October, and the bees have started to cluster. I see a few coming and going on sunny days, but mostly they’re staying in doing what bees do to ready themselves for winter. I did witness several individual drone evictions but not any ‘en masse’ evictions yet. Seems to me that the workers are still tolerating drone presence to some degree. I still have three hive top feeders to remove but I’m done with fall feeding. The colonies that didn’t have all of the foundation drawn out in the deeps six weeks ago are now wall-to-wall capped syrup-honey through two deeps and a medium. It took them 15 gallons of syrup each to get there, but they got there. All except one. One colony refused syrup when it was offered on two separate occasions, two weeks apart. That colony is currently a cluster about the size of a cantaloupe with very little honey and pollen in the upper deep. The lower deep is completely empty. I am not counting them as a colony going into winter because they won’t make it past late November, in my opinion. I thought about combining those bees with other colonies, but the others are set and I don’t want to disrupt them this late in the season. Godspeed and R.I.P.
I wrote in past newsletters about two colonies that had brood up the center of the hive through two deeps and two supers. They had honey, 70% capped, in the outer frames, but when I went to harvest them (figuring after a two week wait they’d be capped) there was very little honey left. Where’d it go? Probably to feed all of that brood during a dearth. I left them that way while I figured out how I was going to get them down to two deeps and a super for winter. I decided last weekend that I’d combine the fullest frames in the supers into one super, remove the other super, and start feeding them syrup. Surprise! I removed the inner cover on the upper super of the first hive and found the super to be wall-to-wall capped honey. I pulled that super off and the one underneath was also wall-to-wall capped honey. No brood in the center frames. And the second hive was exactly the same. How’d that happen during a dearth? The only thing I’ve come up with so far is……..robber bees…….and they’re the robbers. That changed my outlook on robber bees. They’re okay when they’re mine. While rummaging around in the first of those two hives I saw an unmarked queen (which is marked now). I had marked a queen in that hive after it had swarmed and requeened itself so it appears that there’s two queens in that hive, and probably in the other hive as well. With so much brood in those two hives that’s what I had figured was going on. (Current research has found that 10 – 20% of colonies have two queens, usually a mother/daughter team.) So now what? Those two colonies have a tremendous population and two deeps with bees, pollen and bee bread; and two supers loaded with honey. I decided they know what they’re doing far better than I do, so I put the covers back on and walked away. We’ll see what happens next. So my fall bee “to-do” list is complete except for treating them all with oxalic acid vapor. I’m waiting with that until daytime temps are in the 50’s so the bees are clustered and there’s very little capped brood. Oxalic acid can only kill phoretic mites (mites on the adult bees), and that will be the time. A nice thing about using oxalic acid vapor is that I can knock down Varroa without breaking the propolis seals between the boxes. I hope that everyone is making regular visits to our blog to keep up with what Fred is posting. A recent post had to do with an overwintering survival study being considered by UW-Madison. They are looking for Wisconsin beekeepers, like us, to participate in this study. Right now they are merely reaching out to see if there is interest in this study and Fred has provided a link within the post which you can follow to find more information and to express interest, or no interest. There’s even a “maybe” button. No matter how you respond, there is no commitment to the study now. We decided at our last meeting to have more regular meetings, targeting the third Saturday of the month. Unfortunately, that won’t quite work out with the Ripon Public Library. We do have our next meeting scheduled for October 21, but November 18 is not available. Since the following week is Thanksgiving (deer hunting) and everyone likes to be with family (deer hunting) then, I scheduled the following meeting for Dec. 2. Looks like we’ll be playing it by ear unless we find a venue that will be available on our terms. Our next meeting is October 21, Ripon Public Library, 9:30 am, Silver Creek Room. Leanne will be talking to us about what 503C status would mean to the ECWBA, and about grant writing. And Pam and her husband, Jeff, will be bringing a (impressive) homemade bee vac to show us how to construct a kinder, gentler bee vac. If it sounds like a good winter project for you, bring a camera, sketch pad and tape measure. And a pencil. It would be nice if everyone that has some honey brings some to the meeting for a honey tasting. I can get some animal crackers for dipping. I have had the opportunity to taste several members honey and there’s quite a variation in color and flavor. Then again, there’s variation in the honey I extract at different times during the season from the same location. Depends on what was in bloom prior to extracting. Below is the current list of Upcoming Events. Contact Laurie (email address below) if you are interested in participating. · Pilgrim Center, Green Lake, October 17, 6:00 p.m. Mark, Patti, Al and I are planning to give a bee and beekeeping presentation and everyone is welcome to join in. · Markesan Public Library, Markesan, February 19, 6:00 p.m. This is a new Event and no one has committed to it yet. It will be a presentation about bees and beekeeping, like usual. It’s a ways out, but if you can commit to being there, please let Laurie know. · Aerial Applications: Damon Raebe will give a presentation on what’s involved with aerial applications and how he, and others, work to protect pollinators while spraying fields to combat crop destructors. A date and venue has not been determined yet, but Jan, Feb, and March are the target months. See you on the 21st! Gerard Laurie Koeck (Events Coordinator and Apparel): [email protected] Patti Ingram (Secretary): [email protected]
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ECWBA NewsletterSince 2009 Archives
March 2019
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