ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: Orange County, NC Beekeepers
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- From: Randall Austin <ra41717 AT gmail.com>
- To: Bynum Hoekstra <bynumhoekstra AT gmail.com>, "mmorrissey AT fastmail.fm" <mmorrissey AT fastmail.fm>
- Cc: Orange County Beekeepers Association <ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org>
- Subject: Re: [ocba] USGS - Early Spring declared
- Date: Wed, 1 Mar 2017 08:50:12 -0500
Bynum & Michael, Without anything else to go on, I can only assume that the blooming times have shifted this year, they haven't been rearranged or enhanced. All beekeeping is local and you may have agriculture, etc. nearby that change your patterns, but for most of Orange County, the relative March dearth comes between the maple bloom (January/February) and the tulip poplar bloom (the main honey flow in April/May) (see article <here>). The dearth is "relative", not absolute -- there are plenty of blooming plants but the bee population has built up so much on the maple pollen that the amount of nectar available isn't sufficient to feed all of those new hungry mouths. A beekeeper who doesn't watch stores in March can easily have colonies starve. Now maybe the warm days we've had have enabled the bees to more effectively harvest the nectar that is available (e.g. there are more days with adequate flying temperatures). So maybe we can hope for more March honey than normal. However I wouldn't count on that -- hope for the best, plan for the worst. At my place, the main harvestable flow starts with tulip poplar, and that is still several weeks/a month or more away. Michael -- I did my first-of-year inspections last weekend and
found 2 boomers that I will be making splits from this week in a
desperate attempt to ward off swarming. The rest of my colonies
were a bit advanced for this time of year but they don't look like
they'll be starting the swarming process in the next few weeks. If
you've got LOTS of bees then checkerboarding (alternating drawn
but empty comb in the broodnest with frames that contain brood)
may be a good strategy for providing space in the broodnest, but
beware of very cold nights. The bees in cluster must be able to
cover the brood or the brood on the edges will freeze to death.
Spreading out the nest by checkerboarding makes covering the brood
harder to do. Randall On 2/28/2017 6:21 PM, Bynum Hoekstra
wrote:
|
-
Re: [ocba] USGS - Early Spring declared,
Randall Austin, 03/01/2017
-
Re: [ocba] USGS - Early Spring declared,
mmorrissey, 03/01/2017
- Re: [ocba] USGS - Early Spring declared, Randall Austin, 03/01/2017
-
Re: [ocba] USGS - Early Spring declared,
mmorrissey, 03/01/2017
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