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Iowa Honey Producers Association |
The Buzz Newsletter April 2007 |
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Spring Management of Colonies It might be helpful to beekeepers who begin manipulating colonies in Spring to review some practices in management that have proven to be quite successful for a period of many years. THERE IS NO SUBSTITUTE FOR GOOD MANAGEMENT. Having wintered colonies with ample stores of honey will eliminate a lot of problems during the Spring and make the working of colonies much easier without the need to do supplemental feeding. Going into April throughout the Midwest the weather generally cooperates so colonies can be manipulated easily. Starting about April 1st through the 10th here in central Iowa colonies can be examined for disease and for strength as to the amount of brood that has already started the rapid reproduction of bees. This is the time to really get down to business and start manipulating by way of equalizing brood among all colonies. If it is determined at this time that many colonies have six or seven combs of brood it is then time to relieve such colonies of some of the brood taking away all but three or four combs which are left in the parent hive making sure the queen is also left with the parent colony.
The remainder combs of brood, probably two, are placed in another brood chamber along with a couple of combs of honey and by selecting another couple of combs of brood, always with adhering bees from another colony added to the newly constructed hive also shaking in additional bees and some partly filled combs and you have established another colony. Just keep it closed during this procedure and continue to keep it closed until it is moved to another apiary some distance away. Queens should be on hand at this time so all colonies that are developed can be requeened. I realize to some this sounds like a lot of work but if managed properly it will reduce many unnecessary problems in weeks to come. All you may need to take with you in the way of additional equipment is probably extra covers, inner covers and bottom boards plus entrance reducers. All this provided you have wintered your colonies in two brood chambers which most beekeepers have done. Now, some may wonder what is the benefit of all this exercise? The results are simple. You have reduced much of the problem of colonies swarming. NOW don’t assume that swarming has been eliminated entirely BECAUSE there is no such thing as eliminating swarming 100%. However, this and inspecting colonies each week through the months of May and June swarming was kept to 1% or less. In approximately three weeks after doing this equalization all colonies new and parent will probably be ready for the second brood chamber. One way to tell is that after removing the lid and inner cover the single chamber is chuck full of bees and all queens are laying they need room to expand. Throughout the months of May and June each colony MUST be checked to make sure that no queen cells are started in preparation of swarming and if queen eggs are present in the cells should be removed. If good combs are kept the easy and quickest way to check for cells is to simply smoke the colony well, tip the whole hive over on its back, pry the brood cambers apart and look from the bottom of each for queen cells. If the entrance reducer has been kept in place the cells will likely be near the bottom of the brood combs and most will be in view. Place the brood chambers back just as they were. Always remember the entrance reducer should be in place all through the months of April, May, and part of June or until it is determined that the major honey flow is on. That allows the queen access to laying eggs in the combs near the bottom bars in the lower chamber. Again just another means of preventing swarming. All combs will likely be filled by the first or second week in June so now surplus honey supers must be added. Hopefully all will be providing good white combs for the production of surplus honey as a matter of producing a much finer quality of honey. Before the mites were in the picture it was possible to winter colonies with less than a 2% loss. Then using the BROOD EQUALIZATION program we could expand colony count by about 25%. That you can do with honey and I’m not so sure it can be done with much of this supplemental feeding. After having accomplished all this you will note that all colonies will produce within just a few pounds of each other. It entirely eliminated having some colonies with 150 pounds of surplus and some with almost nothing. The entrance reducers are an important item. Soon after all the surplus honey is removed in the Fall the reducer should again be in place. You can simplify your beekeeping and make it more pleasurable by having a task that you would just not have to perform. Glen L. Stanley
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