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Author Topic: To Spring feed or not to feed? (Hives, in Melbourne, Australia).  (Read 3566 times)

Offline damienpryan

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Hi All,

I'm torn as to whether to do a Spring feed.

9 out of 10 of my hives have survived winter but are all extremely light.
They didn't go into winter with much honey on storage.
On warm days the bees are all flying in with pollen.
On cold days there isn't a bee to be seen.

I haven't opened them yet.

I'm thinking of giving them a 'Mountain Camp' style feed each.
(IE add a kilo of white table sugar on the top board).
The feeding style is simple and has worked for me before.

On the other hand I don't want to give them so much that they think swarming in a month or 2 is a good idea.

What do people think?

Cheers

Damien








« Last Edit: August 16, 2017, 09:17:18 pm by damienpryan »

Offline BeeMaster2

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Re: To Spring feed or not to feed? (Hives, in Melbourne, Australia).
« Reply #1 on: August 17, 2017, 11:53:56 pm »
I used to not feed at all. I left enough honey on the hives to survive the winter. Come spring they all made it and would start to build up. When the late winter nectar, Maple, stopped, many of my hives would abscond to find better pastures. Last spring I fed them and I did not lose any. I only put 2 tiny holes in the feeder jar lids to minimize swarming. They get a continuous small amount of nectar but they are not able to back fill with it. It just helps feed the brood.
Jim
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Offline 220

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Re: To Spring feed or not to feed? (Hives, in Melbourne, Australia).
« Reply #2 on: August 18, 2017, 05:05:24 am »
I put sugar in mine a few weeks ago mountain camp style because I was worried about stores after a starve out in one.
3 of them are slowly consuming it the 4th is dumping it out the front door.

Offline awootton

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Re: To Spring feed or not to feed? (Hives, in Melbourne, Australia).
« Reply #3 on: August 19, 2017, 01:04:43 am »
Open and check - mine (Melbourne) have fresh nectar in the cells - no need to feed, collecting nectar is what they do
« Last Edit: August 19, 2017, 05:45:30 am by awootton »

Offline M3RLIN

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Re: To Spring feed or not to feed? (Hives, in Melbourne, Australia).
« Reply #4 on: August 19, 2017, 05:27:26 am »
Maybe just give them 500g sugar each over 3 days. If they eat it good. If they don't, just stop feeding them and try workout why they aren't strong enough to eat.

Offline little john

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Re: To Spring feed or not to feed? (Hives, in Melbourne, Australia).
« Reply #5 on: August 20, 2017, 04:50:00 am »
I only put 2 tiny holes in the feeder jar lids to minimize swarming. They get a continuous small amount of nectar but they are not able to back fill with it. It just helps feed the brood.
Jim

I think that's a good tactic to adopt, Jim - and it's not only the brood which benefit.  One of the problems with 'running on empty' is that bees need fuel in order to find fuel - so a small drip-feed of syrup will also help the foragers to initially 'get out there' in order to help themselves ...
LJ
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Offline LenR

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Re: To Spring feed or not to feed? (Hives, in Melbourne, Australia).
« Reply #6 on: August 20, 2017, 06:03:40 am »

I'm thinking of giving them a 'Mountain Camp' style feed each.
(IE add a kilo of white table sugar on the top board).
The feeding style is simple and has worked for me before.

On the other hand I don't want to give them so much that they think swarming in a month or 2 is a good idea.

What do people think?

Cheers

Damien

Hi
I don't think your bees will swarm feeding dry white sugar, they do not store it like syrup they just eat it if they want it.
I feed dry sugar to my bees every year in winter some hives consume it some do not.
they don't swarm from dry sugar feeding.

Len

Offline damienpryan

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Re: To Spring feed or not to feed? (Hives, in Melbourne, Australia).
« Reply #7 on: September 03, 2017, 12:40:29 am »
I feed them dry sugar.

The bees carefully placed in all out the front!

The didn't do that when I feed them dry sugar in Autumn!
But maybe they are more picky eaters in Spring...

Cheers

Damien

Offline 220

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Re: To Spring feed or not to feed? (Hives, in Melbourne, Australia).
« Reply #8 on: September 03, 2017, 04:05:08 am »
I would say you have nectar coming in, the bees don't think they need the dry sugar so are cleaning up.

Offline Andersonhoney

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Re: To Spring feed or not to feed? (Hives, in Melbourne, Australia).
« Reply #9 on: September 03, 2017, 08:21:18 am »
Sometimes they will drag it out, then bring it all back in in a few days. See what happens during this cold snap melbourne is getting this week.

 

anything