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Subject: Orange County, NC Beekeepers
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- From: Randall Austin <ra41717 AT gmail.com>
- To: Orange County Beekeepers <ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org>
- Subject: Re: [ocba] Package bees
- Date: Thu, 29 Mar 2012 09:04:14 -0400
The advice I give is the same as Liz's but Catherine's caveat about
the extreme is important. Another aspect of this topic that first-year beekeepers need to be aware of is that summertime in Piedmont NC is a dry spell with respect to nectar. Once the main honey flow stops sometime in June, there will be two to three months where not much nectar is coming in, or at least not much relative to the hive population. So springtime MUST be build-up time. If your new hive is holding its own during the honey flow but isn't storing up lots of extra, it will be at risk of starvation in July and August. So Catherine's point about monitoring the inventory and taking action based on what you find is very important. Another wrinkle to this is that my bees only draw out comb in times of plenty. So if I have frames that need drawing, springtime is the time to do it. Feeding may be needed even in a honey flow if the foraging force is too small to provide daily needs, storage needs AND fuel for comb-making. If I hit mid-summer without enough comb to store honey or sugar syrup in, my hive is in trouble. Every hive, every beekeeper, every locational situation and every beekeeping philosophy is different so your needs & responses to them may differ accordingly! Randall Austin On 3/28/2012 10:31 PM, Catherine Adamson wrote: For what it's worth, I disagree about feeding until they stop taking it. Many colonies, in my experience, will keep sucking down sugar syrup long after they have enough nectar coming in. |
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[ocba] Package bees,
Kitty Cunningham, 03/28/2012
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Message not available
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Re: [ocba] Package bees,
Kitty Cunningham, 03/28/2012
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Re: [ocba] [NaturalBeesinNC] Re: Package bees,
Catherine Adamson, 03/28/2012
- Re: [ocba] Package bees, Randall Austin, 03/29/2012
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Re: [ocba] [NaturalBeesinNC] Re: Package bees,
Catherine Adamson, 03/28/2012
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Re: [ocba] Package bees,
Kitty Cunningham, 03/28/2012
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Message not available
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