Starving!

I was so thankful to receive dire warnings via Facebook and email from Metro Atlanta Beekeepers Association, as well as Brushy Mountain Beekeeping and Pigeon Mountain Trading Co. about the immediate need to feed the bees! Even though the season is deceptively warm and we're lured into thinking the bees have plenty of food, an actual lack of nectar flow has put Southern bees into starvation mode.

Yesterday I made a big batch of sugar syrup and went out to inspect Apollo, my only remaining hive. Sure enough, when I pulled off the inner cover, there was a cluster of about 100 dead bees on the top super. Sad, sad, sad. This super, which was full of honey a couple of months ago, was now almost devoid of honey. The bees were STARVING and had been feeding off their stores.

On the positive side, the queen had apparently made it up into this super and been hard at work laying eggs. Six of the frames were full of beautifully capped brood, eggs and larvae, and the laying pattern looked just as it should. My sweet little honeybees need a food source so that they can, in turn, nourish these baby bees and make a strong colony.

The girls went through a large plastic feeder of syrup yesterday and they are now working on a small feeder this morning. Probably time to think about ordering a feeder that can supply them for at least a few days at a time.

Hope I've dodged a bullet and kept Apollo going — I'd hate to lose yet another hive.

Queen or no queen, that is the question...

Two weeks ago, my package bees arrived and I installed them in Sweet Beezus. Unfortunately, I made a rookie mistake with the queen's cage and forgot to remove the small cork that covers the candy plug right away. Two days later, I remembered and removed it.

A few days after that, I opened the hive and found that the workers had eaten through the candy and released the queen from her cage. I looked and looked, but couldn't see the queen anywhere...until I noticed her on the inner cover, which I'd placed on the ground nearby. Yikes! I put the inner cover back on the hive immediately, and closed things up.

Today I thought it should be time to add another brood super. However, when I opened the hive and inspected the frames, they were only full of stored sugar water. No brood in sight. So, either the queen is dead or she is not laying.

Since I don't know how long it "too long" to wait and see if the queen will start laying, I called Rossman Apiaries to ask what to do. They advised me to open the hive again and find the queen. Obviously, if there is no queen or the queen is not laying, there is no brood. And without any brood, the hive cannot survive because the workers have no larvae available from which to a new queen. This means I'll have to requeen the hive.

Requeening is a process I'm not looking forward to — it involves killing the old queen (if she's still alive) and then introducing a new queen (in her cage). But first things first. Tomorrow I'll figure out whether or not Sweet B has a queen and go from there.

On a wing and a prayer...

Since Apollo is my only surviving hive at the moment and its residents have been through a lot already this year, I can only send up a prayer on little honeybee wings that these girls will make some honey to spare this summer.

This morning I installed a beetle trap and put on a queen excluder and two shallow honey supers. The inner cover had deteriorated over the past three years (assisted by the wax moth infestation a few months ago), so I replaced it. While I waited for the smoker to do its job and the bees to calm down and retreat, I peered down into the top brood super -- nice to see it was chock full of bees and they were storing some honey around the edges of the frames.

I removed Rocky from its perch and will break it down and bag it for trash. While there is evidence that the hive had wax moths, I can't help but believe there were other problems that contributed to its demise, including hive beetles, mites and maybe too much moisture.

Sweet Beezus is ready and waiting for new occupants. I can't find my receipt from Rossman Apiaries, but if I recall correctly, my package bees will ship out sometime next week or the following week. Maybe the second time around will be the charm for this hive.

A Tale of Two Hives

This has been a challenging winter for both hives. I've learned more about the pests that plague honeybees and about the value of regular hive inspections, winter feeding and "re-queening." Let's just say I've learned these lessons the hard way.

Apollo

Apollo is my original hive, which I started with a package back in May 2010. This hive has overcome numerous problems including multiple swarms, one particularly brutal and prolonged cold snap and several different pests.

A couple of months ago, I pulled off the cover and noticed that there was a white substance underneath the inner cover. It looked like expandable foam sealant, actually. I had a very hard time prying the inner cover off the top super, and when I finally did, was horrified to see a thick layer of white cocoons. Apollo had a wax moth infestation. (Click on the photo below if you'd like to see an enlarged image.)



Wax moths are extremely destructive insects, spinning webs throughout the hive and their larvae destroying not only the brood comb but also the hive equipment. Here is a picture of the damage done to the super and frames by larvae burrowing into the wood.



I removed the top super — which could not be salvaged — and cleaned out as much webbing and other wax moth debris as I could, put in some fondant for the bees to feed on, closed the cover and hoped for the best. Although I've been told that honeybees are likely to abscond from a wax moth-infested hive, the Apollo bees chose to stay and, miraculously, appear to be thriving right now.

Recently I attended a lecture given by honeybee expert Dr. Keith Delaplane about colony collapse disorder and what the disappearance of honeybees and other pollinators means to the environment and to our way of life. (Check out this informative editorial, "On Einstein, Bees, and Survival of the Human Race.")

Afterward, I was able to ask Dr. D. about my wax moth issue and he just smiled and said, "Wax moths are generally only a symptom of a bigger problem. If the hive is healthy and the bees are robust, they can fend off wax moths pretty easily." So, we talked about the probability of Varroa mites (at least the small hive beetles are under control, I'm glad to say), or... an unhealthy or dead queen. He suggested I "re-queen" the hive, which involves killing the old queen and introducing a new, healthy queen. I shuddered visibly, I guess, because Dr. D. simply smiled again and wished me luck.

For now, I'm watching and waiting to see if Apollo has the strength to keep on keepin' on. There are hundreds of girls out and about lately, flying around in the sunshine on these warm afternoons, so I'm thinking they're gonna make it.

Rocky

Sadly, today I discovered that the Rocky hive is dead. I'd suspected as much because there have been so few bees visibly out and about, nowhere near as many as Apollo. I'm sad and feeling like a "bad mom" because if I'd paid more attention sooner, I might have been able to salvage the situation. I could've re-queened this hive and fed the bees with not only fondant, but also pollen patties.

Bees need a food source during the winter, even in Atlanta where there is some pollen available for foraging pretty much year-round. This year, I didn't give them pollen patties and I feel like this was part of the reason for hive failure.

So, I fell down on the job and it's a hard lesson learned again after losing the Sweet Beezus hive last winter.

Plan B

I've got a package of bees on order to repopulate Sweet B, and those bees will arrive in May. In the meantime, I've signed up to attend a hive inspection tour offered by the Metro Atlanta Beekeepers Association in a few weeks. The inspection of multiple hives will be conducted by a master beekeeper and we'll be able to observe and learn what to look for in determining whether the hive is healthy or has problems.

Also, I found out that, as a MABA member, I can put my name on the "swarm list" and possibly be the recipient of a swarm of bees that MABA beekeepers are routinely called on to collect from people's yards, businesses, school playgrounds, etc. As often as my own Apollo bees have swarmed in the past, I might be lucky enough to collect my own swarm again this spring and repopulate the Rocky hive. And that's an interesting idea in itself, because Rocky was started from an Apollo swarm the first year I began beekeeping.

Happy 2013!

I can't believe it's been 6 months since I posted anything about bees. Shame on me!

Winterizing time:

This year, I remembered my lesson about leaving some honey in the hives for the bees to feed on during the cold months — both Apollo and Rocky have a box of frames nearly filled with honey. I'm also planning to make fondant and put that in the hives as an extra food source. When colder temps arrived in north Georgia a couple of months ago, I went ahead and inserted entrance reducers to keep some of the cold wind out, but I also made sure the outer covers are pulled forward to allow for some ventilation.

I haven't opened the hives in several weeks, so I must do that soon and "bee" sure everything is okay. Perhaps this weekend will bring a rain-free day just right for a hive check.

Repopulating Sweet Beezus:

A new package of bees is on order to be delivered in May, so Sweet Beezus will have occupants once again. In the meantime, I need to move this hive to a more hospitable location...probably closer to Apollo and Rocky, which have both had pretty good success.


This spring will mark the beginning of my fourth year of beekeeping. It seems like only a few weeks have passed since that first package of bees arrived in 2010. And oh, what an adventure and fabulous learning experience it's been ever since!