Winter Feeding: Bees Looking Strong!

It's nearly 60 degrees this afternoon so we took advantage of the beautiful weather to open the hives and put in sugar pies and pollen patties. This is the time of year the queen begins laying Spring bees so the hive needs enough food to make it through until the early nectar flow.

Lots of bees were flying and one aggressive little gal stung me through my pants. Hopefully, I didn't get enough venom to get much reaction. We'll see. My fault for wearing black. She probably thought I was a bear.

We went in just long enugh to feed, but a cursory look showed both hives looking very strong -- lots of bees and very active. There were also many dead bees in the snow in front of the hives, but that's not unusual this time of year. The winter bees will begin dying off and be replaced by the Spring bees. Sometimes they will even be bringing in pollen this time of year, but we didn't see any today. A few weeks ago there were several bees bringing in bright orange pollen on a warm day.

Now if they just continue doing well we will have two surviving colonies come Spring which we can hopefully divide. St. Rita, St. Valentine, St. Francis de Sales, St. Ambrose, and Sr. Lucia of Fatima please pray for our little apiary. Keep our bees strong and healthy!