Winter is coming: 2022

Getting bees ready for Winter really starts in the preceding summer; this may sound illogical but the amount of preparation and work required demands this. There were 3 areas that we were going to focus on:

Varroa Mite Control: Randy Oliver is one of the premier beekeepers in the world, he conducts research and best practices to develop tools for beekeepers to use. We used Randy’s Varroa Mite Model to understand how the treatments we used would favorably impact the elimination of Varroa Mites. Starting in July 2022, I started treatments using an Oxalic Acid vapor treatment every two weeks. This treatment has favorable results on varroa mites with minimal negative impact on the bees. In October, a Formic Acid treatment was applied to the hives; Formic Acid needs to be used in temperatures below 85 degrees and can be considered an aggressive treatment; once the Formic Acid treatment was completed, Oxalic was used in November and December. By using this systematic approach and different treatments we felt confident the Varroa Mite problem was under control and the numbers proved it.

Hive Prep: We wanted to make sure the hives were secure, relatively airtight and would be warm as the bees clustered. I made smaller feeding spacer shims, added insulation boards for the top cover and wrapped the super seams in Gorilla tape to act as a propolis seal and block the wind.

Feeding: We ensured the hives had honey and made several pounds of fondant to place above the top super on hardware cloth. When the weather was warm enough, a quick hive check was conducted, and food was added.

What were the results? Our overwinter success rate was 90% which was phenomenal! This set us up for a great spring honey harvest and now to apply our learnings to the upcoming winter.