Tag Archives: beekeepers meeting

Winter 2024 | Winter prep, storage, bee stuff

The final meetings are taking place: Do the bees have enough winter stores? What’s the mite count? Do I need to treat? Should I add insulation? — So many questions, especially if you’re new to beekeeping.

Sante is a very experienced beekeeper. He showed us how he insulates the hives using the inner cover, and how he treats with oxalic acid. Feeding is still done with syrup; when it gets colder, he switches to fondant or sugar dough.

As a general guideline: oxalic acid treatment is typically done around Thanksgiving, once the first night frosts have hit and the queen has stopped laying (ideally).

Also attached is an idea for storing honey supers: I froze them for 2–3 days and then sealed them in vacuum bags. Over the winter, it’s a good idea to check on them occasionally to make sure everything is still okay.

On a warm winter day, feel free to set out some water for the bees — they’ll gladly take it.

Now it’s slowly time to turn the wax into candles or creams — and who knows, maybe someone’s up for making a batch of honey liqueur?

2024 | September – What’s next after honey harvest?

After the honey harvest, the season’s over? Well, not quite — the winter prep season is just beginning: the bees need to be fed, treated for mites, and protected from robbing (that’s what the little square at the entrance is for). Good thing if you already let them clean out the empty honeycombs earlier — it would be tricky to do that now.
Meeting in Hartsdale at Julie’s, NY.

2024 | February and March Meetings – Online

Since the bee season had not yet started, we met digitally in 2 online workshops in February and March and brought our knowledge together.

Winter prep

The final treatment against Varroa around Thanksgiving seems to be particularly important for the survival of bees in winter, as is feeding.

If you want to take an academic approach, weigh your equipment – I have also started doing this and will add my work-in-progress-list in the photo galery.

If the bees consumed around 6.6pd per month, you should feed 5.2gal from August to October. On warm winter days, you can use the weight check (tilt check) to determine how much feed has been consumed and feed more if it is really necessary.

Perhaps there is someone who would like to do this with me next winter. I’ll keep you posted.

Spring Clean-Up

Last but not least we talked about spring clean-up, especially removing old dark combs and varroa control with drone frames.

To do this, place an empty frame with a bar in the middle in position 3 (see picture) in the hive. This division will allow you to cut out the more developed comb sooner. Remember that mites prefer drone brood for egg laying. Forgetting to cut out the drone combs can significantly increase the Varroa population.

2024 | January Meeting – Mead Workshop

We were very excited to have Jody Hankins as our host to share her recipe and techniques for making mead for our January 2024 HVNB meeting.

Jody introduced us to two contrasting flavors, one very dry and one very sweet wine, which we were invited to taste to see what the extreme results might be. It was delicious.

We also learned that different batches of honey give the mead different flavors from year to year. So, it is likely that mead tastes different depending on the harvest and location.
During the workshop, Jody took us through the mead making process and explained how to control the sweetness or dryness of a wine. Now it just needs to sit and ferment.

If you make mead, please let us know how it turned out. My equipment just arrived and I’m ready to go. Anyone want to join in? Stay tuned, maybe we’ll be able to taste the first results this fall!

Below is a list of the equipment and Jody’s recipe.

Essential equipment

  • Buckets/carboys/other vessel for mixing and storing
  • Hydrometer – for measuring potential alcohol
  • Yeast
  • Sodium metabisulfite or Campden tablets (for sanitizing)
  • Any additives for the mead recipe you plan to use
  • Fermentation airlock
  • Auto siphon with a pinch clamp for racking off and bottling

Optional equipment

  • Wine thief (to move liquid for ease in sampling)
  • Clear graduated cylinder or tall glass for taking hydrometer measurements (you will need at least 5-6 inches height of liquid in order to take a proper measurement with the hydrometer – it needs to float)

Jody’s basic mead recipe 

It will take approximately 2-3 lbs of honey per gallon for the starting solution depending on the desired potential alcohol

For each gallon of honey/water at 11% potential alcohol, add to batch for fermentation

  • 1 tsp. yeast nutrient (I typically divide this and add half immediately, second half added 2 days after fermentation starts)
  • 1 tsp acid blend
  • 1 ½ tsp citric acid
  • ¼ tsp tannin
  • Yeast (1 package of yeast is sufficient for up to 5 gallons, my favorite yeast is a wine yeast Lalvin brand D47)

Optional: Prior to bottling/storing add ½ tsp potassium sorbate per gallon to inhibit further fermentation

Yield: 1 gallon batch of mead will yield approximately 5 bottles of wine (750 mL is the standard wine bottle volume)

Let’s stay connected and join our newsletter for more information.

January 2024 survey: results and upcoming February meeting

Thanks to everyone who took part in our survey!

The next meeting in February 2024 will take place online and will be dedicated to the topics of emergency feeding and the bee calendar/ planning your 2024 bee season as a collaborative digital workshop.

We will comply with the request not to hold the upcoming meeting in February on a weekend in order to reach as many of you as possible.

By the way, there are several volunteers who can imagine mentoring “newbees”. Please “newbees” and mentors, get in touch with us and we will connect you.

Another pleasing point is that, according to the survey, we have a very balanced ratio of women to men. More information in our next newsletter (sign up here for the newsletter).

Enclosed is a survey for the topic of the next March meeting – what would you like to discuss in March – you can vote for it.

Link to survey: What are you up to in March 2024? (survey closed)

Thanks for your input!