Escaping Bees and Counting Mites

Well it’s now the end of August here on Cape Cod. It has been a great summer, weather wise, but the worst honey production year I have seen since I started keeping bees in 1978.
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Left: The dreaded Varroa mite. The mite population increases through the summer months and can reach damaging numbers.
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We are averaging about 10 lbs of honey per producing hive, and only 3 out of 7 hives are producing any honey. Last years yield was 60 lbs of honey per hive. This honey season has been a disappointing one. As a beekeeper, at this point, I can not see what could have been done better to produce more honey. The biggest factor was the spring weather. It was cold too long for the bees to build up in numbers and to take advantage of the spring honey flow. Then when the spring honey flow finally started, three weeks late, it was over too fast.
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Right: A screened bottom board with a sticky board installed. The screened bottom board allows Varroa mites to fall out of a colony and not climb back in. The sticky board is installed to collect the fallen mites in order to observe their numbers.
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August is when the Varroa mites show up in their greatest numbers. Detected in Kentucky in 1991 they have quickly spread throughout the country. A few years ago the cape lost about 80% of its bee colonies because of the Varroa Mites. The mites attach themselves to the bees, feeding off of them, weakening them, and spreading disease.
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Right: A sticky board being removed from the screened bottom board after a 24 hour period. The mite levels found on the board will reveal if there is a mite population problem inside the hive.
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A week ago I conducted a 24 hour mite drop count on all the colonies. Since I maintain a screened bottom board on most of the colonies, a slide in sticky board was used to collect falling mites over a 24 hour period. The sticky board is then removed and the mites counted. If only a few are found then it is an indication that the mite population is low within the colony. My mite count was in the hundreds in two of the colonies, with high counts in a third, and low counts in the others. I have never experienced mites in these numbers before. The trend was that the over-wintered colonies had a much higher mite count than the colonies started in 2007.
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Right: Enlarged area of the sticky board. Among the debris are great numbers of varroa mites. Not good news.
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Before the hives can receive any type of medications or treatments the Honey must be removed from the hive. I installed escape boards which allow the bees to exit the honey supers, and not return. Within two to three days almost all the bees will have exited the honey supers into the brood chambers below where the queen is. After removing all of the honey, I was able to start formic acid treatments. Formic acid is found naturally in the colony. Adding formic acid pads inside the colony raises the formic acid level within the colony. This increased level does not hurt the bees, but kills both Varroa and Trachea mites. The treatment lasts 3 weeks after which the hives will be tested again for Varroa mites to insure their numbers are under control. Once the formic acid pads are removed, the acid levels return to normal.
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Left: Closeup of the sticky board. Oil spray (like pam) is used on the board to keep the mites in place once they fall onto the board.
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Since honey production was so low this year, the hives do not contain much honey for the bees to live on through the winter. We have started feeding the bees with a 1:1 ratio of sugar and water. The supplemental feeding has started early this year so the bees will have enough time to store it in the brood chamber.
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Left: The bottom of a bee escape board. The bees can come down through the round hole, and out the small openings, but are to dumb to find there way back. Once placed between the honey supers and the brood chamber this board will evacuate the bees from the honey super in three days.
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I am hoping that there will be an abundance of Goldenrod bloom this fall. The Goldenrod is the last major producer of nectar and pollen for the bees before the frost and cold weather set in.
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Right: Installed bee escape board.
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We will be extracting what honey we can this weekend!

That’s always fun!
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Left: Bees feeding on pollen patty supplements. This stimulates brood production.
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Lightning Management

Well it is August, a dull time for bees on Cape Cod. The main nectar flow has been over for two weeks, so there is not much for 60,000 bees to do but sit around and watch the honey ripen. Once the bees have evaporated the proper amount of water out of the honey the cells of comb will be capped with a beautiful layer of white wax. The wax capping will protect the honey until it is needed by the bees for food this winter.
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Right: Honey bees collecting water. The water will be used to cool the hive on hot summer days.
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On hot days the bees will be busy collecting water to keep the hive cool, and searching about to find what little pollen and nectar they can. For the beekeeper it is time to estimate how much surplus honey has been produced by the bees, that is how much honey the bees have produced for the beekeeper. We will be extracting honey towards the end of August. This will leave time to feed the bees if necessary, examine them for disease and treat them accordingly

This was a poor honey production year. What should have produce 350 lbs of honey will only produce around 50. The cold spring did not allow the colonies to build up in size enough to take advantage of the spring honey flow. Perhaps the fall Golden Rod will produce some extra honey for the hives, but not for the beekeeper. Honey production was so low this year that supplemental feeding will be necessary to ensure the colonies have enough honey stored for winter.
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Left: Thats me, working the bees in the thunder and lightning.
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Last week I was caught in a thunder and lightning rain storm while working the bees out on one of the cranberry bogs. Needless to say I was a little concerned for myself. There was lightning and loud thunder all around me. The bees didn’t seem to care about the danger I was in. They were actually calm during the whole ordeal.

I wasn’t.
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Right: Beautiful brood pattern layed by one of my home grown queens.
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My queen rearing project has produced four nice queens. You can see from the photograph that they are laying a nice solid pattern of brood. Today I introduced one into a colony who’s queen is failing. Earlier this morning I prepared some queen cage candy by mixing 1 cup of powdered sugar to about 3 table spoons of corn syrup to make a bread dough like candy. This candy is placed into one end of the queen cage, and the queen and some attendant workers placed in the other end, covered by a screen. The plans is, that once the cage is introduced into a queenless colony, the bees will eat the candy out of one end, releasing the queen into the colony. It takes about 3 days for the bees to eat their way through the candy. By the time the queen is released, her “queen sent” has been passed through the entire colony, and she is accepted as their queen. If not, they kill her and try to raise their own queen.
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Right: Queen cages filled with queen cage candy, ready for use.
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This time of year is a difficult one to try to get a colony to accept a new queen. They are very protective of the hive. Because of the lack of a nectar flow, colonies of bees will try to rob weaker colonies of their honey. The bees are very sensitive to any intrusion into the hive this time of year.
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Right: A queen in her cage, ready for introduction into a colony.
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Maybe they somehow sense that in a few weeks a lot of their honey will be missing from their hives, and found on my pantry shelf!
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Left: A bee on my shirt
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