It is slowly warming up. We aren’t seeing spring, but we are seeing hints of it.
The only green thing I am seeing after this long and cold winter is daffodils. They haven’t bloomed yet, but there are buds on the plants. The grass is still brown, and the clover is not yet growing. There is no sign of dandelions. I am not seeing the red at the top of maples, which is one of the first sources of food for the bees when they bloom.
I guess the only concrete sign of spring is the robins, which have made it up to our altitude. Well, that and the warmer temperatures.
Despite the lack of apparent food sources, the bees are flying on days when the temperature cracks 50°F. I started open feeding a few weeks ago, providing both sugar water and a powder that is a pollen substitute. This is the third time I’ve used the pollen substitute, but the first time they have flocked to it. I consider that a sure sign there is little or no natural pollen available.
Hive Survival
Back in February, it looked like four of the hives in my garden had activity and two of them did not. Then we had some more cold weather, including snow. On Monday, it looked like another hive had died. This can happen when the hive builds up too quickly and the bees consume all the stored food when it is too cold to go out and harvest more.
So it was with some trepidation when I took advantage of the temperature flirting with 60°F and went to open the hives for the first time. Happily, four had survived. Still, this is the most losses I’ve experienced over a winter.
Hive One
The first hive had plenty of activity, so I opened it up. A surprising number of bees were in the top box. There were multiple frames of brood, far more than I expected in this weather, and a decent amount of nectar and pollen (carbs and protein), what we call “bee bread.” The pollen was light yellow, the same as the pollen substitute I had been feeding. More proof that it was benefitting the bees. Of course, some maples have light yellow pollen. It is possible the bees are flying down the mountain to a lower altitude where the maples are in bloom.
I also saw a few bees bringing in orange pollen. This might be from dandelions, but none are visible on my property or my neighbors. Again, they could go further afield to look for it.
This queen was doing an excellent job as there were two full frames with capped brood on both sides. Then there were two more frames with brood in different stages and one full side of eggs. I expect this hive will see its population grow rapidly as these bees hatch. I may end up splitting this hive in late April or May.
Since the top box was so full and had lots of brood, I reversed the two hive bodies, moving the box with the brood down and putting the mostly empty box—it just had some honey and pollen in it—on top. This will give the queen room to grow and reduce swarming pressure.
Hives Two and Three
The hive next to this one was also quite strong. Very similar to Hive One. What is interesting is that both these hives were at the north end of the row of hives. I don’t know if this was the side that got the least wind or if it was just a coincidence that they are the strongest. All the hives have the same insulation and construction and received the same anti-mite treatment.
Hive Three was the one I thought might be dead. When I opened it up, I was pleased to see a cluster of bees covering a section on three or four frames. They were only in the front, so it was a small cluster. Interestingly, there was plenty of honey in the hive, so they were not in danger of starving. There was also only a small amount of brood, a circle maybe five inches in diameter on one frame. My guess is that this queen is on her last legs. Perhaps she was badly bred or already weak the year prior, so she didn’t make strong fat-bodied bees to help the hive overwinter.
This hive is struggling, but I think I caught it in time. After ensuring the queen wasn’t on the frame, I transferred a frame from the strong Hive Two to the weak Hive Three. The frame had a good amount of brood across a spectrum of ages, including eggs, so this will hatch a couple thousand new bees over the next three weeks. I’ll add a frame from Hive One next week to boost them further.
In the meantime, it will be interesting to see if the old queen lays any eggs of her own or if the bees produce emergency queen cells from the young brood I provided them. While this hive needs a new queen, I hope they hold off on producing one. I don’t think there are any drones flying yet, and it is unlikely a new queen would be well mated.
Given the small size of this hive, I broke it down to a single large box.
Hive Four
Hive Four was average, not as strong as the first two hives, but not anywhere near being on its last legs. It was pretty average for this time of the year, with a good five or six frames of bees and a couple frames of brood. I expect it to build up and become a good honey producer, but don’t expect it to see much swarming pressure unless the queen kicks it up a notch. I broke this hive down to one box as well. In a normal year, most of the hives look like this one.
By removing extra, empty boxes from the smaller hives, I give them less room to heat and less space they need to guard or protect. Many beekeepers over winter in only one box, but I like to use two because it gives them more resources. Of the six hives I started winter with, only one appears to have starved and/or frozen, or froze because they had no more food. There are dead bees with their heads buried in the comb, their little butts pointing up. I have only had this happen once before.
My guess with the other dead-out is the queen died in December or later. With no brood and chance of creating a new queen, the other bees left, hopefully finding shelter in one of the other hives. It is possible the queen was killed during the mite treatments, but I will never know.
Having Fun with Bees
The good news is I enjoyed working with the bees and in the bee yard, despite being stung twice. But working bees is exactly that, work. It requires time and attention, and plenty of lifting. During the spring, for example, I spend more time tending bees than I do caring for the chickens, and I value the eggs more than the honey. But from mid-November to mid March, I did nothing but dose the bees with some oxalic acid vapors, which took about an hour, and then started the open feeding. So it has been a while since I worked in the bee yard, and I find myself rejuvenated and ready to go after the winter break.
Late last year, I decided not to grow my apiary, but to stop somewhere around eight or ten hives. That was before I knew I had lost a couple. I will split the robust hives and boost the number of hives I have, but I don’t plan on continuing to grow to 12 or 15 hives.
If we run into a SHTF scenario where honey becomes a valuable commodity, that will change, but for now, we are making plenty of honey. I collected 270 pounds last year, and I have at least 50 left, so it won’t matter if I produce less honey in 2025.
Making a Profit
2024 was the first year I made a profit selling honey and eggs. It was not a large profit. The only reason I was profitable is because I did not buy any bees, which can chew up several hundred dollars, or any chicks. I may need new chicks this summer. We’ll have to see how the hens produce. Right now, they continue to lay an average of 16 eggs per day. We already have orders to sell four dozen this week.
It’s a small business, and neither I nor the IRS will get rich from the profits, but it is good to make a few bucks now and again.
Besides producing a few dollars, we get free eggs and honey, which saves us $500 a year, and we have potential trade goods. Besides being unaffected by the rising price of eggs, I find the bees and chickens are a good choice for preppers because they are scalable. I have the ability to breed more bees and produce more hives, which will generate more honey that summer or the following year. Because we have a rooster and an incubator, we can also produce more chicks. We can eat any new roosters eight or ten weeks after they are born, and the new hens will lay eggs when they are four or five months old. I can also sell chicks or even fertilized eggs. All of this would be good in a lengthy SHTF scenario or a long, slow collapse.
