sugar dusting & other questions

[Sasha]

Hi Beekeepers, another year with small honey crops is behind and now its time (urgent) to prepare bees for winter (I am wondering is this just an very expensive hobby??). Last year I treated my bees with oxalic acid and was disappointed with results. Have lost 5 of my 10 hives. So this year no more oxalic, I will try to use only sugar dusting. But I am not sure what size should the sugar particles be in order to do what is expected. Any advice regarding this?
This is my third year ( I think) using natural cell, and it seems to me that my bees are satisfied with LC. The changes is very small toward smaller cell size, like form 5.4 to 5.3 or eventually somewhere to 5.2, and they made a lot of drone brood. Will go tomorrow to check my now urban apiary.This year we had a heavy drought in Serbia so no sunflower honey, and this was earlier the best honey crop here where I live. Some people here claimed to had heavy loses from Bayer seed chemicals (Imidacloprid ), will see tomorrow what my bees are doing and what is the situation. I expect that I will have to feed them heavily.
How much honey do you leave them for winter? I know people are saying to leave them a full medium super but that seems to much for me. Had never leave them so much. Maybe that is the reason I keep having winter loses?

Cheers, Sasha in Serbia

[Walliebee]

Powdered sugar, icing sugar or confectioner's sugar is the right size.

Read up on the frequency of applications. Do a search here.

Don't use Caster sugar, it is a larger particle size --approximately half or less in size of granulated sugar.

I leave at least one medium per hive for the winter. I will then check in early spring and see if they need to be fed then. There are lots of winter losses due to starvation in the spring before the flow starts.

[spunky]

yes, I feel the same as you, as to the expense. I think that most people go by weight of the hive, by lifting a corner of it. I am new and I havent been thru a winter, but here I will feed , pollen patties for several weeks, and syrup from an outside feeder getting ready. all my bees will end up with a medium or close to it of honey left. Good luck

[Sasha]

Thanks Walliebee, I am in Serbia , East Europe, dont have that brands here. Maybe you are right, its best to leave one super and not to worry about food.

Sasha

Powdered sugar, icing sugar or confectioner's sugar is the right size.

Read up on the frequency of applications. Do a search here.

Don't use Caster sugar, it is a larger particle size --approximately half or less in size of granulated sugar.

I leave at least one medium per hive for the winter. I will then check in early spring and see if they need to be fed then. There are lots of winter losses due to starvation in the spring before the flow starts.

[Sasha]

Thanks Spunky,
Its quite a difference when you lift a super full of honey and when you lift an empty one.

Wish you more full supers for the next season.
Sasha

yes, I feel the same as you, as to the expense. I think that most people go by weight of the hive, by lifting a corner of it. I am new and I havent been thru a winter, but here I will feed , pollen patties for several weeks, and syrup from an outside feeder getting ready. all my bees will end up with a medium or close to it of honey left. Good luck

[Mike Gillmore]

Have lost 5 of my 10 hives.

Have you determined what caused the loss of the 5 hives?

[Sasha]

No I didn't and that was one of my mistakes. Didn't have time at that time to explore this.

But I guess several factors were involved, including very ,very unusual winter with very high temperatures, the bees were active in the winter without forage which caused a lot of robing, possibly varroa pressure, also I used oxalic acid dribbling, and maybe I made some kind of mistake with that, (maybe too much acid?). Also they didn't have too much stores for winter. For some reason also not much bees entered the winter. I had combined the weaker hives.
So for this winter, I ll feed them enough, didn't take fall honey,will reduce entrances to prevent possible robbing,will use only sugar dusting. I use foundationless frames 3 year I think, but by my measures of my cellsize didn't change a lot. The hives now look like strong and healthy, but in some hives there is not much brood. Here we have carniolan bees only.Maybe, as I have read the carnis stop rearing brood in fall and because I feed bees rarely they stopeed rearing brood and went into the winter in small numbers?
But if that is the cause how do they survive in the winter in theur natural state?
That does not sound logical to me.

Sasha

Have you determined what caused the loss of the 5 hives?

[Mike Gillmore]

But if that is the cause how do they survive in the winter in theur natural state?
That does not sound logical to me.

Sasha

Carniolians have a tendency to go into winter with smaller clusters than Italians. They are also much quicker to shut down brood rearing in times of dearth. In the natural state a lower population would allow them to get through a winter with less stores. And who knows, the "natural" survivability rate may mirror what you saw happen in your yards.

It sounds like last year was an environmental challenge for your colonies. Just make sure they have plenty of stores going into winter and keep up the sugar dusting.

Are you doing mite drop counts on your colonies?

Also, to give them a little boost, if you feed them a light syrup (say 1 pint sugar - 2 pints water) for a short period in the fall it will probably trigger some egg laying. A couple frames of brood in the late fall will give you some young bees for overwintering. When these bees emerge they will have limited foraging activity and will survive much longer into the winter months.