WHY Did YOUR Bees Disappear?! Maybe Varroa Isn't The ONLY Reason... Beekeeping 101

[@adivax3]

This was a great video!!! This very thing happened to both my hives this year. This was my first year and boy did I learn some lessons! Glad I found your channel. I will definitely give some thought to adding pollen to my feeding schedule before the winter season

[@beefitbeekeeping]

I’m so happy the video was helpful ☺️ don’t give up! Beekeeping has a steep learning curve but it is so worth it! You learn more about what to do in the years that you lose your bees so keep moving forward ♥️

[@mikerevendale4810]

I've recently stumbled across this channel and your enthusiasm for beekeeping is inspiring! And you're quite right that a beekeeper never stops learning. Regarding feeding: late summer feeding of a light syrup is a common practice in order to maintain a large brood nest going into Fall; these new bees will make up the majority of the winter nest. And in Fall, if necessary, we feed a heavier syrup to fill up the nest which adds thermal mass and assures adequate stores over winter. Fall flows are unpredictable, at best. Lastly, a decade ago I switched my entire apiary to VSH Italians and the results have been impressive. No need for "treatments" with expensive and potentially hazardous chemicals. And the brood diseases that were a common concern in the past have been nonexistent with this strain. I still have some winter losses but keeping this strain of honeybees reminds me of the easier times before Varroa arrived. Happy beekeeping and keep up the great work!

[@jaysworld126]

Wonderful information, thank you so much. I am getting my very first bees as a new beekeeper in March. I hope the pollen idea helps control veroa mites but most of all helps them fight infectious bacteria and possible disease already in the hive. Wish me luck!

[@beefitbeekeeping]

That’s awesome! I hope they thrive, pollen is a powerful tool! Where are you located?

[@jaysworld126]

@beefitbeekeeping Thank you, I'm in Upstate South Carolina. There is so much to learn! I enjoy watching your channel and how you are around your bees. I wish there was more information and research using more natural methods such as essential oils for mite and disease control.

[@CastleHives]

Varroa will jump onto a bee, so when foraging they will bring back a little pest. Rob a hive, bring back a friend. 3:32, wow a lot of mites. I tried the new VarroxSan extended release OA strips this fall, the results were promising. We can only hope that research catches up and we as beekeepers have more weapons. Hope all is well up your way. WInter is nearly here,

[@kellyclement7765]

I am new , I heard about the new product but I went with formic pro and I’ve had really good results. as a new beekeeper I didn’t do a summer treatment I thought it had already been done but it had not. luckily they had tons of food and they were huge hive and I think I’m OK

[@billw7894]

Thanks for sharing, your videos help alot, you communicated clearly, new bee keeper here but i have hive alive fondont and pollen patties for winter

[@billw7894]

It looks like you have a few hoover hives. I bought three for next season with screen bottom boards. The screen size looks large to me. Have you had bees get thru the screen?

[@williamhaney593]

First year bee keeper here in North Georgia USA. I started in May this year. Everything was going well with both hives. Then one of my hives in mid October I noticed half of my dead inside the hive and outside the hive. Could not understand what happen. Everyone was mites, but you just shine light on what happen. When I seen this video I was like that is it CCD. Thank you for the information it was spot on step by step to what happen to my hive. I will try to start feeding pollen to my hives next spring.

[@brianw.520]

@@williamhaney593 you really need to get a mite count done but this late in the year it's not really advisable. If you have a screened bottom board, take a slide in cover underneath it. Check the next day and count mites on it. If you have dozens, you probably need to treat for mites. I use Oxalic Acid and it works really well. You want to go ahead and treat now heading into winter so your winter bees will live longer if you find a lot of mites.

[@beefitbeekeeping]

Dead both inside the hive and outside the hive in October? Hmmmmm I’d be worried that they came in contact with a pesticide. This is another big issue with our bees today, when you pair less forage, varroa mites, and pesticides/other sprays all together one of them usually breaks the camels back. Low mite counts and good nutrition (pollen and honey) I’ve seen keeps the bees healthy enough to withstand almost anything. Well stick with it!! I try to tell new beekeepers to expect to lose their bees the first 3 years. It’s all a part of the learning curve but if you stick with it you’ll figure out what works!

[@beefitbeekeeping]

Also @brianw.520 you are spot on with what you said

[@brianw.520]

@@beefitbeekeeping thank you! I had to heavily treat my largest hive this past week for the same reason. Droves of dead mites...

[@harveycardwell7274]

Idk about helping with verroa but pollen is late summer is essential for winter health of a colony! Winter bees for the most part start hatching in Sept and end sometime oct-november for anyone not in a tropical area with yr round recourse. So yes pollen is key, they should be getting ample amounts starting early August through October to rear winter bees! Sugar does not raise bees neither does honey by itself. Gotta have protein to grow! Sugar just energizes the growing process.

[@denodkgoro8124]

Hello, good video. Beekeepers must learn one thing. The problem is not that varroa eats vitalogenin. The problem is that your bees do not have enough vitalogenin for themselves and especially for varroa. Bees from nature bring enough of everything they need. But they cannot satisfy human hunger. We want more brood, more bees and more honey...we get everything but nothing has quality.Look in this video, how the lids look, the lids on the cells of the bee brood on the frame you showed are completely flat with the honeycomb. Proof of well-fed (healthy) bees and brood in the hive are slightly swollen lids on the brood (not like drone cells, quite a bit) When you get winter bees from such a swollen brood, then you have done an excellent job. I don't have a video on that topic, but I found a link about recapping where you can see in the upper part of the frame what I am talking about. Best regards kzbin.info/www/bejne/gYG7q3Wgf9Cgmrs kzbin.info/www/bejne/pYK3dqmJrtCcnLc You can see better here.

[@denniscounts1983]

This video is a complete description of what happened to my bees this year. So confusing and disheartening. But I learned so much and have a plan in place for 2025. Thanks for the info.

[@beefitbeekeeping]

That’s great to hear you aren’t losing hope. I try to tell new beekeepers to expect to lose your bees, it’s a part of the learning process and is sometimes necessary. If they always survived you’d never know what you were doing right. That’s what keeps beekeeping interesting, we all get to be little scientists in our bee yards ☺️

[@kellyclement7765]

➡️➡️➡️Go back to the empty bottom brood boxes: I’m in Va. do we take the bottom box out for winter? We don’t go to 32 for very long. Maybe in single digits for 2 weeks. Will have 40’s a lot during winter

[@heavymechanic2]

I put foundation on in mid June and the bees barely did anything, I stripped it off in September and gave them a half super of honey (will flip them down after its cold enough not to get robbed out). Everything you said about starving is true, I left a full box of honey and some colonies never made any at all, it was nearly gone in September. A re-queened colony was a failed colony because of the number of workers in may, after May there was nothing coming in and I saw robbing activity nearly everyday.. One thing I want to point out, people say never add pollen sub to sugar brick and I start with 1% in December and increase to 3% protein in January because I see the bees in the bird feeder telling me they need pollen. Small amounts of pollen sub in the winter helps get the colony going and an insulated hive is OMG a month ahead of the wood hives.

[@beefitbeekeeping]

I agree with you, especially in a colder climate, if you have enough honey stores in there why not add pollen sub to keep them healthy and a little stimulated. At one point I remember reading an article a few years back discussing pollen dropping being what signaled the production of winter bees but that’s not what I’m seeing now with the most recent research that’s being published. I think dwindling pollen contributes to that switch to winter bees but golden rod is their last big hurrah to help make those winter bees while they have the pollen coming in. I’ve observed some hives, specifically certain genetics collect and store more pollen than others. Our main breeder queen Viplidoo does that, so I wonder if that’s a contributing factor to why she overwinters so well and varroa doesn’t appear to affect her like it does with other hives. Thanks for always following along and sending thought provoking comments my way!

[@heavymechanic2]

@@beefitbeekeeping Just wanted to point out some colonies were given some pollen patty in October and they are stronger compared to late summer.. Just put sugar brick on some nucs because they need help.

[@richardrbrynerjr.7912]

Very rare for a worker bee to bring a mite home from the field! It`s the drones that have a free delivery system as they bounce from hive to hive. I have found that putting a queen excluder on the entrance and keeping the drones out until your bees have there own drones that need out that the mite count was low on every one of the hives. Then pulling green drones frames and checking, no mites found!

[@dallas9722002]

In Turkiye they feed the bees with protein patty all winter, but the real home made patty not the soy bean product. I am a beekeeper in Iowa. Cograts for your nice videos.

[@beefitbeekeeping]

Thanks for watching, that’s really interesting about Turkey! I've never heard of using patties for that long until I made this video and it sounds like there are a decent amount of beekeepers that do the same!

[@ujku331]

Yes, it’s good idea to feed real pollen to a colony before winter.

[@beefitbeekeeping]

Definitely! Do you collect pollen from your bees?

[@charlesmaurer6214]

While no expert I have been checking out beekeeping sites for a while. I have seen some suggest small cell foundation to leave less room for mites and drone frames to trap and kill them. I have also recently thought and asking on treatments if any have tried to combine beetle traps with a treatment with the oxalic acid added to the oil. I have had pets treated for ear mites with mineral oil before. It would be a slow release that might not replace the shock treatments but I think it might be worth exploring (above my expertise and ability to test) I do agree both genetics and nutrition will give any animal an edge to fight issues microbial or parasite including bees. Also wonder if more studies in bee nutrition including lesser items may lead to some solutions. With us high doses of Vit. C and Zinc can help fight colds and flu. In plants micronutrients play a big factor in quality of a crop with commercial growers often lacking because of reuse of the same land for the same crop for decades. Even with fertilizers the secondary items are often missing like iron, calcium and magnesium in the produce. I also notice some feed pollen too but in vids during checks SHB larva are often in those pads so I think smaller but more often making such feedings as just like the mites the SHB will weaken the hive. Screened bottom boards seem to help too perhaps with a paper board glue trap below to insure they can't climb back up. The traps also could be checked as a first indicator. I realize the purpose of the wash test but it seems it would weaken any hive some and the other means would kill less workers or stress the hive less with the pull out board. If they do resort to eating young under such stress, I wonder if a fatty supplement would help too. Maybe shortening or beef tallow based, I know other mites can be smothered by an oily or fatty substance if coated. Yes the mites eat it but if bees can brush up against such item they can eat too they may coat a few mites. Would work like removing a tick by coating it with petroleum jelly. Hope my random thoughts are useful things to think on and do use a grain of salt as I have no data or testing, just some logical ideas. Good luck, I looked seriously into beekeeping a couple times and never got going. Last time I built half a box of frames and 4-5 boxes but a flood hit my basement and those were burned after. I do enjoy watching beekeeping vids but even if I tried I wouldn't want more than 3-5 hives. Take care and help those girls if you can.

[@baldeagleApiaries]

Great job here this is Beekeeping 101 for any NuBee! Thanks

[@beefitbeekeeping]

Thanks for watching! I'm glad it was helpful.☺️

[@quijadriss7650]

I'm going into my first winter with bees (in the midwest US) and worried they don't have enough pollen. We live in a city and I run a single hive at a school. We only have access to the plants folks grow in the neighborhood. I made some sugar bricks with artifical pollen additive. We'll see how that does.

[@beefitbeekeeping]

How much honey do you have on your hive going into winter this year?

[@MrRabbit-qf4xq]

1st comment ❤ Great detail in your videos thank you

[@AlexZaboroski]

I let ya have it 😜

[@beefitbeekeeping]

🤣🤣 well ya both get the first response back! I’m going to keep looking into this topic, if pollen can help it’d be a good tool to have in our back packet in the fight against varroa

[@MrRabbit-qf4xq]

@@AlexZaboroski ok thanks lol 😂

[@dariuszdata1431]

Good info my friend 😊 🐝

[@beefitbeekeeping]

Thank you for watching! There’s so much to learn in this beekeeping life! 🐝

[@timframe6074]

Thanks for all of the information that you share and the hours you put into what you love. Please Try to stay away from what they say happened 100 million years ago. As a beekeepers we often don’t know what happened yesterday and why are bees have failed, When we are personal lookin at all of the evidence.

[@harveycardwell7274]

Anyone serious about beekeeping should be treating 3 times a yr once every 4 months. Most important being bloodlesstime during the winter. Once you get them down it's easier to keep them down. I do oav treatment literally right now, then prior to honey flow I use apigaurd then extended release oxcilic acid after I pull honey. Of course do your mite tests as well to check and make sure its working. Any worker would gladly give it's life to insure the success of the hive!

[@richardlearning3452]

Thanks for sharing maybe one the answer will be found.

[@beefitbeekeeping]

Thank YOU for watching! I’m definitely going to keep digging into this and see what I find out 😊

[@harveycardwell7274]

Pollen is key for brood production, without it bees cannot raise brood.

[@hankliveatthehive3744]

Great Video thank you. I am also reaching out as we are launching a free AI platform for beekeepers to take a picture or up to 15-second video of an entrance and have AI count the bees, the bees with pollen and drones. By the spring, it will also identify wasps and varroa. Let me know if it's okay to post the waiting list link. Thank you. Hank

[@kellyb72601]

Sounds to me like your bees did exactly what you'd want them to do in a pollen dearth. The environmentally responsive bees (carniolans & russians) rear brood based on pollen availability. Some of my russians will shut down for nearly a 2 full months in july & august and people not used to them WILL think the hive is sick. But that's just what they do. They start up full tilt again in late august. The Carniolans & russians have reputations for wintering with a tiny cluster due to this but they can winter with a gigantic cluster if fed some pollen & nectar through the dearth, but also will need more stores. The italians will continue rearing lots of brood even during the dearth and often eat themselves out of the hive.

[@VeritasOmniaVinculaVincit]

buzzz buzzzz buzzzzzz... 🐝

[@beefitbeekeeping]

💃💃💃🐝🐝

[@taylorjohnson6144]

Bees 100% want more pollen over honey. Pollen and NECTAR is what they consume daily. Honey is there preserved over flow nectar for the hard times.... this was my 3rd year i managed to turn 8 hives into 14. Then, from those 14 hives i harvested 1200lbs of honey. Whilst being humbled by mites causing queen issues. This year i had multiple late season swarms and queen acceptance rates were low. Thes in the fall i messed up on apiguard doeses and had 2 hive have terrible mite loads and one hive did develop deformed wing. I managed to get that hive in check and then i had another swarm late and are going into winter small. In 3 yrs of beekeeping ive managed to not loose a hive yet but im not confident in these 2

[@beefitbeekeeping]

That is an impressive amount of honey you were able to harvest - You are definitely doing something right with those bees! It sounds like you had a similar year to my year 3 too. It wasn’t until year 3 when I started taking bigger risks in my apiary that I started losing hives but that is the only way to learn! If they always survived you wouldn’t know what you were doing right ☺️

[@geraltofrivia8529]

Because varroa feed on the fat body and because the fat body represses the action of hormones on the bees, bees with smaller fat bodies skip the young bee stage and move straight to field stage. This leads to a very productive hive that makes a lot of honey, but is missing essential parts of the colony (Dirty cells, not enough nurse bees etc, etc, etc.) This can very often see the most productive summer hives collapse in winter. Probably misquoting a little, but essentially distilling the last lecture i went to by the present heads of beekeeping at Buckfast abbey on hormones and pheromones in bees. I now cut up patties into frame thin strips and feed as the bees will eat them any time they are flying and bringing in pollen. They prefer natural, but for a couple of pence (cents) per hive you can really boost the bees at critical times when they cant gather or what they are gathering is of low quality (Randy Oliver pollen pattie research.) Just dont overfeed, because pests/mould/inability to cleanse.

[@beefitbeekeeping]

Ya know… now this might be way out there..I was looking into the different hormones in a bee and how vitellogenin is influenced by them and also influences them (hormones) and I’m wondering if there’s a way to boost JH hormones in the bees which is responsible for that switch from nurse bee to forager. I mean it makes sense why it happens, if VG is low then it sends a signal to them that they must be starving so they sacrifice the nurse bees to bring home more food for the next generation even if it in turns lowers brood production for a few cycles. But I wonder if there is a way to help boost JH to help keep them from graduating to a forager too early. I’m surprised they aren’t selling a supplement to do that yet, or if maybe that would cause more problems in the hive with the bees then truly starving. I guess pollen would be that supplement to do that in the safest way. Great food for thought! I love to hear I’m not the only nerdy one when it comes to bees 😆

[@eliinthewolverinestate6729]

Why don't bee keepers follow best practices and quarantine hives? Lets put all the hives together and see how long it takes to spread mites to all the hives. You wouldn't do that with a sick cow to get the rest sick. I treat for mites 3 times a year. Hives are spread out over acres to stop bee drift. Queen cages for brood breaks and thymol. I use a sugar water mister with thymol. This means bees clean each other and the hive. Plus I plant beneficial plants around the hive like bee balm, rhubarb, and thyme. And white wash the hives to let beneficial lichen grow on the lime. All help bees fight mites. Perhaps it is a lacking of caring or understanding by bee keepers. 10-20 hives on a quarter acre what could go wrong? Making bees fly farther for resources and making it easier for pest and disease to spread. Bees colonize. They usually move away from the colony. This helps with bees finding resources and not spreading pest and disease. Any time you have many animals together chances for disease and pest increase.