Endless Summer Fries Seattle Forage

For the most part foliage around the Puget Sound has mostly shriveled up with the lack of rain this summer.  We've already had more 90F+ days on record than ever and it's early August.  This is a very unusual summer with trees and shrubs going dormant early or in some cases dying.  There are a few sources producing flowers but unless there is a reliable water source they aren't making much nectar/pollen. The only sliver lining of being in the city is that people water their yards/gardens and that does keep a few things going.

Besides keeping a close eye on hives to make sure they aren't starving, this is also the time of year that disease can take hold.  This is in part due to increasing mite population levels and the slowed brood rearing rates.  The treatment free way to address this is to create a brood break so that hives can "reset" and raise healthy winter bees.  If disease takes hold over the next 6 weeks hives won't be able to raise healthy winter bees and will die.

Many beekeepers miss these signs and end up pinning the cause of hive death on yellow jackets, queen failure, or starvation.  So if disease is happening NOW, here are a few scenarios that might play out:

• Disease will hit fast and kill the hive by the end of September.  You will find a queen running around with eggs in cells but insufficient bees to support her.  There might be some patches of capped dead brood from rapid brood-nest collapse. You may see PMS as well if you look early enough before things start to mold. 
• Same as the above except yellow jackets will sweep in and clean up the hive with no resistance.  You find an empty hive with a few dead bees and probably yellow jackets.
• Disease kicks in and the queen also gets sick and dies.  They are unable to raise a healthy new emergency queen with the high disease levels in the brood and lack of nurse bees.  They become a laying worker hive and die out early winter.
• Same as the above except the yellow jackets clean up the doomed hive when they don't have enough workers to defend it anymore.
• The hive will battle and overcome the disease.  However they will not have raised enough healthy winter bees.  They will go into fall with what looks like a good sized cluster, and then as summer bees die will be left with a tiny cluster.  The first freeze will take them out and it may look like starvation.  It will look like small moldy cluster if you find them in early spring.
• An alternative of the above is that they go into winter still trying to raise a lot of winter bees, but can't keep all the brood warm in the cooler weather with so many summer bees dying and the hive collapses.
• The hive manages to make it through several freezes but the cluster size isn't viable for them to ever build up in spring.

Basically there are many ways this can play out and I don't want to say that yellow jackets aren't a menace, especially with queen rearing and nucs, but the point I'm making is that I see them getting a lot more credit than they deserve.  I believe strong healthy hives can usually protect themselves from yellow jackets.  While starvation is another very real concern, it also gets blamed as the cause of death when it can also just be a symptom of an underlying disease.  Addressing issues now is the single most important thing you can do to get your hives through winter.

Hebe is blooming.  This variety is a late summer bloomer and a huge bee magnet.

Catananche caerulea is in bloom.

Fennel is in bloom and attracting all kinds of pollinators.

Salvia guaranitica 'Black and Blue' is in bloom.  I watched this poor bee struggle to wedge herself into flower after flower trying to get down deep enough to reach the nectar.  It's hard to say how successful she was.

Toad Lilly is blooming.

Globe Thistle (Echinops ritro)

This mid-summer flower will have bees falling over themselves to work, and it is not uncommon to see multiple types of bees, and butterflies working a single flower head in harmony.  Globe Thistle has spiked looking spherical blue/indigo flowers that are "hedgehog like" or Echinos in Greek.  While the common name says thistle this plant is actually in the aster family, and it's leaves do not have any spines that you would expect from a thistle.  However because the leaves are rough looking with deep cuts, and green on top with undersides that are slightly hairy and sliver green they can appear to resemble thistles.  This perennial is low maintenance, drought tolerant, and likes well drained soil which makes it well suited for local gardens.  Plant in full sun and water regularly to initially to establish plants.  New plants can be started from seed or root cuttings, while mature plants can be fussy when moved and do best when foliage is only cut back in spring.

Oregano is in bloom.

Butterfly bush is in bloom.  I've never noticed it to be a huge honey bee attractant.

Silk Tree (Albizia julibrissin) is finishing up it's bloom cycle.

Bee Balm (Monarda) is in bloom.

Russian Sage is mostly done blooming now.

American Chestnut was blooming early July this year.

Crocosmia ‘Lucifer’ just finished blooming.

Lilies are blooming.

Ginger is blooming.

Fireweed is in bloom.

Hive checks (7/11/2015)

Luna
The hive was very calm and was showing signs that the nectar flow was over.  They have several frames of capped honey and have started condensing the broodnest.  They built out the three bars I gave them a couple weeks ago, but I didn't add more as it looks like they are scaling back to deal with the dry weather.

The well liked queen.

Solis
Much like the Luna hive they were also in good shape and the queen has a good laying pattern.  I saw a few newly emerged worker bees as well from the new queen.  This hive was giving off a more floral scent than the Luna hive which was smelling more like Chestnut honey.

Nice patches of brood.

Good looking queen.

Hive checks (7/12/2015)
Queen Castle - Slot 4
If you are following my notes closely I never noted that I put bees in here when I did the join with the Loyal Heights Nuc and the Queen from Slot 3.  I originally broke that Loyal Heights Nuc into 4 parts, but actually ended up pulling another two frames out of it to make room for the merge that I had planned to use to raise new queens from one of my other hives (that I haven't had a chance to do yet).  Despite the fact I just threw a couple frames of bees in here they managed to make a new queen and she looks great.  I also found a nice area of 5-7 day old larvae.  Maybe she won't be pissy like her mother.  In general it's not a good idea to let little nucs make queens but these girls pulled it off.

Nice looking new queen.

Roma
The hive looks good.  The queen is scaling back and they have great honey stores for a smaller sized hive going into blackberries.  They have some pollen reserves.

The queen is looking good.

Nice frame of capped honey.

Queen Castle - Slot 2
They've filled up the space and are running out of room.  Things look really good.

Good looking queen.

Queen Castle - Slot 1
Still pissy, but the queen is a workhorse when it comes to laying and they are building comb.  They don't have much in the way of stores.  I will eventually replace this queen for calmer genetics.

Another great looking frame of brood makes it hard to get rid of this queen.

Her evil majesty.

Loyal Heights Nuc
There are still some pissy bees in here, but overall they are MUCH calmer.  The queen has been busy and the hive is full of bees again.

The queen is getting used to her new home.

Attis Nuc
I found a single nurse bee with DWV, otherwise it looks like the new queen has cleared up the issue.  They don't have much honey stored so I will need to keep an eye on them to see how they fare over the next few months.  The bees are very calm in this hive.

The queen looks good.

Hive checks (7/13/2015)
Plum Creek
They looked good and are still building up.  They have a little honey stored.  The queen looked good.

She's a big queen.

Quickdraw
Not a lot of extra honey, but LOTS of pollen of many colors.  It seems that they got a gene that prefers to hoard pollen over honey. The queen had also laid out the hive with brood and they are about to explode in numbers (not that they are small by any means already).  Like the nucs, the queen looked big and ready to lay a lot of eggs.  What I've been noticing in the mature hives is the queens have slimmed down a bit as they cut back.

I'm not really sure what to make of them since they seem to be out of alignment with the seasons.  On the one hand I like that they work a variety of floral sources, and on the other they are raising a lot of brood going into a dearth and they didn't store enough honey.  I fear that they could easily starve themselves planning for a nectar flow that isn't coming.

Lots of colorful pollen.

The queen is looking good.

They started to tear up their frame and then they changed their mind and started using it for worker brood.  You can see it used to be drone brood and there are still a few holes left.

Nice frame of brood on the way.

Took measurements of new brood comb they built and it measured in at 5.3mm.  This is quite a bit bigger than I would expect for a regressed hive to build.

Dyno
The hive is full of bees and I was happy to find that they scaled back on the brace comb a bit (still more than I would like but better).  There is a LOT of honey in here that they are drying.  They also had a lot of burgundy pollen and a good amount of brood.  Rearranged a few frames to help condense the broodnest and gave away one frame to Plum Creek to make a little more room.  The broodnest in this hive is about halfway back in the hive with the front frames being pollen, nectar, and honey which is a little unusual.  This is a hot/sunny location so perhaps it's easier to keep the back of the hive cooler.

Nice frame of brood.

The queen is looking good.

Hive checks (7/14/2015)
Rosemary
There was some bad cross comb that I couldn't completely fix and only got halfway through the inspection before stopping as not to upset them too much.  I did see the queen, larvae, and eggs, but my guess is most of the broodnest is in the front of the hive.  There is a good amount of honey in the hive but it was spread out all over and there were very few full frames.

This queen has been going for at least 3 years.

Hive checks (8/8/2015)
Attis
The good news is there was no sign of DWV or disease and the hive was calm.  I didn't find any drones.  The broodnest had a nice solid pattern but was small and only covering a few frames.  They also have poor stores of honey and pollen.

This queen is not very robust.

Rebel
This hive is doing well and all the frames had nice looking pollen and honey arches.  She has a nice laying pattern as well and they were calm.  No signs of disease and lots of young bees which is great because that was an issue for this hive before swapping out the queen.  Honey stores are spread out over many frames.  Only saw a few drones but they are raising more.

The queen is looking good.

Titan
Found a pile of dead bees on the ground in front of the entrance that mostly looked like drones.  I saw an occasional drone in the hive, but there weren't many.  They were also calm and there were lots of young healthy bees with a solid brood pattern.  There is honey, but they aren't capping it yet.

This could be a sign of good hygienic traits in response to illness, that they are conservative/sensitive to food shortages, or a warning that they aren't able to raise healthy drones.  Most of these drones looked like they were pulled from brood cells.  I didn't see signs of disease on them and suspect they pulled them in response to the dearth.

The queen is looking good and they have brood over many frames.

Back to the bees,

- Jeff

Late Summer Flowers Are An Ossais in the Dearth

Preparing for winter and surviving the summer dearth can be challenging for hives.  Hives have to conserve resources and try to find as much food as they can all while trying to avoid predators.  Yellow jackets circle around hives this time of year like sharks, waiting for a weak bee to fall to the ground or get knocked off balance while entering the hive.  Dry soils also make finding nectar rich flowers a challenge and bees need to visit more flowers to find food.  All of this is happening while hives are raising bees that will need to survive months until spring rather than a few mere weeks which makes good nutrition even more important.

Malva sylvestris 'Zebrina' is a desirable pollen and nectar source.

Silk Tree (Albizia julibrissin) is a nectar source.

Fireweed is a great nectar source if you have a lot of it around.

Heather is in bloom and a nectar source.

Sunflowers are a good pollen and nectar source.

Knotweed is a good nectar source if you have any around.  This is usually a #1 suspect to eradicate on noxious weed lists.

Calendula officinalis is easy to grow and attractive to the girls.

Oregano is still blooming in some areas and covered in bees.

Borage is an excellent nectar source.

Mint is a good nectar source.

I don't often use cell phone camera pictures because the dimensions don't layout as nicely on the page, but it seems like the bees were posing for me so here are a few I snapped recently.

Dahlia flowers can be attractive to pollinators if you get the right varieties.  If you can, resist getting the ones that are all petals and try to select varieties where you can see the pollen.  I snapped this photo because of the mostly black honey bee next to what I would say was an typical Italian breed of honey bee.  I have one hive with a small percentage of dark bees like this but on average Carniolan bees look more like the bee in the second Dahlia picture.

Another Dahlia photo with a metallic green bee and a Carniolan looking bee in flight.

Zinnia is a popular nectar source.

This huge Artichoke flower is easily a feast for multiple bees at once.

Chitalpa tashkentensis 'Pink Dawn' can be a good nectar source.

Hive Checks (8/3/2014)
Swarm
They have gone through the 1/2 gallon of syrup I gave them in the last few days.  It looked like they had mostly transferred the syrup into existing comb and they have built a new half comb in the last week.  No signs of eggs yet, but I did see the queen and she looked large and ready to start laying any day now.  Will keep the syrup on in an effort to help them build comb and build up.

If nothing else she is a good sized queen.

Hive Checks (8/9/2014)
Solis
This new queen has a tight broodnest across three frames.  The queen looked good and they were making good use of the pollen and bee bread I gave them.  I would expect the first of the new bees to be emerging this week.

The new queen.

Brood pattern looks pretty good for a smaller sized hive.

Luna
Like Solis this hive has multiple frames of capped worker brood now as well.  The pattern is solid and I even saw a few newly emerged bees (mostly light colored).  I'll have to do some balancing next inspection to give the weaker hive a boost.  Between the two hives there is enough food for winter at the moment and the challenge will be to raise enough winter bees to make it till next spring.

Nice brood pattern.

The queen is looking good.

I posted previously about how I saw a higher percentage of bees requesting to be cleaned in this hive than what I see in my other hives.  A commenter asked what this looked like and I thought that it was a great question, but it's not easy to describe so here is a video.  What you are looking for is the bee vibrating in place and not dancing in any direction or pattern.

In case the embedded video doesn't show up (I'm pretty sure it doesn't in email) I also posted the link to YouTube here: Cleaning dance

Ballard daughter
Saw the new queen and she is a tad darker than her mother.  She still has that young queen look but she doesn't seem to be wasting any time either and had laid a nice cluster of eggs and there were even a few 1-2 day old larvae. So that means she started laying on 8/4 and since the split was done on 7/12 that gives us 22 days, or 15 to emerge and 7 to mate and start laying.

I like to see a large group of bees form around queens when they pause like this and tells me she is a desirable queen.

Hive Checks (8/10/2014)
Rose
I'm going to call the swarm from the Rosemary hive Rose because the landed next to an old climbing rose.  I gave them two frames of pollen and beebread I stole from the Rebel hive and have been adding syrup to help them build up resources.  I was quite surprised to see that they already had capped brood.  I'd say it was maybe 2-3 days into having been capped as well.  Doing the bee math this is quite an impressive turnaround.  Split on 7/13 and capped brood lets say in the last 2 days which means that eggs were being laid around 8/1 or just 4 days after the swarm.  She is definitely ahead of the curve compared to what I've seen from other hives this year.  Perhaps that is being driven by the urgency to buildup before winter and the fact that every day counts.

The queen is looking good and also well liked.

Rosemary daughter
This is the sister hive to Rose and while they aren't as far along as the Rose hive there was a good amount of young brood coming and just a few cells that looked like they were a few days away from getting capped.  I thought the Ballard daughter hive was being quick when I looked at them yesterday but these two queens are both a few days ahead of their pace.

A good looking light colored queen.

Hive Checks (8/15/2014)
Ballard Nuc
Upon opening this hive my first thought was, hey they aren't dead.  I did see a few bees with DWV, but overall the larvae looked healthy and there were a lot of young healthy bees.  It looks like the split gave them the boost they needed, and helped pull them out of the DWV issue that was starting to take hold.  There is a lot of brood on the way and a lot of young bees in the hive.  Hopefully they can make the most of fall nectar and pollen sources.  Stores were low and I likely will have to give them a frame of honey.

Still going her usual slow pace.

Roma
The hive looked like it was in good shape and the broodnest and honey arches looked good.  I also now know which hive the completely black bees are coming from (they look like the bee pictured earlier in the Dahlia photo)!  The make up maybe 1-2% of the overall population but they are impressive to see especially with bright yellow and orange pollen baskets.

This big queen is still going strong.

Hive Checks (8/18/2014)
Rosemary Nuc
The nuc is doing well and the queen has been busy.  The frames are crammed with bees and there is plenty of brood on the way.  Honey stores are still a little light.

Scriber Creek
Similar to the Rosemary nuc there is a lot of brood coming and frames have good honey arches, however there is not much surplus anywhere for winter.  They are going full steam ahead through this dearth and are burning stores which is more typical of what you would see with Italian strains for this time of year.

Another shot of Borage that captures late summer well.

Back to the bees,

- Jeff