# Are they prepared for winter?



## danno (Dec 17, 2007)

you have to many boxes on to winter in. you need to get rid of one deep or the mediums


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## zhiv9 (Aug 3, 2012)

danno said:


> you have to many boxes on to winter in. you need to get rid of one deep or the mediums


Won't the cluster just move up into the two mediums full of honey? Is empty space below a problem?


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## juzzerbee (Apr 17, 2012)

So I was pleased to read Rich's hive(2 deeps) situation because it is identical to mine(sounds like anyway). I have only 2 deeps planned for my first winter and I am concerned that there might not be enough "Everything" there to have a successful winter. So.... how does it look for Rich to just use the 2 deeps for the winter? Thanks, juzzerbee


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## [email protected] (May 12, 2010)

Extract the honey in the mediums and then feed, there still is plenty of time to get 80lbs or so of winter stores. There is no reason to leave honey supers on during the winter.


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## zhiv9 (Aug 3, 2012)

[email protected] said:


> Extract the honey in the mediums and then feed, there still is plenty of time to get 80lbs or so of winter stores. There is no reason to leave honey supers on during the winter.


Ignoring the economics of honey vs sugar, if they are happy leaving the bees with the honey, is there a reason not to overwinter with the supers on?


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## seyc (Jul 15, 2012)

zhiv9 said:


> Ignoring the economics of honey vs sugar, if they are happy leaving the bees with the honey, is there a reason not to overwinter with the supers on?


It is much easier to heat a smaller space.


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## Pamela White (May 7, 2012)

Ok, so I am confused. I am new to this also and have just added a honey super to 2 deeps on 2 of my hives. Do I need to take them completely off to winterize them? I was going to leave them on there for them. I didn't want them to get overcrowded. That is what I understood was the reason to add more boxes. Please explain........ Thanks soooo very much in advance.


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## JRG13 (May 11, 2012)

What are your winters like Pamela? If they can fill the super, I don't see any reason to take it off, especially in Texas.


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## xcugat (Mar 4, 2008)

Hello,

Bees usually dont really heat the space per se, rather the cluster. In regards to the supers they are there to harvest from not to leave on as if you do the hive will move up into them in the winter and then in the spring they will be filled with brood which defeats the purpose of using them as supers--they are not part of the broodnest.


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## mgolden (Oct 26, 2011)

Texas is a good place for cold climate bee keepers to winter! Think taking the super off makes sense as you may get some honey and it crowds the bees so they reduce there numbers and need less winter food supply. Provide a top entrance so they get accustomed to entering in the top. May want to screen bottom entrance to force bees to use top entrance. Or use screen bottom board and block bottom entrance. 

You likely should feed sugar syrup after the super is removed to provide a winter supply. We medicate for nosema because bees can't fly because of cold and poop. Suspect this is not an issue in a Texan winter.

You will need to get a queen excluder on and add honey supers in late winter when bee numbers increase and nectar flow is near. Be sure to move some brood frames up temporarily to get bees to work above the queen excluder. Leave top entrance on A small bottom entrance allows them to bring pollen to the brood.

And there hopefully there is Texan beekeepers that will comment and provide local insights


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## AmericasBeekeeper (Jan 24, 2010)

The worst thing you can do is leave a queen excluder between the current brood and food. The cluster will either split when they move up this winter, leave the queen behind to die, or most likely all just starve. I am not sure where the concept of not having a natural hive with honey supers over brood supers came from. It might be from leaving excluders on through the winter. Bees naturally move up. Leaving food over brood strengthens the natural behavior.


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## Rich T (Jun 21, 2012)

[email protected] said:


> Extract the honey in the mediums and then feed, there still is plenty of time to get 80lbs or so of winter stores. There is no reason to leave honey supers on during the winter.


Just want to make sure I understand you correctly. I should remove and extract the 2 supers but don't put them back on? The idea is to have them take the feed and fill the deeps with syrup right?


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## Mrobisr (Mar 10, 2012)

Pamela,
I am only a few miles east of you, so we are in the same climate. First and foremost get the supers off that hive it’s too late they are SHB boxes at this point. Most of Central Texas runs one deep brood, but with that being said please check your second deep for brood and stores. I’m betting that at this point your second box is more honey with very little brood. If you have some brood in the second box then you can do a split by just separating the two brood boxes and adding a queen. You will now have two hives and the bottom box will start preparing for winter and your split will be set with a new queen and stores . If we get the rain in the forecast your two hives will be good to go if not you may need to feed some. Locally Beeweaver still has queens available as I am doing a nuc split next week. If it’s all honey then you will need to extract and determine to eat and/or feed back to the bees for their winter storage. I personally would feed the honey to the bees if we don’t get the rain at the end of the week, but if we do I don’t mind dark honey (personal opinion). Crowding will be solved by the queen laying less for winter prep and the bees will adapt.


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## juzzerbee (Apr 17, 2012)

In my area some beekeepers will keep a super on until October and at that time scratch open the comb and let the bees transfer the honey down to the broodnest. I too planned on keeping a super on over winter but after talking with others over the summer I learned that, in my area(cheese country), most will only keep the 2 deeps on. I will be using 2 deeps over the winter and feeding sugar syrup in about a half of a month and adding mega bee pollen patties. But again, that is my area. All my bees might be dead by Spring...... so all you can do it run with what you think is best and don't look back. juzzerbee


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## [email protected] (May 12, 2010)

Rich T said:


> Just want to make sure I understand you correctly. I should remove and extract the 2 supers but don't put them back on? The idea is to have them take the feed and fill the deeps with syrup right?


Correct, we are near the end of our nectar flow here in the northeast. If you leave honey supers on over winter, they will be full of brood in the spring. You will want the top brood chamber full of honey or syrup and the lower box should also have the combined equivalent of three or so frames of stores. The bees will also have stored pollen in the lower box.


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## Rich T (Jun 21, 2012)

[email protected] said:


> Correct, we are near the end of our nectar flow here in the northeast. If you leave honey supers on over winter, they will be full of brood in the spring. You will want the top brood chamber full of honey or syrup and the lower box should also have the combined equivalent of three or so frames of stores. The bees will also have stored pollen in the lower box.


OK. Thanks for your help. Is 2:1 syrup (sugar/water) the correct ratio for feeding this time of year? Also, right now both the deeps and mediums are completely full of bees. Once I remove the supers will there be enough room for them all? I understand that they'll naturally start to downsize the colony this time of year, just don't want them to swarm after a sudden loss of space....


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## Allen (Oct 5, 2011)

Rich, I am running unlimited broodnest in my first year hives.
I have also been using all the same size super on each hive.
I have 4 hives with 3 deep supers.
Also an all medium 8 frame hive with a total of 5 supers.

Am feeding them now 1-1 for a couple of weeks yet to get them to finish drawing comb and fill all the supers for winter.
Will switch over to 2-1 after that.
Granulated sugar will be placed on top of the inner cover with a little war dribbled on it for emergency feed if needed. Moisture from the hive will also keep it moist.

If the supers fill up with brood in spring, the workforce will be that much stronger and I'll just add more supers.
Or I can rearrange the frames to suit because they are all the same size.
And we might have a bigger bee population when we make splits of any survivors in spring.

If I had 2 deep supers and a medium super with honey consider leaving it on for the winter.
I helped a friend last year with his first year hives.
They went into winter with 2 deep supers and 2 medium supers full of honey and sugar syrup.
One died, but it wasn't for lack of food.
Our winter last year was a bit warmer than normal and his bees were at the top super all winter.
You are north of me and our winters can get cold here.
Its probably time for your area to start 2-1 sugar syrup.
Check out this link: http://www.bushfarms.com/beesfeeding.htm


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## jadell (Jun 19, 2011)

I see no point at all in extracting honey, to feed them an inferior food such as sugar water. Commercial beeks do it, but Rich is not a commercial beek. They will be fine with the honey that's left on them, as long as you don't mind them using that comb for brood in the spring. Bees do not heat the entire hive, they only heat the cluster just as Xcugat says. It sounds like your first year bees have done just fine.


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## c10250 (Feb 3, 2009)

xcugat said:


> Hello,
> 
> Bees usually dont really heat the space per se, rather the cluster.


This is wrong information that keeps getting perpetuated. They DO heat the space. Look at infrared pictures of any hive in the winter. Someone also ran an experiment last year with thermometers in the hive. Believe me, they heat the hive. From my own experience, an insulated hive goes through much less stores than a non-insulated. Why? This is because bees heat the hive.


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## Keth Comollo (Nov 4, 2011)

Rich,
I am near you and I winter my hives with two deeps and a medium. The whole hive should weigh 155 lbs. I would leave a medium on and make sure it is full of honey and then feed them to get them up to weight. Don't feed syrup past Oct 15.


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## Rich T (Jun 21, 2012)

Keth Comollo said:


> Rich,
> I am near you and I winter my hives with two deeps and a medium. The whole hive should weigh 155 lbs. I would leave a medium on and make sure it is full of honey and then feed them to get them up to weight. Don't feed syrup past Oct 15.


Thanks Keth. I am going to leave a medium on and feed like you suggest. Probably going to store the other super so that if they need more food mid-winter, I can quickly swap in some full frames of honey if needed. Have you found that they'll stop taking the syrup after Oct 15th? Do you ever feed any pollen supplements?


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## mgolden (Oct 26, 2011)

Agree bees not warm the cluster but also the hive. 

Following link is from a Research Facility and shows a figure of cluster and hive temps. 

http://www.capabees.com/main/files/pdf/winteringpdf.pdf

If the hive temp outside the cluster is warmer. it takes less food stores to warm the cluster. If it isn't so, why do we insulate and wrap hives.


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## Luterra (Sep 7, 2011)

I extracted honey in mid-August, leaving two deeps of which the top was packed solid with honey. I thought that would be sufficient, but some hives have consumed almost a third of their "winter" stores since then. So on with the sugar syrup...

Next year I might save back a couple of supers at harvest time and feed them back to hives in need. Syrup feeding is time consuming and expensive, and I'd rather let the bees winter on their own food.


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## Keth Comollo (Nov 4, 2011)

I haven't fed pollen sub this year because I saw tons of natural pollen in the hives.

The Oct 15 date is something I learned from the guru of Northern beekeeping Mike Palmer. The idea is that too much open nectar after that date increases the humidity and condensation in the hive and can possibly increase the chance of Nosema and other problems. If you cut off syrup feeding before that date it gives the bees a chance to cap it before the cold really hits and minimizes the humidity in the hive which is always a good thing. I believe Mike is on the right path regarding this issue and follow his advice accordingly.


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## Daniel Y (Sep 12, 2011)

Warm bees are more active and woudl result in more stores being eaten. less stores being eaten woudl be an indication that insulation keeps the hive cooler.

Also bees are hardly the only source of heat for a hive even in winter. The sun alone could keep a hive warm. Insulation would prevent this. Not saying it doesn't work just questioning why it works.

I suspect insulation causes a more stable. even if it is lower temperature in the hive.

Infrared photos are not evidence of where heat came from only that it is present.


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## mgolden (Oct 26, 2011)

Sorry Daniel, put a heat source such as a cluster into an insulated hive and the ambient temp inside the hive will be higher than air outside.

As the article staes, there is an optimum temp of 5C where bees consume the least amount of food. Ideally one would keep the inside of the hive as close to 5C as possible.

The insulation will also slow down temp change inside the high reltive to outside.

Stop the myth that the cluster/heat source does not somwewhat warm the interior air of the insulated hive.


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## Daniel Y (Sep 12, 2011)

I could put an empty box outside and the temperature inside the box will be higher than the outside.

Stop the myth that the bees can heat the air of their hive.


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## Keth Comollo (Nov 4, 2011)

You have a cluster of bees. They generate heat to survive. They are not super insulated in their cluster so a certain amount of heat is lost to their hive. 

*A box with bees in winter is warmer than a box without bees.* If you don't believe that than you don't believe in physics.


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## psfred (Jul 16, 2011)

it is physically impossible for the bees to NOT heat the air in the hive, but even minimal ventilation will remove much of that heat out the top almost immediately. Bees are very efficient at holding heat in the cluster in really cold weather, so the hive isn't going to be like an igloo were the inner walls can melt some, but there is going to be measurable heat loss to the air in the hive as the warm bees more out and cold bees move in.

I suspect fairly solid cavities in trees are warmer than langstroth boxes because they are thicker and the bees don't have upper entrances as a rule. There is often solid wood above the cluster, and wood is a rather poor conductor of heat, and the hive might indeed lose less heat that a langstroth hive.

Double wall hives are much warmer, I suspect, and this is a distinct advantage in damp but not very cold climates like the Northern part of the UK where they are common. 

The best thing to do in quite cold climates is to control ventilation and wrap the hives to reduce or prevent the wind howling through cracks. Both things will reduce the amount of heat carried away from the cluster, and hence the amount the bees will have to produce without actually raising the temperature in the hive much so the bees become active and eat more.

Black wrapping definitely raises the temperature of the box, but only when the sun is shining. Dark colored paint will do the same thing, but you have to re-paint if you don't want summer heating too while black roofing paper is easy to remove.

Peter


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## Beregondo (Jun 21, 2011)

Sometimes common sense and sound, proper judgment seem a bit lacking in online forums.
No matter how many 'scientific' studies were published stating that he sky is green and grass is blue, as quick trip outside to look is all that is needed to refute the assertion.

I put an empty box with a screened bottom on my hives in winter, and fill it halfway up with chopped leaves. 
It does a great job of allowing ventilation while trapping heat generated by the bees. I can push my hand to the bottom of the leaves on a midwinter morning before the sun has a chance to heat things up and it is quite warm...comfy for cold hands, in fact.

Only the top 1/8" or so of leaves gets damp, as the moisture evaporates well.

I've painted boxes dark on one end and side,and light on the others. Dark side faces south and west in winter, light side in summer.
If the bees don't propolize the joints well, as strip of duct tape was invented for that very purpose-- sealing crack to prevent air movement in or out.

Bees heat the inside of a hive I checked.... personally,

In winter if they're too cold they'll eat more to keep warm.
If they're too warm they'll eat more for fuel.
Leave them enough honey and neither is an issue.

Have fun.
Enjoy your bees.
And remember... if you're not sure, check with the bees.
They know more than scientists do about bees.


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## PAHunter62 (Jan 26, 2011)

Yes, bees heat the inside of the hive. I had thermometers in two hives all last winter at the very top of the top box (wintered in four 8 frame medium boxes). We got a cold spell where the early morning temperature was around 10 degrees. The temperature inside the hive at the top of the top box was between 92 and 94 degrees.


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## Tohya (Apr 6, 2011)

The amount of space under a cluster is not very important, what matters is that there is enough food above the cluster.


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## Daniel Y (Sep 12, 2011)

Here is a photo of a cluster of bees.








Hope that shows up.

Black in the photo is 5 degrees Celsius or below. blue is 10 degrees Celsius or below. notice how a blue aura surrounds the entire cluster. This then turns to black quickly.

SO make up all the false claims you can think of about what I believe or don't believe. I consider them as worthwhile as your thinking bees heat the hive.


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## ralittlefield (Apr 25, 2011)

If a cluster generates heat, it would be impossible to prevent *SOME* of that heat from escaping from the cluster. The only question is how much. Perhaps only a minimal amount, but it seems to me that some must escape and add heat to the box.


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## ralittlefield (Apr 25, 2011)

Daniel Y said:


> Here is a photo of a cluster of bees.



Actually, this is not a photo of a cluster of bees. It is a photo of the heat generated by a cluster of bees. The cluster may be much smaller than the area of heat shown.


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## Keth Comollo (Nov 4, 2011)

Since we are sharing cool infrared photos I have one too!










Clearly showing that the hive is warmed by the bees.


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## Daniel Y (Sep 12, 2011)

Keth, No that is a photo showing their is heat int eh hive. no indication where it came from. You assume it came from the bees. The photo I showed indicates otherwise. I don't believe your assumption regardless of how convinced you are.

Ralitlefield. I can see the individual bees in the cluster. it is a photo of a cluster.

I had written more about heat and where it goes but deleted it. Yes in fact heat does go somewhere. The amount of heat generated by the bees is insignificant in regard to the energy required to heat the entire hive. In fact there is not enough energy to heat the entire cluster much less the hive. You can see that not every bee in the cluster is even generating the heat. I have seen a photo that shows this much more clearly. In the photo above you can see several yellow spots among the orange. If every bees was making heat the cluster could be much warmer. Probably resulting in the hive even being kept warmer. But they do not. they generate only the heat needed. that is my conclusion anyway.

A small Christmas tree light for example produces heat. But you can't feel it even if you touch it. I can in fact keep an object warm with it. not an empty space but an object.

It has to do with how heat is transmitted from one object to another. for heat to be conducted. transferred to one object to another such as from one bee to another requires no energy other than the production of the heat.

So to say that the bees add to the heat in the hive would be correct even if it is only a minute amount. to say they heat the hive is incorrect. there are several sources of heat for the hive.


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## Daniel Y (Sep 12, 2011)

Other information about the above that I started to include but did not. the warmest spots in the cluster, bright yellow to nearly white are around 95 degrees.
Black color is less than 40 degrees. ambient temperature at the time of the photo was 38.66 degrees. the blue area is 10 degrees Celsius or 50 degrees Fahrenheit. Indicating that at the outer perimeters of the cluster the bees are not even increasing their own temperature by more than 11 degrees. Pink is 59 degrees Fahrenheit. so the above is not correct. the coldest bee in the cluster is around 59 degrees or 20.34 degrees above ambient temperature. the air around them almost immediately drops to blue or less than 50 degrees and then fades to ambient temperature.

I suspect the major source of heat for the hive itself to be the sun. insulation will prevent the sun from warming the hive as quickly. Black paper will cause it to absorb heat more quickly. A warmer hive would result in bees having to generate less heat for themselves.

Additional heat sources would be various biological process taking place within the hive. again an addition but by far insignificant.


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## Beregondo (Jun 21, 2011)

As you may be aware, IR thermographing doesn't measure heat per se, but radiant heat...that is, escaping heat.

It is a commonly used tool in building weatherization assessment.
See figure 3 on this page for an example.

One can see the hot spots where heat energy is escaping before insulation/sealing, and often a dramatic difference afterward, because so much less heat is escaping.

Despite the dramatic differences in the before and after pics, *the temperature inside and outside the building is the same in both pictures.*

I haven't any doubt that one might believe that the thermograph was an indication of absolute temperature of actual temp, and not merely escaping heat.

I might suggest, though, that before one sacrifices his honor to slander others with accusations of false testimony that he is wise to ensure that the disparity between their testimony and what one believes to be true is in fact dishonesty and not his own ignorance.

It might save one embarrassment.
Unless of course one adopts a "ignore the facts I know I'm correct so I have a right to be offensive" posture.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

The cluster is basically a thermostatically controlled heat source. The temperature inside my house is the same with or without the door open in the middle of winter. This does not mean it's a good idea to leave it open...

I have spent many a night in various size tents and many a day working inside of buildings of various designs and materials and often they changes as we built them. How warm you are inside of them is often not related to what the thermometer in them says... heat moves by many methods.

The factors involved in an overwintering colony are much more than temperature.

o Temperature. This is the simple one. It's easy to measure temperature by putting a thermometer where you want to measure it. Measure the temperature of the distant points in the hive and in the cluster and on the edge of the cluster and outside the hive. These are the "facts" usually used to try to explain the thermodynamics of a winter hive. These facts are one very small piece of the whole picture.

o Heat production. The cluster is producing heat. You can argue all day that they don't heat the hive, and obviously that is not their intent, but they do produce heat in the hive and that heat dissipates into the hive and, depending on other factors, into the outside, at some rate. This is a "thermostatically" controlled source of heat in that the bees will produce more heat as the temperatures decline to make up for heat loss, or less as it warms up. The temperature in your house is the same with the back door open or closed, but that doesn't mean that leaving it open doesn't matter. A thermostatically controlled environment can be misleading when we try to measure it in temperature and don't take into account heat loss.

o Respiration. There is a change in humidity in the hive caused by the metabolic processes of the bees. This water is put into the air by respiration. It is warm and moist air. This changes the humidity and the humidity changes other aspects.

o Humidity. The moisture in the air changes many other aspects of the thermodynamics as it causes more heat transfer by convection, more heat that is stored by the air, more condensation and less evaporation. We express this difference when referring to the weather in things like "it was hot but it was a dry heat" or "it wasn't the cold, it was the dampness".

o Condensation. Condensation of water gives off heat. There is water condensing on the cold sides and lid of the hive all through the winter and this affects the temperature. Condensation is caused by a temperature difference between a surface and the air contacting that surface. It occurs when the humidity of the air is high enough that when the air is cooled on the surface, the air (now cooler) can no longer hold that amount of humidity.

o Evaporation. Water that has condensed and run down the sides to the bottom or dripped on the bees, evaporates. This absorbs heat as it evaporates. Wet bees have to burn up a huge amount of energy to evaporate water that has dripped on them. Puddles of water on the bottom continue to absorb heat until they evaporate.

o Thermal Mass. The mass of all of the honey in the hive holds heat and dissipates heat over time. It changes the time period over which changes in temperatures occur. It holds a lot of the heat that is in the hive. A lot of cold honey can keep a hive cold even when it's warm out. A lot of warm honey can keep a hive warmer even when it's cold out. It moderates the effects of temperature changes and it holds and gives off heat. This is more related to the amount of heat in the system than the temperature. A large mass of moderate temperature may actually hold more heat than a small mass of higher temperature.

o Air Exchange. I am splitting this out from convection, although convection is involved, because I am differentiating an exchange of air with the outside as opposed to convection taking place within the hive. Outside air coming into the hive is essential to the bees having enough oxygen for aerobic metabolism, but the more of it there is the more it affects the temperatures in the hive. If this is minimized during winter, the temperature in the hive will exceed the temperature outside the hive. If it is too minimized the bees will suffocate. If it is too maximized the bees will have to work much harder to maintain the heat of the cluster. Even if you were to increase this gradually to the point of the inside and outside temperatures being indistinguishable, more air exchange from that point would not change the temperatures, inside, outside or of the cluster but WILL cause more heat loss to the cluster thereby causing them to make more heat to compensate. If you rely only on measuring temperature you will not see this difference.

o Convection within the hive. Convection is how an object with some thermal mass and therefore some kinetic heat, loses its heat to the air. The air on the surface either picks up or gives off heat (depending on the direction of the heat difference) and if the air heats up it rises bringing more cool air into its place. If it cools it sinks bringing more warm air into its place. Things that block air or divide it into layers will add to warmth. That's how things like blankets and quilts work. They create dead space where the air can't move so easily. A vacuum thermos works on the principle that if there is no air, it can't carry away the heat by convection. The more open space there is in the hive, the more convection can take place. The more you limit things to layers the less convection takes place. We sometimes refer to an excess of convection in our houses as "it was 70 degrees in the house but it was drafty".

o Conduction. Conduction is how the heat moves through an object. Take the outside wall of a hive. At night if it's colder outside, it absorbs heat from the inside that comes from convection (warmer air against its surface) and heat from radiation (heat radiating from the cluster) and that heat warms the wood. The rate at which that heat moves through the wood to the outside is its conductivity. The heat is conducted to the outside where convection carries off the heat from the surface. On a sunny day on the South side, the sun will heat the wall, the heat will move by conduction through the wall to the inside where convection will transfer the heat to the air. Insulation or Styrofoam hives will slow down conduction.

o Radiation. Radiation is the process in which energy is emitted by one body, transmitted through an intervening medium or space without significantly affecting the temperature of the medium, and absorbed by another body. A heat lamp or heat from a fire are tangible examples of this. In the case of a wintering hive the two main sources of radiant heat are the cluster and the sun. During a sunny day the radiant heat of the sun hits the side of the hive and turns into kinetic heat and is transferred by conduction to the inside of the hive. The radiant heat from the cluster hits the surrounding combs of honey and walls, cover and bottom. Some is absorbed by the honey and walls, and some is reflected back. The amount is dependent on how close the cluster is and how reflective the surface is. Real life experience of radiant heat would be being in the sun on an otherwise cool day or putting a thermometer in the sun and getting a dramatically different reading than one in the shade.

o Temperature differences. The amount of the difference in temperatures between the cluster and the outside is a significant factor. If your outside temperatures in winter average say 32 F and your lows are rarely 0 F the significance of some of these things may be minimal. On the other hand if your winters often have subzero temperatures of -20 to -40 F for long periods then these issues are much more significant.

The real question is, "How do all of these interact in a wintering hive?"

One clue to understand some of it is by watching the bees. They adjust based on what they are experiencing as far as heat loss, rather than what it says on the thermometer. The cluster is drawn to the place where they lose less heat. This should be a clue to us on where and how they are losing heat.


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## Daniel Y (Sep 12, 2011)

I understand you think you are right. I disagree. If you choose to twist that into calling you a liar. You again are wrong. Be offended and enjoy it I am not concerned about your concocted reasoning for your chosen reaction.

You are correct that Infrared photography
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infrared_photography
and
Thermography
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermography

Thermography is a recording of heat radiation.
Infrared photography is an image from the light produced from heat.

Quote:
Since infrared radiation is emitted by all objects above absolute zero according to the black body radiation law, thermography makes it possible to see one's environment with or without visible illumination. The amount of radiation emitted by an object increases with temperature; therefore, thermography allows one to see variations in temperature.
End Quote:

Different temperature objects radiate heat at differing wavelengths. This is what you are seeing int eh image. the wave length differences due to different temperatures. the scale indicates what temperature the object is. they don't provide a lesson in how that is determined.

I also understand that such images are extremely easy to misrepresent. for example in the photo posted by Keth above. the scale is only 6 degrees. if that is Fahrenheit the bees in the hive are dead because the warms object in the photos is only 30 degrees. if it is celsius than the ground is over 75 degrees in that photo and the temperature range is about 10.5 degrees. I don't think the bees are clustered.

Another thought to ponder. 
The bees are producing heat to keep themselves warm and alive. They will not be doing that if the heat is being taken by the hive walls, honey. wax and other materials in the hive.

If you feel cold it is because you are loosing heat to your surroundings. if an object feels cold it is because your skin is loosing heat energy to that object. Insulating your skin from the surroundings such as wearing gloves or a shirt etc reduces the rate your skin is loosing heat. you feel warmer. You will also feel warmth when your skin is taking in heat from your surroundings such as from a warm object or raise of radiated heat from the sun. I suspect that the bees are both producing heat and insulting themselves from loosing it.

With that in mind consider why the bees might be the warmest part of the hive. Regardless of how they got that way. It is sound to assume that they are holding the heat they have and not passing it to their surroundings. How the images indicating that the surroundings do in fact have some heat does not indicate that they got that heat from the bees.


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## Beregondo (Jun 21, 2011)

Thanks, Michael.
Your habit of being generous with your bee wisdom online is greatly appreciated.


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## Beregondo (Jun 21, 2011)

Daniel Y said:


> ]I understand you think you are right. I disagree. If you choose to twist that into calling you a liar. You again are wrong. Be offended and enjoy it I am not concerned about your concocted reasoning for your chosen reaction.


"SO make up all the false claims you can think of." - Post #34

I'm finished with this exchange.
Peace on your house, Daniel.


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