How many dead bees are normal for untreated hives?

[talkingamoeba]

How many dead bees are normal on the bottom board of an untreated hive this time of year? I scraped about 1 1/2 cups out of each hive bottom board.

[cow pollinater]

Untreated? How many dead should we expect to see? In my experiances I pretty much have to answer: All of them.:o Sounds like yours may be faring a little better than mine did.

[Hobie]

I don't have a good answer to your inquiry, but I scooped about that many out of one of my hives today. It, too, was untreated, because it lost it's queen last year, I re-queened in July, and did not want to overtax the colony.

Anyway, as I was scooping out the dead, a guard, quite alive!, zipped out after me. It's still cold here, so she missed and took a header into the snow. I rescued the poor brave soul and put her back inside. :)

[Veracity]

I too had to scoop quite a few out... :cry:

[wmgysi]

How many dead bees are normal on the bottom board of an untreated hive this time of year? I scraped about 1 1/2 cups out of each hive bottom board.

you posted your question in November if I checked that right. At that time of year you should have hardly any dead bees on the bottom of your hive. If you do then you have to find the cause for that. With varroa you may have bees with broken wings or that are not very mobile but most of those bees should leave the hive on their own.
What you should consider is to build your hive in such a way that you can insert a 1/4" or similar plywood covered with a white self adhesive sheet (used to cover shelving) that alows the bees still to go in and out. above that you should mount a wire screen about 1/8" mesh that alows bees to walk on. They will enter the hive on this screen. Mites will fall down onto the white board. If you count more then about 10 to 15 mites/24 hours you may need to control the varroa mite or risk loosing the colony during winter. An organic way of doing so is to use formic acid 65% (ants secrete formic acid) strength evaporated above the inner cover (assuming the cover has a hole of about 3"). This will numb the mites and they fall onto the white board. You remove the board every 24 hours to count the mites. This is done after honey has been harvested and before it gets cold. If you did not do anything your hive will most likely be weak in the spring and you have to do it first thing and before the first honey flows, which is before the dandelions open. Further actions can be taken by cutting out drone brood in late May. This will help to reduce mites to a level sustainable by the bees. Then you have to start breeding with hives that come out of spring strong and requeen at least every 3 years, hopefully with your own queens or someone that you know breeds for mite sustainable queens and not just to sell packages! If you like to keep your product healthy you have to put in some extra work as described.
Good luck.

[talkingamoeba]

My question is refering to now, how many are normal this time of year?

[wmgysi]

Sorry I thought you had this question in November. For this time of year is a different story.
Depending on how many bees you overwintered you have more or fewer dead bees inside. Also many of the aged bees will still leave the hive in the spring but you can expect a lot of dead bees mostly on the bottom and between frames that have no honey storage. So the more important question should be, how many living bees should I have left in the hive.
Hopefully you have a crowed of about 4 frames of bees clustering some of the frames with storage and some honey left to build up. Usually this amounts to about 2500 remaining bees in spring but more is better. Hope that helps.

My bees are still calm as we still have below freezing temps in BC at 1800 feet. I can see inside in about a month.


My question is refering to now, how many are normal this time of year?

[Brent Bean]

1 ½ cup is not a problem, in northern climates the queen will stop laying eggs at least in my area around early November. And will not resume egg laying until mid to late January. You will experience a dwindling of population because of normal attrition (lifespan). And because of prolonged confinement in cold months they fall behind on undertaker chores and the dead will pile up.
If the hive is still alive your good. I will remove the mouse guard in winter months and scrape out a dust pan of dead bees to keep them form blocking the lower entrance when the weather gets warmer. And then find the cluster to be robust when I get a chance to look in the hive.

[talkingamoeba]

thanks for the info.

[Jeffzhear]

I'm in the north and we've only had a few days for the honeybees to get out. Last time was a few weeks ago on a 55+ day. My Italians which tend to over winter with many more bees then my Russians had three times the dead bees out front and on the porches. The answer to your question depends on the type of honeybee you have, your climate, and the weather conditions, and the colony health (i.e. mite-loads)

[Robert Brenchley]

I always get quite a few on my screen bottoms, which get removed during the season. The entrance is an inch and a half or so above the bottom; if it was level a lot might well be removed over winter, but I don't know for sure.