Hi Ian & All,

> No I meant my yearly winter wrap costs 3-5$/hive/winter?  All
> depending on rodent damage,
>

You would find zero rodent damage to your wrap using Reflectix and no risk
of fiberglass contamination.

> You are suggesting poor beekeeping management?

I am not suggesting poor beekeeping management but simply beekeepers doing
what they think is right and taught to them by mentors. I myself was taught
to feed syrup in the fall to insure the colony survival, I found this to be
a wrong thing for me to be doing.

>  I think when
> analizing any winter loss you are looking at all factors.  the conclusion
> I came up with was that there was a higher winter loss, in unwrapped
> or lightly wrapped colonies in my beginning beeyards.  It was not a
> scientific studdy, but my conclusions favoured wrapping.  Spring
> strength of colonies was another factor that favoured wrapping.
> stress of a long cold winter makes our job as beekeepers difficult.
> When I prep the hives for winter, I expect  and prepare for a harsh
> winter always.
> hoping for a average winter
>

You did not answer my questions so I will try to ask them again because I
think it has bering on the outcome of wintering in any condition, wrapped or
not.

1) In this trail and error, did you ever not feed some hives and instead
leave them with honey to winter on?

2) In these trails did you ever notice any dead outs with soiled entrances,
soiled top bars, unripened sugar syrup stores, or any with no feed left?

These are not hard questions to answer and if you were observing the dead
outs you would have noticed these problems. Even if you are still now seeing
these problems in your dead outs it points to poor winter stores in my
opinion, wrapping will not help this. You should answer these questions to
the best of your ability because even if you do wrap you will have better
results if your stores are of better quality.

> Even though cold can
> >kill a single bee if exposed to it, cold will not kill a cluster (like
> >George I. has said so adamantly) because they are working together
> as on
> >organisms.
>
> extreem conditions, long lengths of cold can prevent colony clusters
> from moving into honeystores.  A wrap helps by holding a losser
> cluster during these spells,
>

There are other things that can happen to a cluster when wrapped when the
temperature falls sharply for an extended period of time.

1) While it is warm the cluster is able to move freely and consume more
stores than if they were not wrapped and kept cooler.

2) When it is warm out side it is even warmer inside, the cluster can begin
to brood in a period of time they normally would not have and again more
stores would be consumed than normally. Lots of stores are used when they
brood.

3) When the temperatures do drop sharply for an extended period of time the
cluster will contract and will not be able to reach the stores that was not
rearranged during the warm period.  If this cold period lasts to long they
will die from starvation even though the stores were only inches away. This
can happen even if they are wrapped if temperatures drop sharply for long
periods.

If a colony is wrapped the colony will require more stores than if they were
not wrapped, in my opinion.

> Most all wrapps I have seen provide ventilation.
> I have seen hives in the middle of fields, wind must play a factor in
> there wintering losses.  I try to keep my hives near tree bluffs.
>

You would be surprised that the bees can take more wind than you would
think.

> I don't think beekeepers are that foolish.  Wrapping and winter losses
> are very costly.  It has forced hives to indoor facilities.  You are
telling
> me that all this winter prep is done without any understanding of
> honeybee wintering behaviour
>

Yes, to put it bluntly. Things are not at all what I was lead to believe by
the older beekeepers in my area when I first started beekeeping. Only by
looking at things for myself did I find what I needed to do to make
conditions better for the bees I keep.

obviously you neglected to respond to some of my other conclusions in my
previous post, you either agreed, disagreed, or did not know how to answer
back, I do hope that if nothing else I may inspire you to see these things
for yourself and not trust all you hear and read.
   . ..
c(((([
Keith Malone
Chugiak, Alaska USA
Caucasian Bee Keeper
http://takeoff.to/alaskahoney

Check out current weather in my area and 5 day forecast;
http://www.wx.com/myweather.cfm?ZIP=99654

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