I was interested to read about the problems with wax moths. For them to take over a hive, it means the hive is weak. One way to help the bees defend the hive from them is to reduce the size of the opening. Store frames with pulled wax in the freezer. That will keep them safe and kill any wax moth eggs.

Plant Collector, go to YouTube and watch some videos on trap outs. It will give some ideas about taking bees out of a tree or other places.

Trap out or cut out?

Both of my beehives are dead.. I guess the only thing to do now is take the honey and start over in the spring

So sorry to hear that Heath. Do you know the cause?
We lost one hive but it was a weak hive so not really much of a loss. The other 3 are doing well

I checked the first hive a week before Christmas it was around 70 degrees. I'm guessing that they starved to death even though I had a full super of Honey above them they had some capped brood and from what I understand they won't leave brood to go get the honey. so what I did was I took that full super of honey and put it on my other hive which didn't have a lot of honey. When I did that I saw that there wasn't a lot of bees in there so I'm guessing that they froze to death last week when we had - 2 degree temperatures. It really sucks I spent a lot of money on those bees in the spring and I can't afford to buy any this year so I'm going to be depending on catching some swarms. Last year I caught four swams but two of them came from my hives.

We have had that happen to us before.
Good luck on catching swarms. One thing is for sure, if there are any bees in the are there will be swarms to catch.

Sorry to hear of your losses Heath!
We've lost 2 hives as well, both froze on and in the comb. Funny thing is that the hives were next to others that were smaller when the season ended but as of yesterday are doing well. I suspect the majority of the bees from both frozen ones absconded for some reason, maybe the queen had died as I did not see any queens on the dead outs. The sad part is that one of them had fresh capped brood but no eggs.

The other 5 hives have a lot of bees. However since we hit -2 a week or so ago as well and February chill is still to come, we are putting insulation board around 3 sides of the hive to cut the backside breezes a bit, just in case. The fronts face east and south so that will give them ventilation and a chance to get out when the weather warms up. Yesterday and Saturday it hit 60 here, today it's 54.
The insulation board was cheap so hopefully it will work out and the bees can start buildup- none of the remaining ones had any eggs or brood, hope they have queens!. I added pollen patties yesterday to the 5 remaining hives in hopes that they are there..

I couldn't find the queen in my hives but both had caped brood too. I am looking forward to catching swarms to repopulate the hives. Just disappointed they died and geting another late start in the spring.Hopefully I will get lucky enough find a swarm in early March. Good luck with your remaining hives.

I get my package of bees tomorrow.

Treat news Heath. I hope they settle in quickly

Me too...

I got and installed my package of bees yesterday.








Queen

Looking good Heth
I hope they get off to a great start for you.

I did my first Bee inspection after installing my package last week. The queen had been released from her cage and she was busy running around the frames I couldn't see any eggs or capped brood but the bees are bringing pollen in and everything looked pretty good

Great to hear they are settling in well Heath. My guess is they are stocking up on food before the queen starts laying eggs. Need to feed those babies you know.

That's what figured and polishing up all the comb to get it ready. ... What happened to all the other bee keepers that use to be here? It looks like just me and @Mindy03

I assume they are busy with their gardens or life got in the way. I check the site every day to see if there's a post here.
Our bees are going full blast here. I'm hoping the next time my husband checks them he will remember to tell me so I can try for some pictures. Raining here today.

Building nucs and Swarm traps

All 3 of my hives last season died. Bought 2 Italian packages and going to get a fat bee man package next weekend. Built 5 swarm traps 2 are up. Still trying.

Hi Phillip good to see you back.
Sounds like you are busy as a bee.
We lost 2 of our 4 hives this past winter. The other 2 are doing great H though.
Time to keep an eye out for swarms here. I'm hoping the bees just decide to move ino one of the empty hives again like they did last year that way I don't have to remember to go check on them while my husband is at work.
He's the beekeeper and I'm the one who plants stuff for them