We are getting daily hard frosts now here and day highs in the 60s. I added my last fall patty about 2 weeks ago to make sure the queen doesn't lay to late into fall. I am moving all my haves back to my home yard tomorrow morning. I will do a final OAV treatment and give each colony a good 2 gals of 2:1 syrup and then trickle feed until the cold sets in.... An unvented poly hive (bottom entrance only has good air movement (natural convection) for drying out nectar/syrup. Over the next 4 weeks the bees should be ready for another winter.
I enjoy your videos. You and I are exactly opposite in terms of weather for bees. I live on the 30th parallel very hot summer and mild winter. I have poly hives that keep them cooler in summer. I give prebiotic to the them from time to time to keep there gut health. I use a culture from SCD Prebiotic. I use the mother culture. I take these myself also. I am not a expert beekeeper by any means. But have been around live stock all my life. Have used this for many years now. Keep the great info going.
Carefully and passionately prepared overwintering for bees. Thanks for sharing. I saw everything you recorded (subscribed). I am trying to figure out how to supply water inside the hive all year round. Not only mine, but your bees, too, are begging for water to drink. The amoeba problem would be gone for sure. I would be grateful if you would like to share the idea.
The bees maintain a very tight (low variability range) on absolute humidity 16g/m3 plus minus a couple grams all winter long than move that up to 25g/m3 once brood rearing starts. The low variability tells me things are good… not much wasted moisture… i have 4 different sets of data that i want to compare from a humidity perspective… bees generate 80 to 100% via honey consumption. The goal needs to be how to optimize that.
My goal is to find a safe and convenient water supply inside. So that the bees could drink as much as they need, especially when the brood appeared in the spring.
I like your version of mountain camp sugar... just add a little water, I'm assuming to increase the likelihood they will consume it rather than just chuck it out the hive because its too dry.
Purely so I can pack it into my feed slot vs trying to break pieces off. It also won't just sift down into the hive if I was going to just use dry sugar. I want it wetter than dryer...
Bees are looking good! What did you treat the previous sugar batch with? Don’t the Patties squish bees? Do you store the patties at room temp? Can you take your videos landscape rather than vertical so the images are larger?
just enough water in the sugar to make a paste so the sugar doesn't just fall through. The bees are water limited at this time of year so a a bit of extra water in the sugar (insulated colony) will not cause any problems. Patties are gently placed vs pushed in to prevent squishing. That top slot has a depth of 2 to 2.5 inches a patty is about 1/2" so I leave plenty of room below. :) I'll do my best on the videos.
The sugar you are feeding the hives is that the 10 lbs sugar to 1 cup of water ? It looks like it is not baked to get hard ? Thank you for the help I live west of cochrane , alberta and will be opening up the hives early next week.
Hello Etienne - (interior Alaska) Finally got into my bees as temps hit upper 30's F. Magically 3 of 4 hives are quite active. I saw that you put pollen patties on so I immediately did the same. Well not exactly - I mixed powdered ultra bee with sugar and poured it n the top side of inner cover. Has been two days and temps are back down to 20's. My bees do not appear to have taken a cleansing flight since late September. Do I need to concern myself with the fact that I am adding pollen substitute to bees that have not yet started taking cleansing flights. Something telling me maybe I should have waited. What do you think?
My trigger is that a cleanse is required before I added any patties. We are fluctuating daily between 5C (41F) and -15C (5F) so that bees are getting a minor cleanse (cold break) every couple of days.
![[Live] : ONE 169 วันนี้!! "อนาโตลี vs อูมาร์"](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/IK3YZVWuFJg/mqdefault.jpg)
Thank you so much for sharing your methods and research! I'm in Alaska, so your work is a real gift.
We are getting daily hard frosts now here and day highs in the 60s. I added my last fall patty about 2 weeks ago to make sure the queen doesn't lay to late into fall. I am moving all my haves back to my home yard tomorrow morning. I will do a final OAV treatment and give each colony a good 2 gals of 2:1 syrup and then trickle feed until the cold sets in.... An unvented poly hive (bottom entrance only has good air movement (natural convection) for drying out nectar/syrup. Over the next 4 weeks the bees should be ready for another winter.
I enjoy your videos. You and I are exactly opposite in terms of weather for bees. I live on the 30th parallel very hot summer and mild winter. I have poly hives that keep them cooler in summer. I give prebiotic to the them from time to time to keep there gut health. I use a culture from SCD Prebiotic. I use the mother culture. I take these myself also. I am not a expert beekeeper by any means. But have been around live stock all my life. Have used this for many years now. Keep the great info going.
Colonies are looking great. Thanks for the video.
Population looks good. Your hive designs are nice, I like the insulation and how you have them setup.
Carefully and passionately prepared overwintering for bees. Thanks for sharing. I saw everything you recorded (subscribed).
I am trying to figure out how to supply water inside the hive all year round. Not only mine, but your bees, too, are begging for water to drink. The amoeba problem would be gone for sure.
I would be grateful if you would like to share the idea.
The bees maintain a very tight (low variability range) on absolute humidity 16g/m3 plus minus a couple grams all winter long than move that up to 25g/m3 once brood rearing starts. The low variability tells me things are good… not much wasted moisture… i have 4 different sets of data that i want to compare from a humidity perspective… bees generate 80 to 100% via honey consumption. The goal needs to be how to optimize that.
My goal is to find a safe and convenient water supply inside. So that the bees could drink as much as they need, especially when the brood appeared in the spring.
lookin' great! Nice job. Have not had a chance to get into mine yet (interior alaska)
Thanks! 👍
I like your version of mountain camp sugar... just add a little water, I'm assuming to increase the likelihood they will consume it rather than just chuck it out the hive because its too dry.
Purely so I can pack it into my feed slot vs trying to break pieces off. It also won't just sift down into the hive if I was going to just use dry sugar. I want it wetter than dryer...
Bees are looking good!
What did you treat the previous sugar batch with? Don’t the Patties squish bees? Do you store the patties at room temp? Can you take your videos landscape rather than vertical so the images are larger?
just enough water in the sugar to make a paste so the sugar doesn't just fall through. The bees are water limited at this time of year so a a bit of extra water in the sugar (insulated colony) will not cause any problems. Patties are gently placed vs pushed in to prevent squishing. That top slot has a depth of 2 to 2.5 inches a patty is about 1/2" so I leave plenty of room below. :) I'll do my best on the videos.
The sugar you are feeding the hives is that the 10 lbs sugar to 1 cup of water ? It looks like it is not baked to get hard ? Thank you for the help
I live west of cochrane , alberta and will be opening up the hives early next week.
No exact measurements, enough so that the sugar gets wet and becomes pasty. In my hot setup. bees easily maintain 70% RH at 20C
Perfect. Thank you very much
Hello Etienne - (interior Alaska) Finally got into my bees as temps hit upper 30's F. Magically 3 of 4 hives are quite active. I saw that you put pollen patties on so I immediately did the same. Well not exactly - I mixed powdered ultra bee with sugar and poured it n the top side of inner cover. Has been two days and temps are back down to 20's. My bees do not appear to have taken a cleansing flight since late September. Do I need to concern myself with the fact that I am adding pollen substitute to bees that have not yet started taking cleansing flights. Something telling me maybe I should have waited. What do you think?
My trigger is that a cleanse is required before I added any patties. We are fluctuating daily between 5C (41F) and -15C (5F) so that bees are getting a minor cleanse (cold break) every couple of days.
You don’t slit the patties? Do the bees take care of getting through the paper?
one side has perforated wax paper... but bees will eat through it regardless