Feed for bees

There are many options for feeding bees. There is sugar water, High Fructose Corn Syrup and ProSweet. They all have pluses and minuses. Using the right feed at the right time can lead to better quality bees and increasing winter survival. Let's break them down.

• Sugar, sugar has been the feed that beekeepers have used for the last one hundred years. Table sugar" or "granulated sugar" refers to sucrose. It is mixed with water and fed to the bees. The spring mixture of sugar and water is 1 part sugar to one part water. Fall mixture is heavy syrup, 2 parts sugar and one part water. The bees take this mixture of feed down into the hive and use the carbohydrate for their food and wax production. The bees need to turn this feed from sugar water to honey for long term storage. Sugar water will ferment with time. If the bees don't take it fast enough, sometime the syrup spoils and has to be thrown out.
• High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS). A fructose based sugar. There is two types of HFCS, HFCS 42 and HFCS 55. HFCS 42 granulates very quickly, about 2 weeks to granulate, not many commercial beekeepers use this. HFCS 55 is widely used by commercial beekeepers, it can granulate within a month. Heating HFCS can produce toxins for the bees, that is why with HFCS 55, only purchase what you need to use. HFCS will add weight quickly to a hives winter stores. HFCS is sold by Mann Lake and their dealer network. Mann Lake has the exclusive North American contract with Cargill to sell HFCS to beekeepers. A commercial beekeeper would order a half a semi truckload or full truckload of syrup for their operation. Hobby beekeepers sometimes struggle with the problem of granulation with HFCS.
• ProSweet, ProSweet is a custom feed developed by Mann Lake. It is widely used by both hobbyists and commercial beekeepers. It is purchased in the semi truckload or in 2-1/2 gallon or 5 gallon containers. ProSweet is both sucrose and fructose. Honey is both glucose (which has the same general sweetness as sucrose) and fructose. Honey weighs 12 lbs per gallon, ProSweet weighs 11.55 lbs per gallon. ProSweet does not granulate or ferment. For spring feeding ProSweet gives the developing bees the proper nutrition for proper gland development, because of the providing both sucrose and fructose. ProSweet is available to use direct from the container it comes in. No mixing required. It lasts from one season to the next. Out of all the feeds out there, ProSweet is the most attractive for the bees in my opinion. For fall feeding the bees can take down ProSweet and do not have to dehumidify the syrup, like they have to do for sugar water. ProSweet is more concentrated than sugar water. If you feed a gallon of sugar water, after the bees work to dehumidify the syrup the net amount of syrup is less than a gallon that was started with. The net food after the fact may only be about 2/3rds of a gallon. With ProSweet, you feed a gallon and the net amount of food in the hive is one gallon. So a beekeeper has to feed more sugar water to get the same amount of feed as ProSweet. That leads to increased trips to the hive costing time and gas money. If a beekeeper needs to feed a lot of syrup to a hive, if it gets cool the bees may not be able to get enough sugar water into the hive. The bees may then starve from lack of food. Or the bees may not have enough time to convert sugar water to honey. This may cause the sugar water to ferment in the hive. Fermented syrup and honey can give the bees dysentery and cause the hives demise. By feeding sugar syrup for a long time in the fall can lead to more brood in the colony and higher mite counts. The higher mite counts can increase viruses in the bees. With ProSweet, beekeepers don't have these problems. Feeding is done quickly and the bees don't have to do anything extra for their feed to be ready for winter.

feeding sugar

If a colony is light on winter stores emergency feeding is in order. I do feed dry sugar using a 1 x 2 frame, putting wax paper on top of the frames and pouring sugar on the wax paper. Heaping the sugar on one end, filling up the frame. I leave the end open so the bees can move up into the sugar if they need the feed. The frame does not need the cross supports like in the picture. This was a frame for using formic acid pads. But it works well for feeding sugar. It is easy to heap up 10 - 20 lbs of sugar. Sugar can be easily added later if need be. The bees will chew up the wax paper and more will need to be added if more sugar is added later in winter.
 I do cover the hive with a black winter cover. The hole on the cover usually needs to be elongated to accommodate the added height of the wooden frame.

Feeding

Beekeepers are getting in their last chores of the season. Making sure a colony has sufficent stores for winter survival is one of the last hurdles to cross for getting the hives ready for wintering. A colony of bees eats about 12 lbs of honey a month. This is about a frame and a quarter of honey. When brood rearing starts sometime in February, the honey consumption will increase. We can feed syrup again in early March, so that is our target for food stores. While this is a general rule of food consumption, use of stores can increase or decrease by the size of the overwintering cluster.
 For wintering we would like the following, if you have checked them off already that is a good place to be.

• Have a colony as mite free as possible

• In a perfect world, we would like to see 8 full frames of honey and one partially filled frame, say about two thirds full. The partially filled frame is located in the middle of the top box. The reason for the partially filled frame is that when the bees move up in January, transitioning from the lower box into the top box, it is easier to move up on a little empty comb instead onto cold honey or frozen honey. The cluster can move up and warm up adjacent honey in the moving process. The box under the top box should have about four frames of honey. This should give them enough food for winter. 
• Feeding should be done as rapidly as possible. Don't drag this out over six weeks. Feeding with a quart jar with six holes in the lid, does not cut it for fall feeding. Feed with multiple feeder pails or a hive top feeder. With 40,000 bees in the hive, feeders will get empty quickly. If colonies are close to being full, you can feed one colony, then three days later feed the next one. Or, if you have the feeders, feed them all.
• Your choice of feed for fall feeding is 2:1 sugar syrup, two parts sugar to one part water. The bees will have to suck this down, store it in the cells, dehumidify it to turn it into honey. After the bees turn it into honey, the net amount of actual food will be about 2/3rds of what you put in. Meaning if you fed 10 pounds of 2:1 sugar syrup, your net of honey would be around 7 lbs.
• Feeding with ProSweet. ProSweet is similar to honey. It weighs about 11.5 lbs per gallon. The bees can take down ProSweet and put it into the cells and they don't have to do anything to it. Put it in the cells and they are done. If you give the bees 10 pounds of ProSweet, they have 10 pounds of food.

How to feed fast:

Three feeder pails can be put right on top of the frames this time of year. The bees will drain them in about 3-4 days. Cover with and empty brood box and inner and tele cover.
Feeding with a top hive feeder:



Feeding needs to happen now. Feed fast and get it done. The longer we feed, the longer brood is in the hive. The longer brood is in the hive, the more mites we get. Feeding spurs brood production. Get the feeding done. We want the queen to stop laying, so when we treat with oxalic acid in late October, hopefully the hive will be broodless. With a broodless hive, all the mites that are left in the hive are on the bees. The oxalic acid treatment will put a serious hurt on any left over mites. Then the colony will be ready for the rigors of winter.

Time to finish pre winter work

This is a heads up. October first is one week away. For some of us, it was August just yesterday and now it is almost October. This fall is moving too fast.
 There is work to finish up now before it gets too cool.
Mite treatments. If mite treatments have not been done and a beekeepers wants to still do it, the miticide of choice should be ApiVar.
 Now with the cooler weather coming on, several mite treatments would not be effective. ApiVar is a contact strip. The strips are put in for 42 days and have to be removed after the treatment is finished. That would be removing the strips around mid November. The strips must be removed. The strips cannot be left in the hive.
 Feeding, as the weather gets cooler into the 40's, feeding can get more difficult. When syrup gets cold, the bees will not take the syrup very well. If feeding is still needed, feed now with 2:1 heavy syrup sugar water or ProSweet syrup.
 The advantage here is ProSweet. The bees will fill the frames with ProSweet and no other work is needed by the bees.
 The bees need to convert sugar water to honey. As it cools off, late feeding sugar syrup becomes tougher for the bees. The ability to have the time too convert the sugar water to honey becomes a greater challenge.
 Beekeepers are in the home stretch with their season. Time to get the chores done to help the bees survive the rigors of winter.

Getting ready for winter

 OK beekeepers, winter preparations are under way. This is the to do list.

• Pull and Extract honey
  
• Treat for mites ASAP
• Feed your bees
•  Entrance reducers go in if robbing is a problem or if the temperatures start cooling off. 

This is a list of what not to do

• Do not feed pollen to the bees
• Do not feed late
• Do not wait to treat for mites

 Mite treatments need to get done as soon as possible. If you are doing mite counts and only seeing one or two mites in a sample, you need to treat. If you don't treat, your next mite sample in mid September will have 10 mites in the sample. The hive population falls this time of year, but the mite population explodes. Get in front of the mites not behind. Damage to your bees will be happening soon and the hive may not be able to recover.

 Do not feed pollen to your bees. Bees this time of year will start to shift gears and start to make Winter Bees. Winter Bees have a different physiology than summer bees. Winter Bees have the ability to store more fat. It is this phenomena that helps the bees survive the rigors of winter. It is the scarcity of pollen that makes the bees shift to producing Winter Bees. If you feed pollen to your bees, there will no dearth in pollen. Maybe there will be no winter bees in your hive and the bees set to winter will not be prepared for the onslaught of cold weather. Plus with pollen on the hive, the bees may make too many bees and the bees will starve by eating all their winter stores too quickly.

 Feeding, I like having a hive heavy with honey going into winter. I think it helps the bees get through winter with less stress on the hive. But with fall feeding, you do not want to feed for a month. The feeding should be done quickly. Longer and later feeding leads to more mites in the hive. Longer feeding keeps brood in the hive longer. Late brood in the hive, makes for ineffective Oxalic Acid treatments in late October. Get the hive topped off and filled with honey. To do this, multiple feeders should be employed. If you fed your bees with jars with holes in the lids, don't use them. Fall feeding is like feeding the Conehead family. Give the bee family mass quantities of syrup. My favorite feeder for fall feeding is a hive top feeder. It holds four gallons of syrup. The bees can empty if in about four days. The other way to feed is multiple feeder pails placed directly on the frames top bars. This is three gallons of syrup and the bees will empty the pails in about three days. In the fall I like using ProSweet bee syrup. ProSweet is similar to honey, the bees do not have to dehumidify it. The bees take down the ProSweet and put the syrup in the comb and they are done. 2:1 Sugar syrup on the other hand, the bees take it down, then have to turn it to honey and lower the humidity. More work on their part. With ProSweet if you give the bees four gallons of syrup, that will be the equivalent of about 45 lbs of honey. Now if you give the bees four gallons for 2:1 sugar syrup, after the bees dehumidify the sugar syrup and turn it to honey, you may end up with 36 lbs of honey. Quite a difference and more work for the beekeeper. 

 The bee season is changing quickly, beekeepers need to get after it to get the hives ready for winter.

 

Emergency Feeding (click on photo to enlarge)

I looked at some of my bees today and noticed that a few of the hives were low on food stores. I didn’t want to start feeding syrup yet because this would promote brood rearing. With cold weather on the horizon, excessive brood could lead to colony starvation. I opted for feeding granulated sugar. Here’s how you can feed your bees during the cold winter months without promoting brood rearing.

Remove the covers off the top of the hive. The cluster of bees should move to the top of the hive when they are low on food stores.

Smoke the bees and lay a single sheet of wax paper on top of the frames.

I made a 1-1/2" shim to sit on the top of the box.

Pour granulated sugar across the hive on top of the wax paper. Heap it up as necessary. The bees will eat the sugar and it will not be stimulated for brood rearing. They will chew the wax paper while consuming the sugar. It is easy to peek later on to see if the food is gone or not. If it is gone or there is just a little left, give them more wax paper and sugar.

Remember to leave access to the sugar never cover all the frames with wax paper.

Being the sugar is under the moisture board and inner cover it will moisten by the bee's respiration. I usually throw a little snow on part of the sugar to give them water right away. Put the covers back on (inner cover, moisture board, winter cover, and, finally, telescoping cover).

Emergency Feeding

Bees on top in November is bad. This usually means not enough food.

I take one sheet of wax paper and lay it across the top bars of the top box. Put a 1x2 frame ( a sugar shim ) that will fit the box.
Notice the wax paper does not cover all the frames. The bees need access.

I cover the wax paper with granulated sugar. Heaping it up the sides of the wood shim.

The bees will move up and eat the sugar if needed. They will also shred the wax paper. Checking this monthly with a lit smoker, more wax paper and sugar.

Working quickly, this can be done anytime in the winter.
I don't want to bury the bees under wax paper when they start using the sugar. Trimming the wax paper may be required.

Cover the sugar shim with the inner cover and moisture board. The black cardboard cover top entrance hole will have to be readjusted to accommodate the increased height of the sugar shim.

I have a colony that does not have enough food. It has about 6 frames of honey. I know I should let it go but I will try to see if it can make it.
When I opened it I saw the bees under the inner cover. I know the bees should be in the lower box right now. They will move up into the upper box in January. If the bees are in the top box now it usually means they are short on stores and will starve during the winter.
I will put on granulated sugar to give them a chance. Granulated sugar in not a nectar flow to the bees. They will not raise brood while eating it. Sugar water is a nectar flow and produces brood production. I want this in March not November.
The sugar goes on now and I will check it monthly to keep it full. This technique works in late winter for a starving colony.
A beekeeper could do this now on any colony with normal stores. Checking on it in early Feb. It the bees have used it add more. If they never use it, take it off the hive and make sugar water in March.

Feeding

This is the time of year beekeepers need to get their feeding done as fast as possible.
 To get the feed in a hive quickly, a few different fall feeding methods can be used.
Beekeepers can use multiple pails on a hive. Three feeder pails can be put right on top of the top bars of the top box. It is warm now and there is 50,000 bees in the hive. So beekeepers can take advantage of this by feeding multiple feeders to get the feed in fast. The bees can empty three gallons from the feeder pails in three to four days.
 Using a hivetop feeder is another way to feed a large quantity of syrup to a hive. A hive top feeder holds four gallons of syrup. A larger of number of bees have access to the syrup and the bees can put the four gallon away in about three to four days.
 Feeding ProSweet is the best fall food. ProSweet is similar to honey and the bees take it down and put it into the frames. The do not have to do anything to the ProSweet. The bees put it into the cells in the frame and they are done.
 With 2:1 sugar water, the bees have to dehumidify the sugar water and convert it to honey. Which takes time and energy.
 To compare, a gallon of ProSweet is one gallon of food that the bees get. A gallon of sugar water is by my estimate about 75% of a gallon of food after the syrup is dehumidified and converted into honey.

 three feeder pails on the top bars for fall feeding

 

empty box surrounding feeder pails

Corn and Sugar Commodity Prices

The drought that is gripping a large part of the nation will be seen by beekeepers starting late this year. The corn crop has taken a major hit. Even E-85 fuel will rise or possibly be curtailed in the short term so corn can be used as food. The smaller corn harvest will more than likely lead to higher sugar prices. Feeding bees will become more expensive. As corn prices go up so will the price of high fructose corn syrup (HFCS). Many beekeepers feed their bees HFCS and will incur higher costs.
The price of sugar will also rise. Even though the sugar beet harvest to my knowledge hasn't been impacted by the drought, the higher HFCS prices will drag the price of sugar with it.
Many bee suppliers of HFCS buy contracts of thousands of lbs of HFCS for a set price. Once the contract is satisfied a new one is negotiated. This new contract will undoubtedly be a higher price.
As a hobby beekeeper buying some extra sugar is not a bad idea. Long term storage of sugar can make the sugar get hard and difficult to liquify. ProSweet does have an advantage that it will not granulate for at least a year and will store nicely.
 The silver lining in this all is that the price of honey will also rise. Hopefully the higher honey prices will more than offset the sugar shock that beekeepers may see down the road.

Bee Work, our schedule is growing shorter

The window for feeding and mite treatments is getting less every week.
 Extended forecasts for daily temperatures is heading into a cooler trend. As it cools off ApiGuard and MAQS ( Miteaway quick strips) will not be as effective. ApiGuard and MAQS need warmer temperatures to work effectively.
The next week to 10 days will work for MAQS.  Starting ApiGuard now would be a bad choice in the twin cities and points north. ApiGuard is a month long treatment and there will not be time temperature wise to get a full treatment regimen in.
 Moving forward, from the third week of September. The options for mite treatments will be ApiVar and Hopguard. Both of these mite treatment are contact strips and will work in the cooler fall daily temperatures.
 Feeding if needed should be done now. Beekeepers need to get any feeding done as fast as possible. Feeding promotes brood production because it is a nectar flow. Brood will be raised during a nectar flow. A hive can have brood present 30 days after feeding ceases. It is best to get feeding done by late September if possible. Right now the bees will take the syrup down very quickly. As the temperatures cool the bees become reluctant to take it down. The bees do not like cold syrup.
 Feeding ProSweet instead of sugar water is easier for the bees. ProSweet syrup is just like honey. It has fructose and sucrose. The bees store it in the cells and they are done with refining it. With sugar water the bees have to dehumidify it and turn it into honey. More work and it takes time. Nature's Nectar LLC does carry five gallon pails of ProSweet.
 The winter set up for food is this:

• The top box should have eight full frames of honey and one partially full frame. The partially full frame should be in the center.
• The second or bottom box (if in a two deep hive ) should have four full frames of honey, two frames on the outside of both sides of the box. The bottom box of a three brood box hive should have two full frames of honey on the outside ends of the box.

• Do not put partially filled boxes on top of a hive. The bees may move up into this box in late winter and starve even though honey is in the box below. If you have partially filled boxes, place them now on top of the inner cover. The bees will move up and bring the honey down to the brood nest.

 Feeding ProSweet. The pails now come with an e-z pour spout. The five gallon lid does not have to be removed.

It is time for a quick peek

Feeding sugar for emergency feed. ( click to enlarge)

This weekend it is going to get cold.
I am looking forward to next week. It should be warm enough for a quick peek.
Looking at my hives this time of year I never know what to expect. Dead bees in front of the hive spread around in the snow, that's normal.
All the covers still on, that's good. A quick look at the upper entrance may have live bees crowded at the entrance, some maybe taking cleansing flights.
My bee suit is on the smoker is lit. Taking the cover off, flaps go up on the winter cover, a couple puffs of smoke under the moisture board and the entrance holes.
Lifting off the moisture board a quick gaze at the inner cover hole. Alive or dead? A little smoke, the inner cover comes up. Time for the quick peek.
I am prepared for several scenarios,

• If dead, I look for a cluster of bees and try to determine the cause. If I see the bees with their heads stuck in the cells of a empty frame with their butts looking at me it is a sign of starvation. I clean up all the loose dead bees, close off all the openings and order replacements.
• If alive, how strong are they, 4 frames of adhering bees is a good number. Less than this they may be to weak and I may consider replacements. Is there food? It would be nice to have at least 3 frames of capped honey near the cluster of bees. If there is no capped honey near the cluster and I have some in the top box. I might quickly move a frame next to the cluster.
• No honey, I brought with me a roll of wax paper, a wood sugar shim, and a 10 lb bag of sugar. Smoking the bees down a bit, the 1-1/2" wood shim goes on, a sheet of wax paper not covering the bees if possible and not covering all the frames. I pour the bag of sugar on the waxed paper. The bees will eat the sugar for food, hopefully making it until March when I can feed syrup.
• Not much left to do. I close up the hives. Next inspection in March when I will feed syrup and pollen patties.
  

Late winter hive work

Put the pollen patties right where the bees are. They need to be able to touch the patty. Leave the wax paper on both sides of the patty. Replace if the patty starts getting hard or moldy.

We are now turning the corner on winter and transitioning into spring. Right now there should be brood in a live hive. The queen should be laying. The amount of brood can vary widely from hive to hive. Several factors can influence this, available pollen in the hive, hive strength, room for queen to lay.
 Sometime this week, pollen patties can be put on the hive. Once pollen patties go on, they should be checked every ten days or so. If they are being consumed, replacements should be offered as needed. Do not let the colony run out of patties. This can set them back and brood could perish from lack of protein. A steady supply of pollen assures good hive development. Poor protein supply results in poor quality bees that will have shorter lives and improper glandular development.
 Natural pollen collection can be interrupted by an extended cool or wet weather. Keeping pollen patties on the hive assures always having a protein source for the bees. I leave pollen patties on the hive until the dandelions come out. Then the fruit bloom comes with fruit trees and ornamental flowering trees. After the fruit bloom there is usually a dearth of pollen. I normally put pollen patties back on from mid May until early June. Package bees will need pollen on the hive from the time they are installed into a hive, until early June.
 The introduction of pollen into the hive will kick the hive into more brood production. More brood means greater consumption of honey stores. 
 Feeding sugar syrup or ProSweet may be required to keep the colony alive.
A beekeeper needs to judge whether feeding is necessary. Lifting up the top box should give you a clue if feeding is required. If a groan is involved in the lifting process, there is probably enough food for now, in the top box. If the top box seems light, give the colony a pail of syrup.
 The problem that beekeepers run into is, overfeeding. This is a common problem with spring feeding. If a beekeeper feeds pail after pail of syrup on an overwintered colony, the bees will fill their hive with syrup. This will leave no place for the queen to lay and the hives population may suffer.
 When feeding package bees or when drawing out comb on new foundation, feeding needs to be constant until the comb is all drawn out.
 Not much else to do yet. Keep the winter covers on for another couple weeks.

What's happening in the hive right now

This latest stretch of warm weather has come at the right time. This is the time of year when bees move from the lower box into the top box. The warm weather makes it easy for the bees to make this transition. I talked to some beekeepers who said their hives were heavy with honey going into the winter. They told me their bees had not moved up yet.
 While some other beekeepers told me their bees had already moved up into the top box and they were not sure if the bees had enough food for late winter.
 There should not be any egg laying going on yet. I hope that the high 30's that we will be experiencing does not get the queen to start laying. If the colony starts making brood, honey consumption will increase. If a colony is light on food starvation may occur.
 The queen will start laying and the bees will eat honey to keep the brood warm. This extra consumption of honey will deplete honey stores around the brood. The bees will then move out to nearby frames to acquire honey to keep the brood warm.
 This all works well as long as there is honey to get and the weather stays warm. If the weather gets very cold, the bee cluster contracts to concentrate their heat cluster. The bees cluster around the brood doing everything they can to keep the brood warm. If the bees have depleted their honey stores around the brood and the cluster contracts off of nearby honey stores, starvation can happen.
A beekeepers can go out on a warm day and quickly open a hive and move or add a frame of honey next to the cluster. Don't disrupt the cluster. A full frame of honey is usually enough honey to feed a colony for about three weeks. A little less if there is brood rearing going on.
 Emergency feeding methods can be taken to try to get a colony to survive. A candy board, winter patties, or granulated sugar can be added to the top bars for emergency feed.

 Checking a hive for food stores in winter

feeding granulated sugar on top of wax paper. A 1-1/2" shim is used to give room to heap up sugar. You don't need the cross bars.

Heap up granulated sugar. The bees will move up on the sugar and chew up the wax paper as the cluster moves and consumes the sugar. Check it after two weeks and add more if needed. It is easy to heap up 10 to 15 lbs of sugar on top of the wax paper. Don't cover the cluster of bees, they need to be able to get up on the wax paper.

 

 Candy board one method. Don't add any pollen

 

Feeding

As we head into Sept, now is the time to make sure enough there is enough food in the hive. Right now the heaviest box of honey should be the top box. The top box should have at least 8 full frames of honey. The next box below this should have four full frames of honey. If the hive doesn't have this amount of honey feeding should be started immediately.
Waiting to feed can cause a couple problems:

• As the weather starts to cool the bees become more reluctant to take feed. The risk of not having enough food in the hive becomes greater.

• Whenever bees are fed, it is considered a nectar flow. A nectar flow encourages the queen to lay eggs and make more brood. Feeding late will keep brood in the hive for another month after the feeding stops. If a beekeeper feeds into mid October to early November, brood may be in the hive into December. The colony will have to eat more of their winter stores to feed the brood and keep it warm. This increased honey consumption can lead to colony starvation in late winter.

 The bees right now will take the honey down quickly because there are many more bees in the hive than when most of us were feeding in the spring. Feeder pails will be emptied in about 3 days because of the higher bee numbers.
 Fall feeding is heavy syrup or 2 parts sugar to 1 part water, or feed ProSweet syrup. Feeding heavy syrup the bees have to take it down and dehumidify to turn it into honey. The advantage of ProSweet is the bees don't have to turn it into honey, the bees take it down and store it in the frames and they are done.
  Adding ProHealth or some other equivalent to any syrup will also help keep down Nosema spores in the bees gut. Nosema is a stress disease that bees can get in late winter and can kill a colony. It is recommended that all colonies are fed two gallons of treated syrup in the fall.

The nectar flow in mid Aug

I use this drywall mud mixer to mix sugar syrup. When it is 2:1 the sugar is tough to get mixed in. Some hot water (not boiling) with the sugar mixed in liquefies quickly with this method.

I have really seen the nectar flow slow down in my area. Not much going in the supers. Goldenrod is blooming but I usually never see much of that honey around here.
Now my attention is pulling honey, feeding and mite treatments. Pulling my honey by labor day is usually my goal so I can treat for Varroa before it gets to cool for Api-Guard to be effective. It is not a bad idea to pull the honey by the last week of August, feed that week then treat with Api-Guard. Feeding early helps the bees shut down brood rearing early. By feeding into Oct & Nov. usually means there is brood in the colony as late as Thanksgiving or later. This late brood rearing makes a colony more inclined to starve in mid to late winter because the bees depleted their stores keeping the brood fed and warm into Dec. A hive in winter consumes about 12 to 14 lbs a month. If the bees eat 18 - 20 lbs in Dec and we have a cold winter, look out for the grim reaper.
Remember an overwintered hive needs two gallons of heavy 2:1 (2 parts sugar 1 part water) syrup with Fumigilan in the syrup to prevent Nosema in the spring.

Feeding

 When to feed? If you went out to your hive today and your top brood box is not full of honey, you need to feed right away. Or, if you have finished your mite treatments and do not have enough winter stores, you need to feed now.
 Our weather right now has been on the cool side. Weather sometimes gets in a trend. The trend at the moment is on the cool side. I have looked at long term fall weather forecasts. The forecast is for cooler weather, with colder weather as we move into late October and November.
 When it gets cool, the bees do not take syrup very well. If your hive needs more winter stores, feeding NOW is the best strategy.
 For winter stores the top brood box needs 8 full frames of honey and one partially filled frame (located in the center of the top box). The brood box under the top box should have four frames of honey, two frames on either side of the box.
 When we feed we need to feed fast and hard. Feeding needs to get done as fast as we can do it. The longer we feed the more mites can be produced. So it is in our best interest to get feeding done.
 I call it feeding hard. Getting as much syrup as we can in the fastest time frame. Don't feed with one feeder pail, use three feeder pails. There is 40,000 bees in the hive and they can empty feeder pails in a couple days. A hive top feeder may be a better choice. A hive top feeder holds four gallons. The screened access the bees use to get the syrup, lets hundreds of bees feed at the same time. You don't need a hive top feeder for every hive. Feed one hive, then move it to another hive.
 The syrup being fed is 2:1 sugar syrup, two parts sugar to one part water. The bees then have to dehumidify the syrup and turn it to honey. This takes time. When it is cold, sometimes it is hard for the bees to finish the syrup.
 ProSweet in my opinion is the best feed. The bees don't have to convert it to honey. The bees put it in the comb and they are done with it. Nature's Nectar LLC offers the best deal on ProSweet.

Fall feeding using three pails, resting directly on the frames. It is warm out and we do not have to put the pails on the inner cover.

You can see the three pails fit. The bees will empty the pails in about 3-4 days.

Hive Setup For Winter And Feeding

Now that the honey flow is over for most of us, it is time to make sure the hive is set for winter. Mite treatments should be ongoing or completed by now.
Honey has to be in the upper boxes. Bees will not move down for honey in the winter. Never leave a partially filled deep box or super on top of hive. If the bees move into this box they may consume the available honey and starve, even though there is honey in the box below.
 The top box on the hive should have 8 full frames of honey and one partially full frame. With the partial frame in the middle.
 The box below should have four frames of honey in it. Position the frames two on each side. There should be honey in the other frames that have brood in the hive.
 If you are in a three deep hive, in a perfect world, two frames of honey on the outside, one on each side.
 If your hive does not have that, you need to feed. Feed NOW.
 The bees should take feed very good right now. As the daily temperatures decrease, the bees may not take the feed down very well. That is why we need to feed hard.
 When we feed, it spurs brood production because it is a nectar flow and the queen will lay. The later you feed, the longer there will be brood in the hive. With brood in the hive, the bees will consume more food feeding and keeping the brood warm. This can effect their winter stores. Also mites will start increasing in the brood.
 Fall feeding is 2 parts sugar to one part water. The bees have to convert it to honey. That does take time. If you put in 24 lbs of sugar water, the bees have to dehumidify the sugar water to convert it to honey. So the net amount of syrup put into the hive will be several pounds lighter because of evaporated water.
 Nature's Nectar carries ProSweet syrup. ProSweet is similar to honey. The bees do not have to convert it to honey. The bees put it into the cells and they are done. If you put in twenty four pounds of ProSweet that is what is put into the hive.
So feed hard. The bees will empty a pail in three days.
This is how to feed hard:

Three feeder pails can be placed directly on the top bars in the fall.

A hive top feeder holds four gallons of syrup. The bees come up through the slots under the screen. Whatever level the syrup is, in the syrup well, the bees can pick up. When the bees are feeding, the entire screen area is solid bees.

Hive top feeder

It is getting late

The window for feeding is getting smaller.
The weather forecaster from channel 5 said yesterday that we may see freezing temperatures in 7 to 10 days. As the temperatures cool off the bees will not take syrup as well as when it is in the 70's.
 Now is the time to feed your bees. The weather still is favorable for feeding.
The feed of choice right now is ProSweet. The bees can take it down and don't have to convert it to honey.
 Feeding sugar water, as we get later into the fall, the bees will have a harder time converting it to honey.
 The next few days and into early next week the temperatures are favorable for feeding.
 Any colder temperatures at this time, will not stress the bees. Winter covers don't have to be installed until November.
 Make the time to feed, now, if the bees need the feed.

Feeding in Oct

I have been asked several times why feeding should be over with by Oct 5th.
That date is just a date I always tried to shoot for to finish feeding. I know that the later it gets the bees can become reluctant at taking the syrup as it gets colder.
A beekeeper can feed into late Oct. but consider this. Feeding stimulates brood rearing. The later a hive is fed there will be brood hatching out a minimum of 21 days after the feeding is done. The bees have to keep the brood at a higher temperature so they will eat more of their winter stores. Also Varroa will still be increasing their numbers if brood is still being raised. The bees have to convert the sugar syrup to honey.
All of this takes more effort that can be prevented by finishing by early Oct.
If a hive needs to be fed then of course feed it. By putting two feeder pails on at once can get the food in the hive faster and not drag the feeding out another two weeks.

Hive Light On Winter Stores?

Mass feeding in late summer is easy. Three one gallon feeder pails right on the frames.

Three one gallon feeder pails covered with a deep. In late summer the bees will empty the three pails in about five days.

This time of year a beekeeper needs to check the hive for winter stores. If the colony had swarmed earlier in the summer, the hive might have missed the nectar flow and need some feeding. Waiting to feed later in the fall does have some pitfalls. If it cools off, the bees won't take the feed very well. Feeding spurs brood production. Normally, it is best to get the brood production to stop by late October. By feeding late, there may be brood in a colony past Thanksgiving. Having brood in a colony late, increases food consumption and colonies can starve easier in late winter.
 Right now the top brood box on a hive should pretty much be full of honey. If your colony does not have a full box of honey, feeding should start now. Don't wait to feed. Remove your supers.
 The bees will take feed very well right now. I would move full frames of honey to the outside of the top box and empty frames to the center. The bees will fill up the center frames easier that way. Feed heavy syrup 2:1 sugar and water or feed ProSweet bee feed.
  On the other hand, if your hive swarmed and all of your brood area is full of honey. You may need to extract out a few of the frames in the bottom box so the queen has room to lay.