>At my location, 47N, most queens reduce laying in early Sept. and are
> pretty well done by early Oct.

So, just to reiterate that "all beekeeping is local", as Paul has said.  I'm directly west of him on the coast, almost on the water actually in Puget Sound.  I'm on an island, and have yards up and down all 15 miles of it.  The north yards are very different from the south yards and all the yards in between.  After the main flow of blackberry and ocean spray, we have a pretty extensive dearth throughout September, October and November (mostly arboreal forest - no agriculture) with dandelion and clover about all we see, except for what's in people's yards and the non native English ivy that blooms in October/November.  It must not be very useful because they'll eat the pollen sub and not touch the ivy if I put it on.  

All that said, I have brood in my boxes in November depending on the size and needs of the bees (they seem to know when they either need more bees or they have enough forage/feed to support a little expansion in late fall).  December is my break period so I OAV, but I can't wait long, because I usually have capped brood in my strong colonies by Jan 1 (this year especially since the temps never really got down into the 30's)!!  I enjoy the warehouse storage temps like the big commercials - a very stable 40 - 50 degrees (water effect) everyday and every night, only without the bricks and mortar costs!!  Last year our Dec and Jan temps were 5-6 degrees above average, so running out of feed is a real concern for me.

I overwinter nucs, as well as 10 frames in deeps and a half, and when they come up into the medium it's my signal that they're hungry and may need support - I don't break boxes until the February freeze is over here (two weeks of night time freeze temps around 30), so they all get mountain camp and a small taste of pollen sub just to keep them moving forward until the first dandelion and deadnettle/henbit start to pop end of the month....so nope, I don't really get the winter off!! lol!!

So there's another pollen sub story for ya all, I'm thinking there are about a million derivations of it.  :)

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