the sun reflecting off the snow can make it very bright for the bees and they think it's warm and go out and end up falling into the snow. He suggested I lean a piece of slate or piece of wood against it to darken the entrance. I did that one day and only had a few bees dead in front of the hive. Now my snow has melted so I can't test this theory further, yet. I'd like to hear your guy's thoughts on this...

Foxhound · November 15, 2015, 07:21:27 PM

Wouldn't that just be from the dead bees that are cleaned out of the hive. 20-40 bees doesn't seem like much this time of the year.

mtnb · November 16, 2015, 09:14:07 AM

I'm not sure. It's only my first winter with the bees and just don't know what's normal. On average, how many die on a daily basis? Does that average differ from winter to summer months?

Foxhound · November 16, 2015, 09:30:18 AM

By this time of the year, the majority of the bees that are going to die have already died. Bees will carry off other dead bees away from the hive, but often drop them just in front. You may be noticing it more because the dead bees are on the white snow. Instead of on the brown/green grass.

It doesn't sound alarming to me at all.

iddee · November 16, 2015, 09:31:21 AM

The bees judge the temp at the entrance. If it is above about 43 F., they will fly. If the reflection, or the sun on the entrance, raises the temp of the entrance to 50 F. or so, they will fly out. He may have an idea there. It would let the air temp be the same as the entrance temp.

BeeMaster2 · November 16, 2015, 01:36:56 PM

If you look at the old bee skep videos on utube, you will see that they shaded the entrances to keep the sun off during winter to keep them from flying when it was too cold.
Jim

Michael Bush · November 16, 2015, 02:42:21 PM

I think it has to do with light polarization which is how they navigate. Not so much brightness.

mtnb · November 17, 2015, 10:38:28 AM

This is all just so interesting!

Iddee, i watched something like that the other day. Some of them were coming and going peeking out of the entrance. I even saw a drone peek out. lol One bee got further out than the rest, maybe didn't feel that collective heat anymore, and fell off the landing board. I quickly picked her up and set her back on but she immediately started convulsing and died. The freeze was instantaneous on her.

Jim, I've watched a couple of those skep videos before but don't remember seeing about shaded entrances. I'll look more. Skeps are pretty cool. It seems like I could easily make one but they're illegal here, right? Could we use one just as a trap?

Mr. Bush, the light polarization concept in bees is fascinating! There's so much to learn!

Foxhound, I think you're probably right. Those little fozen tunnel graves all over the front looked macabre. lol I've thought about it and since the population drastically increases during the summer months, there should be way more dead bees daily during that period than now.

Thanks everyone so much. You all have given me plenty ideas to research.

BeeMaster2 · November 17, 2015, 12:30:44 PM

"Jim, I've watched a couple of those skep videos before but don't remember seeing about shaded entrances. I'll look more. Skeps are pretty cool. It seems like I could easily make one but they're illegal here, right? Could we use one just as a trap?"
MT Bee,
You probably cannot use the skep for keeping your bees only if you state requires that the hive bee able to bee inspected, which they probably do.
You can use them as swarm traps and leave the bees in them long enough to get established.
Jim

Ed Gallop · November 17, 2015, 07:05:53 PM

I'll go with cleaning dead bees from the hive. However... I retired from Alaska and have shoveled my driveway for 15 to 20 minutes in below zero temps without a coat on and be very comfortable in the sun without wind on a dry day. But the furnace still ran in the house. Their cluster is their furnace and I doubt they could be fooled when exiting the entrance. But I don't know for sure.