Hi all. We puchased an 8ha block of land in Springvale, Central Otago several years ago. We have built and I am developing a small orchard. We moved down from Timaru and I transferred my hives down several years ago. Conditions down here are a little more extreme than South Canterbury, but I was familiar with dry summers and cold winters. We get a very good spring flush of clover and thyme. But when the norwesters start in early december, it can be like a blowtorch and the paddocks can go from lush green clover to brown and dessicated in a few days. We then get a very good viper's bugloss flow over summer. I border a very large vineyard (MCArthur Ridge)This past season was extreme, with an exceptionally dry, windy late spring and a hot dry summer. Rainfall much lower than the normally low levels. I did not bother to harvest much honey, taking only about 10kg and leaving the rest for the girls. Lucky I did as they have required a lot of feeding in autumn. I want to catch the clover flow early this year, and want to stimulate my bees with syrup in order to have them near full strength say mid October. I am uncertain of the timing of when to start this. Can anybody help me with how soon I would need to start and what sort of amounts I would be looking at using? I am not worried about the potential hassle of hives wanting to swarm as I am more than happy to split strong ones and build up my hive numbers. I treat with OA staples, and have never used synthetic miticides in the 8 years I have been owned by bees.
Stimulating queens late winter/early spring
- Thread starter markypoo
- Start date
As I recall from when I was down that way, serious clover flow gets going in November. To have bees up to peak strength by then you don't need to stimulate them they should be naturally strong by then. However we did used to put bees on willows or certain crops to give them an early boost and those ones did do better, so stimulate if you want.
As you say, you are subject to the vagaries of the season there will be good and bad years dependent on just when, and how much, it rains.
To some extent you will have to play it by ear, because if you are somewhere where a dribble of nectar is coming in early, you will have to do nothing. But if you are somewhere where there is zero natural nectar until the clover starts, your bees will benefit from a stimulative feed.
As you say, you are subject to the vagaries of the season there will be good and bad years dependent on just when, and how much, it rains.
To some extent you will have to play it by ear, because if you are somewhere where a dribble of nectar is coming in early, you will have to do nothing. But if you are somewhere where there is zero natural nectar until the clover starts, your bees will benefit from a stimulative feed.
Thing is about that, one hive is different to another. If they are weak start earlier, soon as the cluster breaks and bees are foraging in numbers. If strong, maybe early October.
Doing that swarming could be an issue but you say you will split them so that should take care of it.
This first year will probably be experimental for you, keep notes of dates etc and next season you will have a good idea.
Doing that swarming could be an issue but you say you will split them so that should take care of it.
This first year will probably be experimental for you, keep notes of dates etc and next season you will have a good idea.
if your not concerned about swarming then stimulate as soon as you think the weather is warm enough for you to open hives.
remember that pollen is a big part of it, you will need pollen sub as well.
a big part of it will come down to cost. once you get those hives up in size the amount of feed they need goes up.
Cheers for your replies. For further detail, I have been laid up for a while and unable to properly check my hives. I was injured while coaching a rugby team at school at the beginning of may, just before the weekend when I had intended to put in a fresh batch of OA staples for winter, as well as wintering them down properly. I slipped badly while in full stride and snapped my quadriceps tendon. As I went down I tore my achilles in my left leg I had the op on my quadriceps within days and have an achilles reconstruction booked in for thursday. I have managed to hobble to my hives in the last few weeks and give them a good feed. But I am expecting a couple of hive losses. I am going to dump a couple of kg of sugar in each one and hope for the best. I have two strong hives that basically had a full super of honey going into winter so expect them to be fine, but 2 of 3 late season splits might be in trouble. So I may just end up using one of my strong ones as a nuc producer this coming season. That is the reason why I was hoping to have at least one strong producer hive going for the season so I would get some honey.
Sucks to be getting old. Surgeon told me that I am in the target age group for snapping my quad tendon. 53 year old blokes running around like they did when they were 23.
Sucks to be getting old. Surgeon told me that I am in the target age group for snapping my quad tendon. 53 year old blokes running around like they did when they were 23.
I dabbled with them, but didn't like the design I built. And then I had an inspector go though my hives in june one year in Timaru while I was out. Broke off nearly every piece of brood from the topbar. Hell of a mess in the hive.
