Overwintering Nucs

[Moonshae]

Here is tools and material

If you buy stryfoam construction board, you may split it with knife.  You make a cut, and twist the board and it will split a part.
Then you put a little moisture in surfaces and polyuretane clue. After a minute it is hardened. After using you split the clue point apart.

1) clue http://www.yourzagi.com/images/211-1188_img.jpg
2)  30 mm  insulation board http://www.isover.fi/files/pictures/tu_re_avance300.jpg

3) knife http://www.sharpeningsupplies.com/images/knife_parts.jpg

So, I'd just build this box and set it over the top of my two nucs together? Or each one separately? And since the bottom is open, that's how they'd get out for cleansing?

[Finsky]

So, I'd just build this box and set it over the top of my two nucs together? Or each one separately? And since the bottom is open, that's how they'd get out for cleansing?

You make one big box and all under it.  When it is cleansing time, you take big box off.

Or, you make a opening, where bees may fly all the time in and out.

If you have 5 frame nucs, which are well occupied, they survive over winter quite well. It depends do they get nosema or mites have bitten them.   But it is sure, that bees will not over winter in room temperature. It is not natural to them. They run too hot.

In late winter bees start brooding too early and that makes a big problem too.

.

[Cindi]

Moonshae, to add on a little bit to this topic.  Bees can go a very long time without going out for a cleansing flight.  For example, where Finsky is, in Finland, it is so cold for so long, that the bees stay within the colony for the winter sleep.  It is several months before the bees in his country are able to take a cleansing flight.  I think he may have said four or five months.

Bees are remarkable in how they can manage their climate that they live in.  If they are in their winter cluster for long periods of time, they do not eat very much food, they are clustered.  It is when they break cluster that they really begin to consume lots of food.  In the cluster, they are concentrating on keeping this cluster warm by vibration of their thorax muscles. 

If the hives are kept in a warm basement for example, they will eat lots of food and of course, then will need to get out for cleansing flights.  This can be disasterous if the weather is so cold outside that they freeze the moment they go outdoors.

Finsky has said that observation hives are not in very good condition after the winter.  I believe that.  There is lots of food for thought here, not wanting to burst your bubble, but we need to really understand the biology of the bee to understand what is going on within.  I am one that needs further study, I recognize that, that is one of the reasons that I love to spend time on this forum, I listen and I am learning.  Have a beautiful and wonderful day, we all are learning.  Cindi

[Moonshae]

You make one big box and all under it.  When it is cleansing time, you take big box off.

Or, you make a opening, where bees may fly all the time in and out.

Ok, then one last question about this box...How tightly should it fit to the nucs? Should I leave a gap? And also, wouldn't this trap moisture inside the nucs (or does the open bottom provide sufficient ventilation)?

Thanks!

[Finsky]

Ok, then one last question about this box...How tightly should it fit to the nucs? Should I leave a gap? And also, wouldn't this trap moisture inside the nucs (or does the open bottom provide sufficient ventilation)?

Thanks!

It is good if nucs are side to side. So they give warm. Insulated walls are ofcourse the best protection to bees.

My brother nurses bees near polar circle in Sweden. He put his bee hive into a bigger hive and put insulation (newspaper) between hive hive and summer hive. Bees managed fne 20 years and then he stopped whole beekeeping.

Of course the big box is colder than nucs. So moisture is ventilated outside and it condensates on the walls or just in "cold air" when warm moist air meets the colder air.  Open bottom keeps nucs dry.

One trick woud be the best and simplest:

You put your two nucs sice by side outdoors. One entrance to west, and one to east.
Make from styrofoam board extra walls and keep entrance free bees to fly.
Make a little upper entrance that air circulates out.

It means that you make a bigger hive, when you put double hive inside. - Good insulations aroud that double hive.

This will help colonies in early spring when they start brooding.

.

[Moonshae]

Thanks for your explanation and patience, Finsky. I'm going to be doing this as soon as I can.

[Michael Bush]

Here is this year's plan:

http://www.bushfarms.com/images/Winteringnucs1-2007.jpg
http://www.bushfarms.com/images/WinteringNucs2-2007.jpg
http://www.bushfarms.com/beesnucs.htm

It kind of is all one big "box" with styrofoam on the top and bottom and heat on the back.

[Moonshae]

I'm finding a pile of dead bees outside the entrance to the styrofoam now for one of the nucs, about 20 today. Seems like a lot from a nuc. The other is not having this problem. I'm guessing this one isn't going to make it through the winter, unless there's something I can do...but I have no idea what's wrong.

[Michael Bush]

>I'm finding a pile of dead bees outside the entrance to the styrofoam now for one of the nucs, about 20 today.

On a warm day they will catch up on houscleaning.  20 isn't that many.