The Beehive: Wintering in Kansas to save the honey stores and ultimately the inhabitants

Hello, welcome back to the beehive. Here we are, in early February, in what seems to be a mild winter with no snow cover. A person would think this would be a great winter, as far as the bees are concerned. In this column, I will remind you folks as to how our bees entered the winter season, and then, bring you up to speed with some exciting news about how our bees are progressing. If you folks remember, we had a dry August. The honey flow was over at the end of July. Our bees started consuming their honey stores in August. I found that our bees were about to enter the winter with insufficient honey stores. So we fed our bees sugar water, as long as they were able to take it. In late October, Brenda, Danielle and I, loaded up our best, most promising hives, and hauled them down to Paola, Kansas. When we arrived at a friend’s farm, we set the hives up, and got them ready for a Kansas winter, by placing an empty honey super on top of two deep boxes. This would serve as an emergency feeding chamber, if the bees would run out of honey stores. We put the granulated sugar and a pollen patty in the empty chamber. In a perfect world, we would have either left the bees more honey, or we would have fed the bees more before the weather had turned cold. Anyway, these were the cards we were dealt, and this was our solution to the problems we faced. We returned home from our Kansas trip, where we wrapped our remaining hives that were here in Park Rapids and hoped for the best. Last Friday, Brenda and I returned to Kansas to check on the bees. I have to say, I didn’t sleep much Friday night. I kept thinking about the bees. I wondered if they were still alive. Did they run out of food? Boy, it was going to be a long drive home if all the bees were all dead. Waiting for the day to warm up, we started out about mid-morning. As we entered the bee yard, we saw bees flying everywhere. To our delight, the bees were fine. Every single hive was alive and well. We were so excited. High fives were in order. We started checking the hives. Some of the hives had consumed all the sugar we had left them. As the day warmed up, the bees came out in force. There were bees everywhere. Brenda and I fed all the hives, made a few bee videos and headed north, breathing a sigh of relief. [[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"1520928","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","height":"480","width":"360"}}]] Back at home, our bees are struggling. We have lost about half of our hives so far. I think part of the problem is that we took the healthiest hives to Kansas, thus leaving the hives that were already struggling here to battle the more severe climate. All in all, we are very optimistic about our bees this spring and the upcoming season. I will write again when there is more news, good or bad. As always, thanks for your interest. PS: If you would like to view the bee videos, check us out on Facebook, at Double “B”ee Honey.[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"1520923","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image Kent","height":"360","width":"480"}}]] Hello, welcome back to the beehive. Here we are, in early February, in what seems to be a mild winter with no snow cover. A person would think this would be a great winter, as far as the bees are concerned. In this column, I will remind you folks as to how our bees entered the winter season, and then, bring you up to speed with some exciting news about how our bees are progressing. If you folks remember, we had a dry August. The honey flow was over at the end of July. Our bees started consuming their honey stores in August. I found that our bees were about to enter the winter with insufficient honey stores. So we fed our bees sugar water, as long as they were able to take it. In late October, Brenda, Danielle and I, loaded up our best, most promising hives, and hauled them down to Paola, Kansas. When we arrived at a friend’s farm, we set the hives up, and got them ready for a Kansas winter, by placing an empty honey super on top of two deep boxes. This would serve as an emergency feeding chamber, if the bees would run out of honey stores. We put the granulated sugar and a pollen patty in the empty chamber. In a perfect world, we would have either left the bees more honey, or we would have fed the bees more before the weather had turned cold. Anyway, these were the cards we were dealt, and this was our solution to the problems we faced. We returned home from our Kansas trip, where we wrapped our remaining hives that were here in Park Rapids and hoped for the best. Last Friday, Brenda and I returned to Kansas to check on the bees. I have to say, I didn’t sleep much Friday night. I kept thinking about the bees. I wondered if they were still alive. Did they run out of food? Boy, it was going to be a long drive home if all the bees were all dead. Waiting for the day to warm up, we started out about mid-morning. As we entered the bee yard, we saw bees flying everywhere. To our delight, the bees were fine. Every single hive was alive and well. We were so excited. High fives were in order. We started checking the hives. Some of the hives had consumed all the sugar we had left them. As the day warmed up, the bees came out in force. There were bees everywhere. Brenda and I fed all the hives, made a few bee videos and headed north, breathing a sigh of relief.
Back at home, our bees are struggling. We have lost about half of our hives so far. I think part of the problem is that we took the healthiest hives to Kansas, thus leaving the hives that were already struggling here to battle the more severe climate. All in all, we are very optimistic about our bees this spring and the upcoming season. I will write again when there is more news, good or bad. As always, thanks for your interest. PS: If you would like to view the bee videos, check us out on Facebook, at Double “B”ee Honey.
Hello, welcome back to the beehive. Here we are, in early February, in what seems to be a mild winter with no snow cover. A person would think this would be a great winter, as far as the bees are concerned. In this column, I will remind you folks as to how our bees entered the winter season, and then, bring you up to speed with some exciting news about how our bees are progressing.If you folks remember, we had a dry August. The honey flow was over at the end of July. Our bees started consuming their honey stores in August. I found that our bees were about to enter the winter with insufficient honey stores. So we fed our bees sugar water, as long as they were able to take it.In late October, Brenda, Danielle and I, loaded up our best, most promising hives, and hauled them down to Paola, Kansas.When we arrived at a friend’s farm, we set the hives up, and got them ready for a Kansas winter, by placing an empty honey super on top of two deep boxes.This would serve as an emergency feeding chamber, if the bees would run out of honey stores. We put the granulated sugar and a pollen patty in the empty chamber. In a perfect world, we would have either left the bees more honey, or we would have fed the bees more before the weather had turned cold.Anyway, these were the cards we were dealt, and this was our solution to the problems we faced. We returned home from our Kansas trip, where we wrapped our remaining hives that were here in Park Rapids and hoped for the best.Last Friday, Brenda and I returned to Kansas to check on the bees. I have to say, I didn’t sleep much Friday night. I kept thinking about the bees. I wondered if they were still alive. Did they run out of food? Boy, it was going to be a long drive home if all the bees were all dead.Waiting for the day to warm up, we started out about mid-morning. As we entered the bee yard, we saw bees flying everywhere. To our delight, the bees were fine.Every single hive was alive and well. We were so excited. High fives were in order. We started checking the hives. Some of the hives had consumed all the sugar we had left them. As the day warmed up, the bees came out in force. There were bees everywhere.Brenda and I fed all the hives, made a few bee videos and headed north, breathing a sigh of relief. [[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"1520928","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","height":"480","width":"360"}}]] Back at home, our bees are struggling. We have lost about half of our hives so far. I think part of the problem is that we took the healthiest hives to Kansas, thus leaving the hives that were already struggling here to battle the more severe climate.All in all, we are very optimistic about our bees this spring and the upcoming season. I will write again when there is more news, good or bad. As always, thanks for your interest.PS: If you would like to view the bee videos, check us out on Facebook, at Double “B”ee Honey.[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"1520923","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image Kent","height":"360","width":"480"}}]]Hello, welcome back to the beehive. Here we are, in early February, in what seems to be a mild winter with no snow cover. A person would think this would be a great winter, as far as the bees are concerned. In this column, I will remind you folks as to how our bees entered the winter season, and then, bring you up to speed with some exciting news about how our bees are progressing.If you folks remember, we had a dry August. The honey flow was over at the end of July. Our bees started consuming their honey stores in August. I found that our bees were about to enter the winter with insufficient honey stores. So we fed our bees sugar water, as long as they were able to take it.In late October, Brenda, Danielle and I, loaded up our best, most promising hives, and hauled them down to Paola, Kansas.When we arrived at a friend’s farm, we set the hives up, and got them ready for a Kansas winter, by placing an empty honey super on top of two deep boxes.This would serve as an emergency feeding chamber, if the bees would run out of honey stores. We put the granulated sugar and a pollen patty in the empty chamber. In a perfect world, we would have either left the bees more honey, or we would have fed the bees more before the weather had turned cold.Anyway, these were the cards we were dealt, and this was our solution to the problems we faced. We returned home from our Kansas trip, where we wrapped our remaining hives that were here in Park Rapids and hoped for the best.Last Friday, Brenda and I returned to Kansas to check on the bees. I have to say, I didn’t sleep much Friday night. I kept thinking about the bees. I wondered if they were still alive. Did they run out of food? Boy, it was going to be a long drive home if all the bees were all dead.Waiting for the day to warm up, we started out about mid-morning. As we entered the bee yard, we saw bees flying everywhere. To our delight, the bees were fine.Every single hive was alive and well. We were so excited. High fives were in order. We started checking the hives. Some of the hives had consumed all the sugar we had left them. As the day warmed up, the bees came out in force. There were bees everywhere.Brenda and I fed all the hives, made a few bee videos and headed north, breathing a sigh of relief.
Back at home, our bees are struggling. We have lost about half of our hives so far. I think part of the problem is that we took the healthiest hives to Kansas, thus leaving the hives that were already struggling here to battle the more severe climate.All in all, we are very optimistic about our bees this spring and the upcoming season. I will write again when there is more news, good or bad. As always, thanks for your interest.PS: If you would like to view the bee videos, check us out on Facebook, at Double “B”ee Honey.