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Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology

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Subject:
From:
Christine Gray <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Sat, 6 Sep 2003 11:34:35 +0100
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From: "allen dick":  Nucs can be wintered in cold climates with long
winters, but there are many details to consider, and few beekeepers in cold
climates are very happy with their success in the long run.  Most go back to
wintering strong colonies or buying package bees, given a choice".

A beekeeper can hope to master the procedure for preparing a nuc for winter,
but in UK at least the uncontrollable, unpredictable element is the
variability in weather temperature.  When, in the past, I tried to
overwinter spare queens in small nucs,  the problem seemed to be that
sometimes they 'woke up' too early, and could not handle the spring
regeneration of the small population, so dwindled to nothing.

I asked earlier if anyone had keep nucs at a controlled (low) temp in a
fridge/freezer - Michael Palmer responded 'yes, Vermont!'. So if u are lucky
enough to have lovely long deep winters, OK. Last winter in southern UK we
had just one day when snow lasted overnight - of course, it brought the
country to a halt, as many people left work early and broke down on hills,
so the gritters could not get thru. Bad weather for wintering small nucs I
would guess - unbroken moderate cold would create less need to change/adapt
within the small cluster.

So I come back to asking - what about using a fridge /freezer?  Can any
farmer say whether there is now surplus capacity in say cold rooms used for
say fruit ?   What I am envisaging is a new service to beekeepers in UK - we
deliver our mini-nucs to a farm cold room in say October (?) and collect in
say March (?) ,   after reliable wintering (assuming the nuc was properly
prepared by the beekeeper, so no guarantees by the farmer except of
maintaining the temp).

I seem to lose 10% of queens in the winter, due to ????? - poor mating?
weak constitutions due to contaminated wax ?  ,  higher endemic levels of
virus due to persistent sub-lethal varooa infestation?  inbreeding?   I
cannot mate new queens reliably until mid-May , too late for the season. So
I am in the market for a way to RELIABLY over-winter some spares in
mini-nucs in a variable, temperate climate.

Robin Dartington

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