Winter

Now that it’s April I feel a little bit better about saying that two of the three hives made it through the winter. In late October we combined two hives since one was so weak and clearly without a queen. We fed each hive with sugar blocks that we made and pollen patties.

This photo shows the hives on January 10, 2010. At the time we thought this would be the worst snow we would get. Boy, were we wrong! I included this picture so you can see the relationship of the sun to the bee yard. We found that the bees kept the clusters over toward the side that had sun on it all day. Wrapping the hives really helped.

On January 23 it was so warm (almost 50*) that we were able to check the hives and add more sugar. We were delighted to see that the bees were quite happy in both hives.

During the weekend of February 5 we had a big snowstorm. By Saturday night we had over 18 inches of snow on the ground. As you can see from the picture above and the one below, the hive stands were buried and the entrances were well under the surface of the snow mounds. Alex trudged down the hill to dig out the entrances that evening and we all made our way to the girls to dig them out on Sunday.

It was a few weeks before it warmed up enough to open the hives but we were still able to check on them. Using a stethoscope we could listen to the bees keeping warm in their cozy homes. I was amazed that we could hear them so clearly! I hope that we can find a better quality stethoscope before next winter. It really gave us piece of mind to hear the activity in the hives. Thanks for stopping by today! I hope to post more often now that we’re into a more active season. Have a bee-utiful day!