Any casualties yet?

[drumgerry]

My only "casualty" so far is a nuc which was in a split National box together with another nuc. The bees all seem to have migrated round through the back entrance to one side leaving the other empty - not a bee to be seen. Of course it could be CCD (or not).

All twelve remaining range from 3 to 8 seams and I'm counting the days till Spring.

[greengumbo]

I did my OA treatment on 24th Dec and checked if my fondant was being munched. Only 2 seams of bees and even they were only along 2/3rds of the frames but they were quite active and the fondant was only marginally gone. Scraped about 100 dead bees from the floor using a twig through the entrance. I am a pessimist so quite worried as the replacement queen only started making winter bees in September. Fingers crossed.

[Poly Hive]

I have lost 8 from 9 nucs which is sad though not totally unexpected due to known poor matings. One colony lost, again I suspect due to poor mating as they tried several times to get themselves put right and I had nothing better to offer them. The price of the poor season I suppose.

What I have in hand though seem to be thriving and were OA treated today. Fondant has been on for over a month now and very little used all in all so off on holidays now quite happy.

PH

[prakel]

edit: on 20/03/13, having come back to this post to make an update I think for clarity that I should point out that my initial clue as to something being 'wrong' was due to a very definate change in behaviour from previous visits, apparent when checking stores.

On the face of things, quite a nice mating nuc for January but a little further investigation shows that things are far from fine (I know, wrong time of year to be opening hives -but it can help to build a useful picture of what's actually going on if carried out over a few years).

[Jon]

So why do you reckon they are making queen cells - look like emergency cells and there is brood present so the queen must have died or disappeared unexpectedly.

[prakel]

There's no sign of her beyond the brood shown in the photos -and so far as I'm aware nothing untoward has happened to the nuc, certainly nothing visible. Shame as it's otherwise a nice unit that fits it's box well. Some of my others look considerably weaker than I'd normally expect at this time of year.

[greengumbo]

I did my OA treatment on 24th Dec and checked if my fondant was being munched. Only 2 seams of bees and even they were only along 2/3rds of the frames but they were quite active and the fondant was only marginally gone. Scraped about 100 dead bees from the floor using a twig through the entrance. I am a pessimist so quite worried as the replacement queen only started making winter bees in September. Fingers crossed.

Well I went out in between the chills to quickly check fondant and it had half gone. Whacked another lump on quickly but saw no sign of any bees underneath the older stuff......think it might be game over Time will tell.

[gavin]

Two smallish frames of bees can be two well-covered frames which struggle on to make it through the winter, or can be just a few hundred bees clustering at the top of largely deserted combs. The latter could be from a failing or failed queen, or any number of causes, and was never going to make it whatever you did.

You'll not be alone this winter. I have a few at the association apiary under my 'care' (!) which are in a similar state - again I've tried to overwinter some that were really too small.

As long as you think that there was no serious disease, I'd pick off and pick out dead bees and sealed brood (if any), do an acetic acid fumigation (if you can access some) when the weather warms up a little, then let it air and set it up as a bait box for May swarms. Or splash out for a nuc from someone.

These guys suggest 140 ml per box. Pour on absorbent towels or kitchen sponges on the top bars, seal the box in a dustbin bag, and set out in a sunny spot for a week or two.

[Jon]

If you use 50ml of Acetic acid and leave it for a week it wont all have evaporated.
I know that 140 ml is Fera advice but I never have to use that much.
It is well worth doing as it should eliminate everything except AFB spores.
Nosema in particular is very sensitive to acetic acid by all accounts.

Gav, everyone I have spoken to is reporting the issue with smaller clusters this winter.
Some of these will need a lot of nursing and TLC if they make it through to March.

[gavin]

Sounds rather like the volume I've used but I wasn't trusting my memory. I doubt that the volume is critical anyway.

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