# Winter Loss Poll



## dug_6238 (May 9, 2007)

If you had no losses, please also add a reply post describing your wintering techniques and any special precautions that you feel helped this year. If you experienced greater than a 50% loss this year, please describe your wintering setup and tell us either what you feel went wrong, or what you saw in your deadouts. Oh, and those who post, please also let us know how many hives you operate as well. Thanks!


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## drobbins (Jun 1, 2005)

went into winter with 8 hives and a 5 frame medium nuc
the nuc starved
of the others most look good, a couple are small and lite, but spring is around the corner and I'm starting to feed so I think they'll be ok
this is my fifth year and starving is the only problem I've had so far

Dave


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## JoeMcc (May 15, 2007)

I currently have 17 hives and no losses. Winter is far from over here in the NW though. I do have 2 hives that have small clusters but I think they will make it. Last spring I treated with Miteaway formic pads and in the fall I used apiguard. I also am feeding dry sugar at this time on newspaper.

The bees got some flying time today and were hauling in pollen from the nut trees. Seeing them fly sure gave me the itch to get things rolling. I even started cleaning up the honey house and painted a few boxes 

JoeMcc


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## phil c (Jan 21, 2007)

Last fall I treated my 4 hives with formic acid pads and fed heavily. I also put 1 med super under each 2 deep with a queen excluder inbetween. The super on the bottom is intended to raise the cluster up higher away from the cold air. I also wrapped the hives from ground level to top with 30 lb. tarpaper, and am using ventilated inner covers. An older beek in wisconsin told me bout this method. 
So far it has brought the girls thru the bad sub zero weather and heavy snows we had.
Theres still alot of cold weather left and I will start feeding soon.


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## peletier (May 5, 2007)

I went into winter with 8 Langstroths, two top bars, and two 5-frame nucs.
All made it. Winter is mild and short here. Bees fly most days. I didn't take any honey after August and we had a pretty good goldenrod/aster flow.


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## dmacmtb (Jan 9, 2008)

Lost 4 of 6 hives. All hives were single deeps with 2 supers of honey left on. There was available honey in the dead outs. 

Treated for mites with sugar dusting sporadically - not on a consistent schedule. Have screened bottom boards which were left open through December, and we had some sub 10 degree, windy weather. 

One lost hive was an early fall split which I probably should have combined back with the source hives or not done at all. Took the starter frames out of two hives which also were lost. The fourth lost hive had been booming through spring. Early summer it got knocked over by a bear. The only damage done was to the supers.

All of the hives were moved twice - once in late winter and once in early summer. There was quite a bit of drifting in the process of the 2nd move. Also had some robbing going on in the fall.

Of the two hives which survived they are doing very well. One was requeened with a NWC queen in the fall (all other hives are Italian). The other was my weekest hive in the summer. I never felt like it swarmed; however, it definitely superceded at some point in the summer.

I feel like mismanagement on my end put several hives at less than full strength going into winter. The combination of smaller cluster, expanding mite population, and extremely cold temps did them in. If I had to guess, the two surviving colonies have their new queens and broodless periods to thank for their success. 

I am a first year beekeeper learning a few lessons the hard way but looking forward to ramping back up this spring.

-Drake


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## Jeffzhear (Dec 2, 2006)

Too early 2 take your poll....we still have lots of bad weather 2 come.


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## naturebee (Dec 25, 2004)

Winter loss polls are fun, but they really do not tell much. 

* Experienced beekeepers take their losses in September, and therefore tend to suffer very little loss. 

* Risk takers may winter bees that should not be wintered, and therefore reflect poorer on that person than should be.

To comment on previous replies, 

IMO, It is difficult to attribute the use of treatments to successful wintering. 
Ask any beekeeper in Pennsylvania that wintered bees in 95-96 and treated as recommended by Penn State. 

Best Wishes
Joe
http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/HistoricalHoneybeeArticles/
“Contracto frigore pigrae” - With cold benumbed, inactive they remain 
- (Virgil, Georgics, Book IV)


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## mgmoore7 (Jul 6, 2007)

No losses for me. I live in Tampa, FL. I am finding that there may be only a few weeks of the year that nothing in the form of nector or pollen is coming in. That is the benefit of a neighborhood with lots of flowers and various trees.


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## magnet-man (Jul 10, 2004)

NatureBee is correct. it all depends if you take your winter losses in the fall or not. I tend to lose my hives due to starvation because I don't get them prepared for winter soon enough. Oklahoma only really has a spring flow so feeding in in late summer is needed if you take a lot of honey. Sugar is cheaper than honey. I also tend not to check the hives earlier enough for stores in late winter. Lost two breeder queens because of this.:doh:

As Lou Costello would say "I'm a baaad beekeeper".  My excuse? I am too busy sewing bee suits.  If I am not careful Bee Welfare will show up at my door one day.


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## justin (Jun 16, 2007)

lots of bad weather to come, but right now i am 4 for 4.this year i didn't wrap,only put dry sugar on 2 last week that may or may not have needed it.after what allend said i am glad i did.2 of my hives i did not get one super of honey off,so they wintered on expensive feed,although it looks like i may get some of it back in mid may.my hives are 30" off the ground(ave. snow depth)and because i did not have time to build a roof over them i just grabbed some oversized scraps of plywood and put some heavy rocks on that.i went out to knock snow off bb's after storms but there never was any.i have extra entrance reducers under my top covers, but now realize i should prop the inner cover for moisture.i feel like i got away with a mistake there.i have a terrible track record for wintering so i am feeling really good right now.i have had losses due to low stores, moisture in the hive,snow around the hive,mice in a weak hive,so as i said i am loving it right now.j


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## rw3212 (Apr 8, 2008)

I had 7 hives in September when I treated with Checkmite+ and Menthol. In mid-October I setup all the hives with a full deep and a full medium each. SBB where closed underneath and no enterance reducers where used. All hives had some brood, honey and pollen.

5 hives, located on a site with a major ant population, and within 100 feet of the house (with 2 x 1 gallon feeding) all totally perished or adsconded. 3 of them had lots of dead bees, head in and clustered. No brood and lots of stores, the other 2 had no bees - no brood- little stores.

The 2 surviving hives where in an isolated site that recieved the same treatment and prep with no attention since. All where checked within a week of the ones at home. One is boiling with activity and the other is actively bringing in pollen on warm days. They have since recieved terrimiacin dusting, Apilife, Menthol and Fumigilian treatments. While there are ants around the don't seem to be a bother to the hives at this location.

1 replacement package on order and hoping to add some more.


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## tecumseh (Apr 26, 2005)

at this point in time it appears the distribution of loss is a two tail non normal distribution. of course the poll might be a bit premature since for a lot of folks winter ain't over and a lot of hives (historically) will die with spring just around the corner.

the two tail effect may quite well be a matter of folks discoving small things that enhance survival at some particular location. I have snipped a remark from my brother justin's comment to reinforce this notion..

a justin snip..
"lots of bad weather to come, but right now i am 4 for 4.this year i didn't wrap,only put dry sugar on 2 last week that may or may not have needed it.after what allend said i am glad i did."

for this location spring is for all practical purposes here. this winter I reduced my winter losses by first culling in the late fall (figuring it made more cents to feed a good box of bees rather than a problem box of bees) and then I kicked bottom (my term for culling) again after the first cold snap when any problems with queens became evident. winter losses this year about 3%. which given the prior years (summer and fall) conditions was several fold better than I expected.


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

Still winter here abouts. Ask again in two months.


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## JPK (May 24, 2008)

2' of snow on the ground and they are calling for 12-16" additional by morning 

Otherwise it appears that my only losses so far are one of 2 Nuc's that were made late in the season. The lost Nuc never really took off unfortunately and was gone by Dec 1. The other Nuc is doing very well with a healthy cluster and plenty of stores (Russian Queen). 

Its been a pretty normal Central NH Winter with temps at a low of -24 with a couple of days in the high 30's.


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## Joel (Mar 3, 2005)

"Winter loss polls are fun, but they really do not tell much."

I think they show trends and really are about as valuable as most of the other Anecdotal information we share here. It would be nice to know more by area and have more information on mgt techniques that did or did not work. We go into winter planning on losing stock since our goal is to let the weak stock die, move the strongest stock South in January, and breed from these survivors. If a hive fails most times we contribute it to genetics if other hives are surviving and thriving. If we take 200 hives into winter and 50 die, 75 do OK and another 75 are great we want the great hives to make great queens for the upcoming year.


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## Brenda (Nov 23, 2006)

100%, but I only had the one hive.


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## denny (Aug 2, 2006)

All 26 colonies,...16 hives and 10 nucs are alive and doing well, except I'm not certain about one hive with very small , fist sized cluster at top...whether it will make it, but they're Russians so they may just pull through. Some of the hives appear to have large populations so I better keep an eye on them to make sure they maintain enough stores. I'm using the Mountaincamp wintering method, and have just started feeding home made pollen patties which includes 25% pollen I trapped from them last season. I've put a 1/4" shim under the front of the inner cover on each side to let moisture evaporate from the hives that have shown moisture buildup on the underside of inner cover.

Winter has a ways to go yet....we'll see.


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## Ken&Andria (May 2, 2007)

I'm three for three so far, all new packages from the spring. But it's really too early to take this poll. Should ask again in April?


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## Jesse (May 15, 2006)

As others have stated already - it's definately still winter - 2 more months here. As of right now all 11 of my colonies are still alive.

No treatment for mites or anything - polystyrene hives painted a flat medium color with SBB left on all winter and lower entrance left open. Multiple upper entrances for ventilation. I only leave honey on - no sugar water feeding in the fall.

9 were started from nucs in '08 the other two are going on their 3rd season.


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## Allen Dick (Jan 10, 2009)

It's still early, but I still have ten of ten. Some are still down, some are up. One is spread out a bit, but seems OK. I finally wrapped the last three I hadn't gotten around to. Wrapping is most important when brood rearing starts and that is about now. 

I've commented previously about wintering preparation beginning in spring and continuing all summer into fall. The keys: Feed protein supplement in spring, never leave the bees hungry, stay out of the brood chamber except for essential operations and never disturb or rearrange it late in the season. Winter feed this year is honey the bees made themselves. I had no need to augment it.

We'll see how things look in late April. That's when our weather settles a bit and pollen gets reliable. Who knows what the future brings?


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## Kieck (Dec 2, 2005)

Way too early to count winter losses as a total yet. Most of our winter losses around here seem to happen in March and April. Winter is far from over.


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## USCBeeMan (Feb 7, 2009)

4 for 4 so far. That's if I haven't screwed up on my best hive. Everything I have read says March is the month that tells the tale. All of my hive have at least 1 super of honey on top and I can easily start feeding them SW via top feeders.

They have been flying a lot on the warmer days (at least 48 degrees). They have been brining in some pollen since back in December. But they just started bringing the pollen in heavy the last two weeks. Also put MegaBee patties on all 4 hives.

Now it's wait and see. 

Getting 4 new packages around the 10th of April and I might buy a colony that can be delivered in mid March. Don't have a clue what to do with a mid-March package..........but I will learn.


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## naturebee (Dec 25, 2004)

Kieck said:


> Way too early to count winter losses as a total yet. Most of our winter losses around here seem to happen in March and April. Winter is far from over.


All may have different experiences, perhaps based largely on the local environment.
But my in my area of western PA, I find that if a colony makes it till Ground hog day, 95% of the time, they will make it through winter. Perhaps because of the strong maple bloom not far off in first or second week of March is key, I am not sure. I am also not sure if on Ground hogs day, if the bees check see their shadow. 

What date is your maple bloom? Losses that late in my experience are generally due to nutritional deficit. 

Joe


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## beedeetee (Nov 27, 2004)

I think that it is environment. My loses usually don't start until the first of February. It doesn't matter when maples bloom here because rain will keep them indoors until into April usually.

Sometimes unless we add pollen and sugar water they may dwindle until there aren't enough left to raise brood. This is the time that I need to watch them carefully.

Sometimes I will find 3-4 spots of brood with dead bees stuck on it. They start brood, it gets cold and rainy and most move to another area of honey leaving some to protect brood. This can continue until their demise.

So the area that you keep bees will have the most affect on how you need to raise them, IMHO. When we get to the first of April first I know how many hives made it through winter. Last year we had snow for a few days in the first week of April, I lost my winter nucs during that time, so even the first of April isn't fool proof.


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## NeilV (Nov 18, 2006)

*No Losses And I'm Suprised*

Went into winter with 5 hives. All still alive. I used powdered sugar only for varroa. On 4 hives, I put menthol in for tracheal mites. I fed heavily in the fall with 2:1 syrup. I went into winter with 3 strong hives, one medium hive and one weak hive, which is actually better now than in the fall. I think it might have superseded twice. I am amazed by the weak hive's current condition. 

Of the hives, the race of bees and strength going into winter were as follows:

1 Italian, really strong with extra honey going into winter. Have very high hopes for this one. Looks like it wants to make a bunch of honey for me. Queen is from Pendell's in N. Cali. These girls are my favorite hive.

2 Pure Russians, pretty strong going into winter and look good now. Queens from Hubert Tubbs. Really like these hives too. They have acted like model citizens.

1 Mutt Queen Bee from a swarm lat year. Medium strength going into winter. Looks pretty good right now.

1 Hive that started out as Russian but the bees superseded the queen early and went into winter very weak and did not take much sugar. Can't figure out how this one lived but its stronger now than last fall. Was meaner than a snake last year and will be combined with the 1st swarm I get my hands on.

However, I will add that hives tend to die out in March here, when they start raising brood. I have some 1:1 on the weaker ones and I'll see what happens.


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## eebnut (Apr 28, 2008)

to early to check on losses we still have a mouth of cold weather.


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## GRIMBEE (Apr 3, 2007)

No losses, 2 hives. No special treatment except overwintering in1deep and 1medium. I did use formic acid in fall for mites. Is that considered special?


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## Klaus (Apr 24, 2008)

*Over wintering Techniques*

It's still pretty early to count all hives ( five of them) to be okay but they seem to be doing well when I opened up the hives to check their supply of food. Today it was close to 56 degrees. No wind. Curiosity got the best of me, I had to look at the ladies.
I added Mega-Bee patties in late November on top of the frames. about eight inch in diameter patties. Checked them today and the ladies were busy munching away. They were very placid although I did have smoke available, I didn't need but a puff or two at the inner cover. I feed syrup with jars inside the stack. Wooden ware is all mediums stacked in threes.
Made up some 1:1 (by measure) syrup and started them on that today.
I did provide a good windbreak with some hay bales (three stacks high) and opened the telescoping covers about 1/4 to 3/8 with spacers to provide ventilation.
Here in the Pacific Nowrthest it's been a very wet winter and we have had more snow and cold than is usual. Temperatures got as low as 20 degrees F this winter. If I can keep them happy for another four weeks, then the dandylions will be out and we'll all be happy campers.


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## tecumseh (Apr 26, 2005)

klaus writes:
I did provide a good windbreak with some hay bales (three stacks high) and opened the telescoping covers about 1/4 to 3/8 with spacers to provide ventilation.
Here in the Pacific Nowrthest it's been a very wet winter and we have had more snow and cold than is usual. Temperatures got as low as 20 degrees F this winter. If I can keep them happy for another four weeks, then the dandylions will be out and we'll all be happy campers.

tecumseh:
excellent discription of what you did to try and insure survival. don't absolutely know, but I do suspect this kind of miscellanous information that is the difference between single digit and double digit winter losses at a given location. 

and to klaus: I suspect unless the girls starve (which by all appearance it looks as if you have assured they will not) your hives will most certainly make the winter. and good luck.


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## Hobie (Jun 1, 2006)

Can't say. Got about 6-8 more weeks of winter to go!


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## Kieck (Dec 2, 2005)

> All may have different experiences, perhaps based largely on the local environment. -naturebee


Exactly. March is still pretty solidly winter around here. April may still be winter, at least in some years. Last year, we received more than 20 inches of snow here on April 29, and had temperatures fall to low single digits. A couple of my hives that had been doing well up to that point ended up dying at the end of April.

Maple bloom varies quite a bit from year to year here. Sometimes maples bloom in March. Sometimes in April. Sometimes in early May.

I seem to keep writing on these threads something along the lines of, "The really cold weather often doesn't seem as hard on honey bees as the up-and-down temperatures of early spring." Around here, "early spring" is usually into April or even early May.


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## Allen Dick (Jan 10, 2009)

> All may have different experiences, perhaps based largely on the local environment. But my in my area of western PA, I find that if a colony makes it till Ground hog day, 95% of the time, they will make it through winter.


Here in Central Alberta, that seems about true, too, assuming we don't get too ambitious and unwrap early or start pushing until late March or early April. Keeping wraps on until the middle to end of April seems to help many years.

Although most do not wrap packages, which ideally come in the first two weeks of April, wintering hives seem to need the protection almost until May.

In my experience, hives that die before Christmas were either chronically malnourished, light in stores in late summer/early fall (even if fed later), diseased, or queenless.


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## Gene Weitzel (Dec 6, 2005)

Winter seems pretty much over here in SE Texas. We may have one more brief cold snap left. I lost 8 out of 80 hives, but they were gone by the end of the fall flow (a couple absconded but most were too weak to overwinter). I voted in the 1-10% category, but I guess I could have voted in the 0% as well since I took the losses in the fall and everything I attempted to overwinter so far seems to be in pretty good shape (I did have a few that I felt were marginal after the disruption of hurricane Ike, but I was pleased to see that so far, they have done quite well).


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

I brought 392 colonies and about 40 nucs to SC last November. I didn't check all of the nucs. But of the 392 colonies, 61 are currently dead. There may be a couple of the live colonies that will starve between now and mid-March when I get back here, but I think that they will probably pull through.

So, at this point I have had a 15.5% winter loss.

I used Tactic strips last fall, before bringing the bees south. I haven't seen any varroa mites in broken brood, yet. SHB isn't a problem for me and I don't expect to see very many at all until March or April. I don't do anything to "control" them except moving my bees north and south.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

naturebee said:


> Winter loss polls are fun, but they really do not tell much.
> 
> * Experienced beekeepers take their losses in September, and therefore tend to suffer very little loss.
> 
> ...


Well, I have to differ w/ you on some things or admit to being a risk taker.  
I check my hives before taking them south and don't bother taking the obvious drone layer or queenless or dead colonies. But I do take what are probably marginal colonies and try to get them through. Sometimes I put them in nuc boxes and they do quite well. Sometimes they don't.

I don't mind a certain amount of winterloss, discovered in late winter or early spring. Come March I need the empty equipment anyway. I've got to get it to SC somehow.

I'm sure if I was overwintering my bees in NY, I wouldn't bother wrapping a colony that looked like it wouldn't make it through the winter. Maybe that's what you were refering to.

Don't you think that a properly timed miticide would benefit your bees?


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## Allen Dick (Jan 10, 2009)

> Experienced beekeepers take their losses in September, and therefore tend to suffer very little loss.


I always wrap anything that looks at all decent and double up the rest, then wrap them, too. 

After years of trying to guess which hives would make and which would not, I decided that there is no way of knowing in advance, in cases other than obvious drone layers or disease, so we wrapped everything and saved time and got more through in total than with culling.

12-15% was our average loss every winter (3000 hives, typically and measured in May) after we learned to do things right and after went to spring feeding of protein. Before that our results were all over the map.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

Yup, I can understand how sometimes wrapping dead or dying colonies can be more efficient. Especially if you are paying help.


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## Allen Dick (Jan 10, 2009)

Exactly. Another factor is that usually such colonies were dead in fall and/or robbed out. The strong bees in the yard did our culling for us 

For that matter, 10-15% loss is excellent in an area where the winter period extends from the end of October through mid-April -- 6 months. Background queen failure alone is typically in that range over a six month timespan. 

We lose about the same number over summer, from June through October. Should we refer to that as summering loss?


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

Yeah, now that might be an interesting poll too. After one has built their colony count to its' maximum, how many do you lose before it's time to move them south or wrap them for winter?

I've seen years when I had quite a lot of "summer loss".


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## Kieck (Dec 2, 2005)

Intriguing idea. I'll have to go back through some of my records, but I suspect that "loss" might be about the same over a given length of time for both summer and winter, too. 

Sometimes, an unusual winter event will lead to what I perceive to be greater loss following that event. But that result might be skewed, too, because I'm more likely to go out and check hives following some sort of event that I think might affect the bees. They might really have died two or three week earlier if I hadn't been checking, but I only notice it after a winter storm for example. I would tend to count that as a loss due to that weather event, and it may not have been.


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## Allen Dick (Jan 10, 2009)

Yes. I think there are wintering losses that are clearly due to winter, and losses that are background losses. Just as there are events in winter that are hard on bees, there are events in spring and suimmer that lead to losses, too. The best hives motor on through, but the weaker ones fall by the wayside.

There are, of course, catastrophic events that can occur, like smothering due to ice, but that is quite uncommon. Can't say I've ever seen it. Horse damage, lids off, shrews, nosema, starvation, mite kills, malnutrition... these are not really winter loss IMO. They are management or bad luck losses.


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## naturebee (Dec 25, 2004)

sqkcrk said:


> Well, I have to differ w/ you on some things or admit to being a risk taker.
> I check my hives before taking them south and don't bother taking the obvious drone layer or queenless or dead colonies. But I do take what are probably marginal colonies and try to get them through. Sometimes I put them in nuc boxes and they do quite well. Sometimes they don't.?


I am not convinced that you are escaping the risk. There is a reason behind every colonies performance. Likewise, there is also a reason that would cause a colony to be mediocre, or marginal. By transferring marginal colonies to the south, is there a possibility that the risk you wish to avoid might simply be transferred to into the next season to be dealt with at a later time?,,, are the reasons for a colonies mediocre performance investigated or realized at some point? Or is this the risk you are prepared to take the following season by sending the mediocre south? 



sqkcrk said:


> I'm sure if I was overwintering my bees in NY, I wouldn't bother wrapping a colony that looked like it wouldn't make it through the winter. Maybe that's what you were refering to.


No, here is what I mean by risk taker:
Lets say <bee breeder #1> chooses to winter all his colonies regardless of the condition or strength of the colony or the stores within. Being a risk taker, he winters all his 50 colonies as they are, and subsequently has a winter loss of 50% leaving a total of 25 colonies.

<bee breeder #2> also having 50 colonies is not a risk taker, and he lessens his exposure to risk by using procedures of combining weak colonies and moving stores where needed during the end of the active season. He might end up wintering 40 colonies, but he will manage to reduce his risk, and therefore might suffer a more average loss of 25% leaving a total of 30 surviving winter.

The appearance to the average new bee looking to buy queens and listening to these two bee breeders bickering on the discussion lists over bragging rights, might be assume that bee breeder #2 has some terrific bees. When the new bee sees that bee breeder #2 has a 75% winter survival rate, and bee breeder #1 only managed a 50% survival rate, they’ll be reaching to zip a check of to bee breeder #2 

So one can argue that winter survival rates mean very little.
One might also argue the case that bee breeder #1 has the better bees, because their survival was not aided by beekeeper intervention, and would select naturally for honey gathering.



sqkcrk said:


> Don't you think that a properly timed miticide would benefit your bees?


Miticide would do no good for me because mites are not a problem for me. For some reason, mite populations are difficult to detect in my colonies. I suspect the resurgence of the ferals with mite resistance traits has benefited in some fashion.


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## Joel (Mar 3, 2005)

"because their survival was not aided by beekeeper intervention, and would select naturally for honey gathering."

True to some degree but many times bee starve in a hive full of honey because a long cold spell will prevent bees who simply exhaust stores "under them" and are unable to break cluster and move. I've also seen Hives that go into winter with plenty of honey, good cluster size but due to a warm winter and high survival in the brood nest combined with either an extended or early brood start eat plentiful stores before spring. These are colonies with no apparrent disease or mite problems that were good foragers but beaten by a particular weather pattern.

We do strongly attibute success/failure to genetics but also realize many good genetics are trumped by natural forces and a little help does not negatively affect good genetics.


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## winevines (Apr 7, 2007)

I thought we were supposed to write notes on those who have, as of yet, no losses.

Northen Virginia Area. So far so good with no losses at all. KNOCK ON WOOD!
Went into winter with the same 2 hives I started with in 2006, plus 2 swarms that I grew into full hives (i think that came from those hives) plus my first ever double nuc. I took some honey off of the 2 original hives in July (end of our flow here), but was not greedy. I fed them all sugar syrup August through October as needed. When it really got colder and the syrup was totally crystalized, I left out the hardened sugar syrup under the eaves of my house, and on warm days that was devoured by the bees. Double nucs followed M. Palmer's methods more or less- but I started giving them hard sugar (ala Mountaincamp) in early January. They ate that all up in 2-3 weeks and soon it is time to give them syrup. All hives were requeened in July with local stock plus one queen from Vermont. One I messed up, and I think the original queen stayed in that one.

Treated all hives with powedered sugar about 4 or 5 times. Treated the 2 original hives with apiguard. Nucs only got powedered sugar 2 times or so. 
One happy beek here!!!


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## walking bird (Mar 2, 2008)

Only a single hive. Lost due to mites. Actually, they didn't die, at least not somewhere where I could see them. They left after I tried an emergency thyme oil spray treatment. I think they were also fighting off robbers, and they finally decided enough was enough.


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## naturebee (Dec 25, 2004)

Joel said:


> True to some degree but many times bee starve in a hive full of honey because a long cold spell will prevent bees who simply exhaust stores "under them" and are unable to break cluster and move..


Hello Joel,

I am not doubting your observation that bees can starve being unable to move to new stores. But, the reason of “long cold spell” that you subscribe I will shed doubt by use of supporting documentation. 

According to ‘The thermology of wintering honeybee colonies’, the reason for this is not the cold spell, but as they state in the document: “Weaker colonies might starve with honey in the frame next to the cluster, because the bees are unable to generate enough heat to let the cluster spread over additional comb.” So we need to find “fault” here to obtain a diagnosis, the fault for the cause of this particular description of winter starvation, according to the document, is weakness, and not a long cold spell.

The study proves that a strong colony can move the entire cluster to access stores, even at very cold temperatures. The study shows that a cluster does not need to break to be able to move. I tend to cringe when I hear beekeepers say bees need to break cluster to move, that is simply not so. The study shows that clusters are extremely maneuverable, flexible and move to and fro the entrance on a day/night/temp basis, and also expand loose and tighten as needed, move up, down and sideways to access stores, all the while ‘NOT breaking‘.

An illustration of what wintering bees can do:

“…a very unusual movement was also recorded. On January 4 between 0700 and midnight when the outside temperature was between 2º and 9º F., the cluster moved sideways and down into the center body (fig. 6, L, N, P). Then it returned to its original location. Apparently it moved to obtain honey. This demonstrates how a strong colony can move its stores under low temperature conditions. Weaker colonies might starve with honey in the frame next to the cluster, because the bees are unable to generate enough heat to let the cluster spread over additional comb.”

THE THERMOLOGY OF WINTERING HONEY BEE COLONIES
http://www.beesource.com/pov/usda/thermology/techbulletin1429.htm




Joel said:


> I've also seen Hives that go into winter with plenty of honey, good cluster size but due to a warm winter and high survival in the brood nest combined with either an extended or early brood start eat plentiful stores before spring. These are colonies with no apparrent disease or mite problems that were good foragers but beaten by a particular weather pattern..


Some beekeepers here lay similar blame to the weather pattern. But I always ask them as I would of you, if the weather pattern killed or caused hardship on that colony, why didn’t it kill or cause hardship to that one? or that one over there?,,, are they not experiencing the same weather? If many colonies are not affected, then this suggests something other than weather causing the calamity. Some strains delay brood start till pollen begins, and some brood up prior to spring, so there is much more to it than weather. For one to secure good blame on the weather, it would have to be an event that causes similar problems throughout the apiary as well as the entire region. I have many such weather bee mortalities and hardships listed in the Historical Honeybee Articles site, and all weather related bee events recorded here are widespread events, regional events, events not affecting one or two colonies, but stressing the entire operation. 
http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/HistoricalHoneybeeArticles/
Files > 13) Honeybee Mortality and Hardship 

Best Wishes,
Joe


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## Allen Dick (Jan 10, 2009)

Thanks you, Joe, for spelling that out so well. That is what I have come to believe over time. 

While starvation inches from good stores can be the obvious and proximate cause of death, the true cause, 99 times out of 100, came earlier, and the true underlying cause is either disease (virus, nosema?) or malnutrition and.or poor development from the egg to adult due to conditions at the time.


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## Shorty (Nov 21, 2007)

*Still early*

Up here in SD it is still to early to really get a true picture, but so far it looks really good.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

naturebee,

I don't claim to be the best beekeeper and I don't recommend that anyone else should do as I do, but the way I handle things in the fall is to take everything that is alive to SC. I do this in November. I don't bother taking out any frames and doing a hive/brood assessment unless there aren't alot of bees or something doesn't appear to be right. I do heft the hives and check the top and the bottom to get an idea of the bee population and the amount of stores. Last year I marked the light ones w/ an L, thinking that I'd feed these when I got them to SC. But I didn't. Many, if not most, of those are still alive. Mite treatment applications are not done religiously. So many things don't work or are dangerous and or complicated to use.

Over the last 4 years I have had CCD like loses, the year before it was IDed. And since then, until this year I have had 33% or greater losses.

I pay for a semi to take my bees south, so I'm going to fill it up. Usually w/ as many live colonies as i can find and then empty equipment. Other equipment goes on my F-450. Like I said before i need empty equipment in the spring. So if some of the marginal colonies die in SC that's fine because I need the equipment and don't need the weak genes, if that's what killed them.

I'm sure that if i were someone different I'd do things differently and I often do do things differently, but mostly what I discribed above is what I do every year. I don't requeen either. If a queen is laying well enough to keep things going I leave her alone to live another season.


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## beedeetee (Nov 27, 2004)

I am not sure that whether they die because the are weak or because of weather or a combination of the two is that important. I just think it is too early for me to know which hives will make it through the winter.

I am sure that it is true that weak colonies will be more likely to die from now until warm weather, but they may still die.


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## Joel (Mar 3, 2005)

Hi Joe,

Rather than hijack this post I'll make a couple of quick points:

#1 The studies you cite don't cast doubt or preclude anything since they are not a finite statement as to bee behavior under any circumstance other than the controlled environment and management practices used for the study you cite, none of which reflect what I do or my local conditions or hive conditions.

#2 To suggest bees die due to genetic influences and not other environmental influcences is not credible. Clusters do break and move, I've seen it, clusters do move within a hive at different times as stated in the study (when they don't have to abandoned brood) I've seen it. Of course I don't believe in the magic of feral bees because I'm confident all gentics are flawed and the perfect individual does not exist.

#3 Obviously there are a slew of circumstance other than genetics that could influcence the survival of two hives side by side not the least of which is yours and my interference at some point as a beekeeper.

I think further debate should take place on a seperate post if that's your goal.


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## danno (Dec 17, 2007)

8 hives all doing well
all bottom boards closed, 80+ lbs of honey, mouse guards, a Imeri shim for a top enterance, 4" box with 10- 1" screened vent holes drilled around the sides above the inner cover with a book of straw in it and full sun. Early fall apiguard treatment before goldenrod and 2 gallons of fumigilin


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## queenking (Oct 24, 2007)

*winter loss*

i fined it hard to believe that you beekeepers came out of winter with what you went into winter with. i did every thing right and i still had winter losses


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## Allen Dick (Jan 10, 2009)

> i fined it hard to believe that you beekeepers came out of winter with what you went into winter with. i did every thing right and i still had winter losses


Well, winter is far from over for many of us. 

Also, wintering, as with anything to do with bees is somewhat statistical if a large sample is taken, rather than cut and dried. 

Chance and distributions enter into it. If you have one hive, and the probability of loss is 50%, you either have a 100% loss or a 0% loss. If you have 1,000, hives, then you would expect 500 dead (+/- 10 or so) with the same hypothetical odds, but the losses would be randomly distributed, unless there was a local effect in one group. (Random distributions can look very much like patterns, so it can be very hard to tell).

When I was a commercial, we consistently averaged 12-15% ( 13.5% +/- 1.5) annual winter loss. With 3000 hives, the numbers smooth out. That did not mean that we found that percentage in every yard. Often we would find an occasional yard with many dead and many yards with few or none dead.

It is hard with a small sample -- like most hobby yards -- to know.


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## mgmoore7 (Jul 6, 2007)

queenking said:


> i fined it hard to believe that you beekeepers came out of winter with what you went into winter with. i did every thing right and i still had winter losses


Maybe it is unfair that those of us that have very mild winters to answer this post. 

I am in Tampa, FL. The low monthly average temp is in Jan and was 52F and this was one of the coldest winters I can recall in 30 years. 

Therefore, from the bees perspective, we really don't have much of a winter. There are only a few days that I have seen them not fly at all due to the temperature.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

Agreeing that the end of February is too early for most of the beekeepers in North America to really have a count of what survived, since most "winter kill" occurs in March, when do you figure your winter loss numbers? I guess I would do that when I start making increase, when I start making splits. How do others see it?


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## Allen Dick (Jan 10, 2009)

> I guess I would do that when I start making increase, when I start making splits. How do others see it?


I think that is pretty well standard, for the final count, at least. For us, it is early May.


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## Robert Brenchley (Apr 23, 2000)

I lost one out of my original four hives; this was a weak swarm which I requeened rather late. In Decmber, I acquired two more which had been treated with Apistan, when most of the local mites are resistant. One was very weak and died out shortly afterwards. The other is ridiculaously strong - the cluster almost fills a standard National broodbox - and has DVW despite an oxalic treatment a few weeks ago. I'm just hoping it keeps ahead of the mites until the weather warms up and I can do an Apiguard treatment. Right now it's too cold to do much at all, though I did take advantage of a mild day to check that all the survivors have eggs.


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## HarryVanderpool (Apr 11, 2005)

*When do you count your losses??!!!!!*

When I give my number of "winter" losses, I subtract the amount of healthy hives in the spring from the TOTAL amount of hives I had in the previous year at it's peak.
So if you had 1000 hives on the 4th of July and you go into spring with 900, your winter loss was 10% REGARDLESS of when they were lost.
Otherwise, every beekeeper can set the bar all over the place and we can never have a meaningful discussion.
If you had 1000 in July and lost 10 in August (and did not restart ???) and 10 in Sept and 10 in Oct and ect... which leaves you with 900 in spring, you lost 10%.
I lost 4.25%
No hidden little mulligans in that number.


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## Ski (Jan 18, 2007)

Went into winter with 6 hives and so far 6 are still active.
Here in NC we get some warm days through winter so I was open feeding syrup for the 2 hives that did not have a hive top feeder. 
For the 3 with hive top feeders I would scoop out the cold syrup and add warm syrup back on warm days, the feeders have been on all winter. 
One hive had a quail water and I would empty and fill it on warm days. The quail feeder had an empty deep over it. Warm is anything above 50 degrees. 
I also had/have sugar on newspaper on the top bars for moisture control and snacking if they wanted to.
I have some trees behind the hive but added landscape fabric on the north side of the fence and in December I added it to the west and south sides as well because of south and south west winds that were getting up to the 35-40 mph range. 
I have a fence all the way around the hives because we live in a skunk travel zone. I have seen 8-10 killed on the highway and have still seen 3-4 different ones eating the dropped bird seed on the ground. 
Well all that stuff above is nothing special but maybe each little thing helped them through the winter so far. Its 56 degrees out right now and the bees are active. Yep the open feeders are filled. Will check the hive top feeders tomorrow supposed to be around 60.


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## Allen Dick (Jan 10, 2009)

> When I give my number of "winter" losses, I subtract the amount of healthy hives in the spring from the TOTAL amount of hives I had in the previous year at it's peak. So if you had 1000 hives on the 4th of July and you go into spring with 900, your winter loss was 10% REGARDLESS of when they were lost.


Are you saying that your winter starts on the 4th of July and extends until spring? 

Any beekeepers I have discussed this with all distinguish between summer losses, counted at wrapping or end of fall work, and winter losses, which occur from that point until spring work begins. 

Some may feed patties and syrup previous to that date and do a little centering, but when inspections, splitting and requeening begin is the usual time for the tally. And, in some cases, the dates used could be unusual, (like early March survival rather than May 1st). 

Of course in discussing these things, it is always prudent to find what the assumptions are, since some count anything alive on that date and most only count the viable ones.


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## naturebee (Dec 25, 2004)

Joel said:


> #2 To suggest bees die due to genetic influences and not other environmental influcences is not credible.


Not to high jack the thread, but I would like to respond in brief. 

I recommend that you learn the definition of ‘environmental influences’. An environmental influence is “anything outside the bee itself” (if I recall correctly; quote by Pellett), this includes pests, disease and all other things in the environment that affect the bee. So bees with genetics not adapted to, and which cannot cope with a particular disease or other stress found in that environment can die, and this would be the fault of genetics not the environment. If I can locate the quote from the great late Frank Chapman Pellett, I will see that you get it.



Joel said:


> Clusters do break and move, I've seen it, clusters do move within a hive at different times as stated in the study (when they don't have to abandoned brood) I've seen it.


The cluster in the situation you describe is elongating. Bees must maintain a cluster to generate and contain heat or else freeze to death. So there is no “breaking up” of a cluster or they would freeze to death, simply a elongating, or contraction or expansion to move. This is not a ‘breaking of cluster’. But we can agree to disagree. 



Joel said:


> Hi Joe,
> <<<#1 The studies you cite don't cast doubt or preclude anything since they are not a finite statement as to bee behavior under any circumstance other than the controlled environment and management practices used for the study you cite, >>>.


<<<a controlled environment and management practices used for the study you cite >>>??????

You clearly did not read the study! and therefore your comments are disingenuous and deceitful to those reading that wish to learn. The study was done with a colony which was <<<not in a controlled environment.>>> as well as control colonies. 

I have presented the study with honesty as to the significance of its content, and you reply with a deceitful comments in order to discredit the study based on an outright “fib“.

I believe an apology is in order before we can proceed, as I would certainly do the same. 

Joe


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## Joel (Mar 3, 2005)

Joe,

I'll ignore your ill founded acusations, personal attack and insults, your last post is really beneath both of us.


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## Joel (Mar 3, 2005)

Allend,
I'm curious to when your primary flows happend in relation to wintereing? Is there a hive average for the area in lbs. or kilos/hive in an average season?


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## HarryVanderpool (Apr 11, 2005)

*Fuzzy Math?*



allend said:


> Are you saying that your winter starts on the 4th of July and extends until spring?


Well, maybe I'm slightly off topic here, but I would prefer a discussion of "annual losses" or something along those lines rather than "winter losses" which is VERY loosley defined.

Right now I know how many hives I have in California and how many new hives I'm starting this year. As in all years, all of my equipment will be up and rolling in a few months.
Out of that total amount, how many will make it to California next February?

Otherwise, we end up talking about "fall dwindling" and, "Oh, don't count that one; it was a late swarm" and a gimmee here and a mulligan there.

Anyway that is my honest answer to the losses question.


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## HarryVanderpool (Apr 11, 2005)

*then again...*

....or if you all prefer:
Almost all of my deadouts were from queen issues which surely happened in the fall.
Put me down for ZERO losses.
Boy, I'm sure glad I had no winter losses, that would be horrible.


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## Allen Dick (Jan 10, 2009)

Well, I figure my annual loss ran just under 30%. That included spring loss (bad splits, failures during May, June, & early July), summer losses, and winter loss. That meant one split for every two of the remaining 70% to get back up.

As for crops, typically we have flows from May through mid-September, but the main flow is usually in July or sometimes August. If we are lucky, both. Crops run around 150 lbs around here on a good year. Some do better, some worse, and some lie.

My thoughts on losses are that they are actiually happening at a fairly constant rate over the year and are largely due to queens declining or failing completely. 

The actual hive mortality, however, may appear at specific times since robbing season will identify and eliminate the dying colonies in fall, or the first bitter cold will take out some of the late failures in November/December. Then, in March, more of the failing hives will start to die of old age and this process continues until the first check. Then splits are made and a few more culled or requeened. Some splits are failures, and are combined down.


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## naturebee (Dec 25, 2004)

Joel said:


> Joe,
> I'll ignore your ill founded acusations, personal attack and insults, your last post is really beneath both of us.


What is there to ignore?
It was not a personal attack, nor was it an insult to your person.

I was commenting on “your comments made”, particularly “what you said pertaining to the study” that you clearly didn‘t read, not you as a person.

For example:
If I catch someone cheating in a poker game. 
A personal attack would be calling them a “cheater”. 
If I were to say, “your not playing fair”, that would NOT be a personal attack or insulting remark, because I am commenting on how they choose to play the game, NOT attacking the person.

You submitted a false comment about the study which were meant to destroy, -the creditability of this most excellent study (that BTW, is cited again and again in the scientific community for its great content). That was simply NOT fair play.

If I didn’t point out the fact that your comments were in error, the GREAT RISK is that new bees and others reading might trash the study based on an erroneous comment, and this is to great of a risk to not have the record corrected. 

That’s what I was commenting on here, was how you were choosing to play the game, and that’s what we all expect to see here in these discussions , -fair play. 

I have the highest respect for you as a person and would never attack you in a harmful or disrespectful manner, and if you interpreted it as a personal attack, I did not mean that and apologize to you. 

Please be aware for future that when I comment, it is on what the person says, and NEVER do I attack the person.

Best Wishes,
Joe


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## USCBeeMan (Feb 7, 2009)

Okay, as a new beekeeper ya'll have got me curious as to what you are bantering pro/anti about? :scratch: Please provide a link.


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## Joel (Mar 3, 2005)

"disingenuous and deceitful" , 
deceitful comments , 
"on an outright “fib“.
"You clearly did not read the study!"
"You submitted a false comment "

Whew, for a moment here Joe I thought you were calling me disingeous, deceitful and a liar. But your last post clears it up alright! You were talking about my words not me, my words were being deceitful and did not read the study. I was really worried there for a bit but now I'm OK! 

I'm on on the road today but I'll start a post and we'll debate your points further when I get home. It's been awhile since we had a good natural beekeeping debate. Some of what we are talking about appears to be splitting hairs when it comes to definitions and we can clear those up.


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## Bizzybee (Jan 29, 2006)

Provided this dialog makes a clear turn away from the tone that has been taken in the past few posts, there should be no problems.

We would all enjoy seeing a "good" debate on the subject.


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## Allen Dick (Jan 10, 2009)

Just to qualify what I wrote a few posts ago, my comments about losses assume a competent beekeeper, adequate feed, management, etc..

The losses I am talking about are the normal background continuing losses, do not include the effects of unusual events, disease outbreaks, pesticide kills, uncontrolled predation or parasitism, or mismanagement.

I consider those to be unusual losses and not 'winter loss', although many include them, especially where they are unable to recognise and isolate them from normal loss.

Moreover, the natural yearly loss rate will depend on many factors. Annual requeening with quality queens may decrease the attrition rate. Quality, quantity and timing of forage available will have an effect, as will other factors.

My experience, however is that in any given well-managed commercial oputfit, the losses tend to be very consistent and the operator is usually able to recognise unusual losses above the background (normal) level.


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## Kieck (Dec 2, 2005)

I did a quick look for a thread on "environmental influences" or "genetics" or something of that sort, and didn't pick up on one. If there is one created already, this reply really belongs there.

My opinions fall more into the category with Joel's on this topic. What I seem to see among some beekeepers right now is an overemphasis of "genetics" as cure-alls in beekeeping. Mite problems? "Genetics" will solve that. Harsh winter conditions? "Genetics" can overcome those. CCD? "Genetics" can overcome that. Lack of pollen or nectar? "Genetics" can withstand those dearths. T-mites? Small hive beetles? Wax moths? AFB? EFB? Nosema? Any and all -- "genetics."

But it ain't that simple. At least the way I see it.

No matter the "genetics," environmental effects can kill hives. Let's start with the extreme: let's say that we have a hypothetical bee that's resistant to all the problems listed above. That strain of bees can withstand -50F spells lasting three weeks, can survive the up-and-down temperature spells of early spring, is absolutely death on _Varroa_, is completely immune to t-mites, has no issue with any other diseases, seems to be a "perfect" bee. And let's say that we have a yard filled with these things. And a tornado rips through that yard. Or a bear. Are those "environmental influences?" And can "genetics" really be expected to withstand such conditions?

Breeding or "genetics" is not a magic bullet. We won't eliminate our problems just by breeding or finding that "perfect" bee. It doesn't work that way. It hasn't with any other form of life on this planet, and it won't with bees. And this emphasis on genetics recently even seems to have equated "genetic diversity" with "the more, the better," in the minds of some beekeepers.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

HarryVanderpool said:


> Well, maybe I'm slightly off topic here, but I would prefer a discussion of "annual losses" or something along those lines rather than "winter losses" which is VERY loosley defined.


Okay. Let's see. In January 2008 I had maybe 250 to 300 colonies. By May I had over 550 colonies. In November I had over 400. I sold about 100 nucs. So reduce that 550 number to 450. I don't know how many I lost between January and March '08. Does that mean that my annual loss was 50 colonies? Then I guess I had a 12.5% Annual loss. That sounds better than 15.5% winterloss.

I don't think I understand the rules of Annual Loss Accounting.


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## jean-marc (Jan 13, 2005)

So far our winter loss is around 2.5% and that is the best ever for this time of year. Queen problems will take us closer to 10 % by May 1.

I talked to another beekeeper and in his outfit he says 3% of queens per month are lost. My overall annual loss is 40%. So if on may 1 I have 100, next may I have 60 unless I split hives. I do split them about half per year so slowly my numbers increase. I spoke with Richard Adee when he was at the Alberta Beekeepers convention a few years back and they also experienced a 40% loss per year.

Genetics play a big role. High winds blew lids off hives one year and I did not get to the bees for 2 weeks. One certain genetic line withstood the rains we get here., most others perished. I'M not saying it's an absolute but this particular line is kinda tough. They withstood some extreme environmental influences. It is kinda miraculous because we get heavy rains here. When I saw them it was early spring and they were brooding.

Jean-Marc


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## Kieck (Dec 2, 2005)

> Genetics play a big role. High winds blew lids off hives one year and I did not get to the bees for 2 weeks. -jean-marc


Is that "genetics," or is that random chance? How do you make the determination that genetics caused those bees to survive?



> One certain genetic line withstood the rains we get here., most others perished. -jean-marc


To me, that might be more interesting. What made that group of bees different? Did they all originate from one queen or a few closely related queens?


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## naturebee (Dec 25, 2004)

Kieck said:


> I did a quick look for a thread on "environmental influences" or "genetics" or something of that sort, and didn't pick up on one. If there is one created already, this reply really belongs there.
> 
> My opinions fall more into the category with Joel's on this topic. What I seem to see among some beekeepers right now is an overemphasis of "genetics" as cure-alls in beekeeping. Mite problems? "Genetics" will solve that. Harsh winter conditions? "Genetics" can overcome those. CCD? "Genetics" can overcome that. Lack of pollen or nectar? "Genetics" can withstand those dearths. T-mites? Small hive beetles? Wax moths? AFB? EFB? Nosema? Any and all -- "genetics."
> 
> ...



Kieck, If you paste your letter into a thread titled "Environmental Influences / Genetics" I would like to comment.
Perhaps in the Biological beekeeping forum.

Joe


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## naturebee (Dec 25, 2004)

Joel said:


> "disingenuous and deceitful" ,
> deceitful comments ,
> "on an outright “fib“.
> "You clearly did not read the study!"
> ...


Joel, I need to apologize, the quote I wanted to let you see was from Franklin E. Phillips 1918, and not Pellett. 

“The environmental factor may be inside or outside the hive, or even inside or outside the individual bee. For example, pathogenic micro- organisms or irritating foods are inside but not part of the animal and are therefore environmental factors.” (Phillips 1918) 

Joel, I am happy that you realize that I was commenting on your words and not you, as a person. It is key to a discussion list to be able to call each other on disagreements or falsities to keep things factual.

I would be happy to discuss some issues in an appropriately titled thread, if, and as time permits. With moderators as referees, of course.  I hope that you would list a few key points so we can keep the length contained. 

Best Wishes,
Joe


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## franktrujillo (Jan 22, 2009)

well did you know that sugar water has now nutritional value what so ever also it causes nosema its better to leave bees with there own honey in stead of taking most of it this way there is no feeding cost and need to keep lavender around so bees collect its nector the mites and varroa dont like the smell


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

franktrujillo said:


> well did you know that sugar water has now nutritional value what so ever also it causes nosema its better to leave bees with there own honey in stead of taking most of it this way there is no feeding cost and need to keep lavender around so bees collect its nector the mites and varroa dont like the smell


Interesting theory. Your comment on the nutritional value of sugar syrup is probably correct, but I was taught by Dr. Jim Tew, that bes that wintered on sugar syrup did better because the syrup lacked the minerals which they pooped out onto the hive during their cleansing flights. In other words, fewer problems w/ dysentery. I'm not sure whether the same would be true w/ nosema.

I don't know anyone who takes ALL of the honey from their bees. Sugar syrup and hfcs is mostly used as a supplement feeding to light hives and as a means to treat bees for certain diseases.


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## Kieck (Dec 2, 2005)

> Kieck, If you paste your letter into a thread titled "Environmental Influences / Genetics" I would like to comment.
> Perhaps in the Biological beekeeping forum. -naturebee


Done. I am genuinely interested in others' opinions on this subject, so I started the thread in the Biological beekeeping section.

It's here:

http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?t=226337


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## summer1052 (Oct 21, 2007)

I went into winter with seven hives, and am finishing with seven. I did not treat with any miticide, Fumagilin, or menthol. I *may* have treated with something else, but I'm not sure, continue below and see notes on feeding.

I do not have SBB on my hives. DH made ventilator covers for the tops, which I removed. The three hives that are "smaller" I reduced the entrance on. The four "biggies" I left the large opening on. FWIW: The "biggies" had a full deep of honey, comb, brood to play with, and another deep to play in -- which they did not use. The "smaller" hives had 2-4 frames to play with in a deep. This was their first winter, and we had a dry, borderline dearth, year.

I fed all my hives, but only the smaller ones took advantage of it. I fed 1:1 syrup. My girls don't take thick syrup very well. Not sure why.

When I make sugar syrup, I add 2 drops per quart of water, of melalecua alterniflora oil -- Tea Tree oil. The girls take it just fine. I have had zero problems with mold in my syrup this way.

Tea tree oil has anti- bacterial, fungal, viral, and biotic properties. I use it around here for all our cuts, scrapes, cleaning, etc. DH uses it directly on his teeth and gums, and has reversed and stabilized some gum issues that were going to require major oral surgery. I think the stuff is miraculous, but I know others think it is snake oil. Whatsumever.  If I treated my hives with anything, this would have been it. And 2 drops per quart is a fairly weak solution. So I note it in the FWIW catagory.

I feel lucky. This climate has some pluses for beeks, but drawbacks as well. But I have seen no evidence of mites, and I do check. Still think SHB and Wax moths are the greater evil. I *did* have a fire ant hill set up under one hive, and I dosed them.

GL all
Summer


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## coontail (Feb 6, 2009)

i had a hive that hadnt been touched since 2004 and this year when i was excited about getting into beekeeping they died out.


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## gingerbee (Jul 22, 2006)

I went into winter with three hives- one strong and two weak. No losses so far, they all still have bees flying around on warmer days, are bringing in pollen, but the weak ones were robbed out last fall and had little honey to get through the winter with. I'm not sure they're going to make it through. I've been feeding sugar syrup and hard sugar through a hive-top wooden feeder. 

I want to go into the weak hives to check for brood, presence of a queen but am afraid to break any cluster they have going until it warms up. 

I'm learning more about hive management and feel if I lose these hives lack of consistent management practices probably accounts for it.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

You can do just as much harm going into them too often as you would by not managing them properly. Maybe more. Wait a week or two, until there are more consistantly warm days and not so cold nights. Then check all three and if need be, equalize the frames of brood in all three. But if the weaker two are strong enough to continue on on their own, let them grow and split the strong one.

But, unless you have already checked, you really don't know which one is strongest or weakest at this time, after most of the winter has gone by.


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## jean-marc (Jan 13, 2005)

Kieck:

The bees that survived the rains come from closely related lines. I had 2-3 hives that survived that particular wind storm and it's aftermath. A neighbour who runs that same line experienced something similar. That line survived exposed. I remeber him telling me he had been away from that yard 2 months. That line survived the rains, others did not. Why, I dunno, but I like those bees.

Jean-Marc


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## odfrank (May 13, 2002)

How can we rub this poll showing the loses regionally? I am down 50% again here in the San Francisco area. Is that a left coast thing?


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

jean-marc said:


> The bees that survived the rains come from closely related lines.
> Jean-Marc


Jean-Marc,
Is the climate of BC more like a tropic/subtropic rain forest like climate than a temperate climate? Do you have rainy seasons and dirth seasons?


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## jean-marc (Jan 13, 2005)

skqcrk:

I live in Mission BC, this is a temperate rain forest. This part of the coast gets an average rainfall of 64 inches per year. August and September are our drier months. Seattle is about 2 hours south of us. The joke is we have 2 seasons around here, rainy and wet.

Jean-Marc

PS- I set out a rain barrel to measure the winter rains. This season has been colder than usual and drier. The rainwater and melted snow was within 2 inches of the rim. I started collecting the water late october.

Jean-Marc


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## comb (Jan 12, 2006)

great idea for starting thread i think we need to seperate differant parts of the country we have some in florida others in canada hard to compare


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## Joel (Mar 3, 2005)

I think it would be helpful to see the reasons (as well as can be determined) as to why hives were lost as well as where (region) they were lost. Perhaps do the posts by region and include a list of common loss reasons (lets exclude CCD unless it's been verified). I used to be able to do a Poll like this but under the new system I seem to be limited by the number of choices I can list.

Edited by Joel
It was kindly pointed out to me since we don't know the cause of CCD we can't verify it.  So if someon has the smarts to do the poll we would have to classify CCD as with the published symptoms of CCD!


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