The entrance to a hive can give you some clues to the health of the hive - are you seeing normal activity such as pollen coming in, no bees fighting etc. Usually it’s a good sign that everything is going well. Look for - Are there dead bees at the entrance? Varroa load might be high. Might need treatment early. Are there bees crawling around the entrance? Varroa causing viruses to take over the hive. Need to treat for mites. Are there bees with deformed wings around the entrance? Again varroa causing deformed wing virus to spread in the hive. Any signs of runny bee poop around the entrance? Nosema. Does the hive smell bad? Check for dead or dying brood and AFB. Check for enough stores in the hive. A good chance of bees running out of stores from now to late spring as the hive will be starting to expand. If unsure of anything always get someone experienced to have a look. A good healthy hive should be active on a good day with pollen coming in and good numbers of bees going in and out of the hive. Having one bad hive in an apiary can affect the rest of the hives around the area. So make sure all hives are checked and if there are any dead outs, remove them. Weak hives - find the reason and act early so it does not spread.
NZBF: Quick look at the entrance
- Thread starter Josethayil
- Start date
Really useful checklist, thanks for laying it out like this — genuinely bookmarking it.
One I'd add: robbing. Late-season/dearth, bees fighting right at the entrance, wax cappings or comb debris on the landing board, and that erratic zigzag "casing the joint" flight from bees that aren't quite landing — that reads as robbing rather than a health symptom, and the fix is narrowing the entrance immediately rather than treating it like something's wrong inside the hive.
Curious how much of this stays visual/pattern-based for people here vs anyone tracking entrance traffic more quantitatively (in-vs-out counts, time-of-day patterns) as an earlier signal before it's visually obvious. Seems like a real gap between what experienced eyes catch instinctively and what's actually been measured.
One I'd add: robbing. Late-season/dearth, bees fighting right at the entrance, wax cappings or comb debris on the landing board, and that erratic zigzag "casing the joint" flight from bees that aren't quite landing — that reads as robbing rather than a health symptom, and the fix is narrowing the entrance immediately rather than treating it like something's wrong inside the hive.
Curious how much of this stays visual/pattern-based for people here vs anyone tracking entrance traffic more quantitatively (in-vs-out counts, time-of-day patterns) as an earlier signal before it's visually obvious. Seems like a real gap between what experienced eyes catch instinctively and what's actually been measured.