Survey suggestion

Perhaps a “What do you plan to do differently”, i.e.: I plan to use an alcohol wash test before treating colonies in the future. Also a suggestion – Google forms surveys tend to be buggy. Survey Monkey has a free option and is much more user friendly in my opinion 🙂

RESPONSE: I like your suggestion. We do have the comment section at the end to cover this open-ended question “what do you plan…” issue. Not sure how asking that question on this survey would provide us the answers we are seeking. We assessed Survey Monkey the first year of this survey. That program will only allow a free member (keeping costs as low as possible) to ask a limited amount of questions and, as you have experienced, this survey would easily surpass it. Alternate survey tools, or pro-bono programmers, are continuously sought for survey customization….might this be you? Keep the suggestions coming & thanks for your comments!

Survey confusion

I’m not sure the survey allowed me to really state what I did. I bought to CA packages, split them, left the two original queens in two hives and gave the other two hives hygienic queens. The bees were put in hives with comb and honey from the previous year. I think moisture killed the colonies but I can’t be 100% sure.

RESPONSE: I think the survey had some places you could have included these comments. We ask why you feel colonies died and under other you could have added you moisture comment. The detail we were seeking was 2 new splits and 2 packages with 0 survivals. I am not prepared to ask about queen sources – but it could be added at some future date. Too few beekeepers know their queen sources to allow for many respondents.

DWV – deformed wings

I did not have visual confirmation of mites, but did find a few deformed wings on dead bees in October.

RESPONSE: We do not believe seeing mites on bees or deformed wing bees are useful for predicting mite infestation. We know our bees have mites. When we see a mite on an adult bee and see bees with Deformed wings –we are seeing the “tip” of the iceberg – that colony has mites at a high enough level to be at extreme risk of NOT surviving winter.

Feeding

Feeding: I fed fondant during winter (it is soft and can be immediately consumed by bees) in the weight of honey, I included 10 shallow frames of comb honey. I gave away or sold swarms and splits which were not included in the count of my hives.

RESPONSE: Fondant is a good, but more expensive, source of sugar for bees. You had good results with it. On our survey giving away or selling hives (nucs) is not included. We are looking for reports on activity during the overwintering period.

“over spraying” of pesticides

Who do you contact for reporting over spraying of chemicals?

RESPONSE:  There is no reporting system for reporting “over spraying” of pesticides. If you have a concern, contact your state Department of Agriculture, pesticide division. They can investigate misuse of pesticides.

Mold vs. drawn comb

Hives were very damp and moldy when I opened the dead hives. They were strong earlier with plenty of food packed away.

RESPONSE: When colonies die the combs do get moldy and honey (if any) will ferment and by the time we discover the loss the comb looks terrible. BUT give it to bees to clean up and you will be amazed how they will recover that comb. Drawn comb is our most valuable resource- don’t cut it out, nor throw it away.

Questions are difficult to answer

With multiple hives and various types of hives these questions are difficult to answer in some cases

RESPONSE: We recognize that some questions are hard to answer and with more colonies and more apiaries it becomes very very difficult. The average beekeeper responding has 2 to 3 colonies in one site and they have an easier time responding. We are open to verbiage suggestions, feel free to email them to us & thank you for the comment.

Early spring swarming altering counts?

On section 11: I wanted to reply 3-4 colonies, based on my current hives swarming. Went from 2-3 hives due to a swarm from one of my hives this April 2016. Questions about packages of bees vs. swarms of bees might be of use in terms of overwintering, Queen health and survival. With regard to varroa control, allowing for natural swarming to break the mite cycle might be an informative category. In terms of learning beekeeping, my best source has been the online Warre listserv. Might want to include such a category (yahoo groups) in your questions. Thanks so much for doing this! I look forward to seeing the results.

RESPONSE: That you for your comments although we do get at many of them within survey questions.  Allowing annual swarming might be a good response option to split out. I think online sources should be an option – will see about adding it & we do have category other which is where you would state this. We will transfer it from here this year.

Survey glitch – # of active colonies

In Section 1c you ask “How many active colonies do you currently own?” Since I lost both my colonies during the winter and have not purchased new ones this spring my answer would be “0”… only it won’t let me enter 0. For three years (2012, 2013 and 2015) I have started with 2 nucs each spring and so far none has made it through the winter (no dead bees anywhere). The first two years I chose to do very little and just let the bees be. I took a class and read a little but did not go to club meetings or had a mentor. Last year I realized that I had to do more so I started networking but developed a severe allergy in July that prevented me from working with the bees and take measures for winter. This year I will not purchase nucs but will try to either catch a swarm or bait them with a swarm trap and also make an effort to learn more (read more, find a mentor, classes etc)

RESPONSE: Thank you for your comments. This was meant to be another way to check the active colony count but has since been edited to allow for 0,0 entries for just this reason. It was fixed about a week into the collection period. Nucs are tough to get through the season – I see you have not had much success so far. However given that we know colonies get heavy mite numbers, and you have elected not to control mites, that is not surprising. It is a perfectly acceptable method of keeping bees- starting anew each season with a new nuc is a practice that several elect to practice. Trust you are able to bait a swarm or hear about one to capture as a way to put onto the drawn comb you have form previous nuc colonies.

Bee PMS

They died because I was gone for 5 months (Oct – Mar) Tried to feed them pollen/fondant while I was gone but it turned semi liquid ran into hive and one colony absconded and the other moved to one side and starved with honey in the hive (but not above them).

RESPONSE: Thanks for your comment on the PNW survey. Sounds like an instance of Bee PMS – so nothing would have helped. Running of feed does occur on occasion – but it was due largely to bees in poor health. The bees moving off brood area is very typical of Bee PMS.  I hope you have better luck this next time around.