I received an email from my beehost yesterday and it was extremely bad
news. This past Sunday, it went up to 47F degrees. And some of the bees
ventured out of one of our beehives. But unfortunately, they were
unaware that it's actually winter and snow on the ground.
The bees became disoriented and could not find there way back to the
beehive. These warm spells are the worst because they get tricked into
thinking it's spring and so they will come out of the hive to forage and
look for food. But with the snow all over the ground, they become confused.
Seeing all these honeybees frozen, trying to get back to the hive makes me so sad and want to cry. I feel heartbroken. I really hope there are enough bees inside the hive to keep the Queen alive. I almost can't wait until the end of next month to open the hive and see what's going on inside.
Oh no, this made me sad to read of the confusion and demise of your bees. I do hope the queen and the hive survives.
ReplyDeletePoor bees :( Hope it's good news when you're able to inspect.
ReplyDeleteThis could just be a bit of spring housekeeping...cleaning out the dead winter bees that have fallen onto the bottom board. Looks like you are getting a few really warm days coming up...you might want to take the opportunity of a nice warm day to do a quick hive check, and maybe install a syrup feeder to give them emergency rations through the last bit of the cold weather. What were your hive winterizing measures this winter?
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