I took apart an abandoned hive yesterday, I do not know when the bees left since I thought they where clustered and did not bother them. It was a combination of two weak hives. I combined them the last week of October and fed them for two weeks. The feeder did draw some attention from the other hives but it was close to cold weather and I knew the bees would be clustering soon. I also was putting out syrup in shallow pans away from all the hives to get it used up. There are about 15 hives in this yard and I walk through it every day. Once in a while on nice days I would see bees flying at this hive and the other hives near it, now I see they must have been robbers. The other day I was putting my ear to some hives to hear the bees and this hive was silent so I pulled off the cover and did not see any bees, pulled a few frames to look in the bottom box and no bees. I took the hive into shop thinking I would clean it out before mice got the wax or the dead bees molded and when I took it apart there were no bees in it at all, not much honey either. I guess them leaving saved me from cleaning out dead bees. 
An interesting thing about the whole combining of those hives was one hive was a swarm from August 9. I took their box and put it on another hive about 25 yards away knowing I would loose the field bees. But I did not loose them, I saw the field bees land where their hive used to be and sit there for about 5 minutes and then go 15 feet away to the hive they swarmed from. There was no fighting at their old hive and no bees on the ground where the swarm hive used to sit. Even the next day not one bee went to the spot of the old hive. So I know they were allowed to stay where they swarmed from. Now I wonder if they all went to the hive the swarm came out of, even the bees that where not from that hive originally. If spring comes and that hive is chocker block full of bees I may suspect they did.

I have notice my bees using dead bees for draft control. At first I thought the bees dead in the entrance reducer where a problem but then I saw what the bees where doing. They where using the dead bodies to control how much air came into the hive. On the coldest windy days I have seen stacks of bodies in the entrance and then sunny days I see it will be opened up for more air, kind of like cracking a window. Back to cold windy days and back to the entrance partly covered with bodies. I see that bees are very smart about controlling their drafts if we let them be. 
Today I heard my observation colony really buzzing up a storm and I went to see what had got them so active. Allot of bees where in the tube that goes to the outdoors. I thought I would go outdoors with my twisters to grab a few, I sting my ripped rotator cuff. I stuck the twister in the tube and only got a bunch of dead bees, I did this a few times then I got a thin stick and went far into the tube dragging out allot dead bees each time, I did manage to drag out a few live ones to use on my shoulder. None of the live bees came out at me when dong this though. I went in the house and saw there were still dead ones in the tube so I dropped the trap door and took off the tube and blew them out. After I got the tube back in place the bees immediately got quiet, I guess the tube was blocked with dead bodies and they were not getting any air so they got upset, a little to efficient on the draft control.

That is about all the bee excitement I have had this winter. We have been nailing together boxes, poured some cement for a better floor in the extraction room and doing inventory in the shop. 

Karen
in Maine

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