TheBeekeeper.org - How to overwinter your beehive 

Thank you for your extensive library of high quality educational videos. Have a good solstice tonight (12/21/2023) and holiday season

Frederick Dunn, I love his videos. Just awesome.

Fred is the bees knees! One of my favorite two bee keepers right here. Fred, and flow hives!

I am an amateur bee keeper, but a professional educator. This video is superb. Bravo!

Very well done Mr. Dunn! This is something I can share with our beginners that have so many questions going into their first winter. You're a gem!

Fredrick, this was the most straight forward, most interesting explanation i've seen yet, thank you for taking the time. God bless you

Our amazing Dr. Dunn. Thank you once again for the highest calibre mentoring.

Thank you for sharing your experiences and informative information Fredrick. Although we’re in Australia 🇦🇺 in a warmer environment it’s great to see what happens elsewhere in the world.👍👍🐝🐝🐝🐝

Great information. So clear and informative. Thank you!

Thanks for sharing your “best practices.” Best of luck in this upcoming winter.

You are an amazing teacher. I wish you lived down the street from me here in MA. RU-vid will have to do for now :)

Hi Fred ! I don’t use screened bottom boards , we never have , years ago we didn’t either and we flipped the small entrance upwards so the dead bees don’t block the entrance, years ago we had two small holes for the bees , one hi , one low, now years ago we didn’t have varoa mites to worry about, we didn’t have feeder shims years ago but we used a hive body for a shim , and we rarely added food for the bees , the bees did get fed around the beginning of March, our bees used mason jars , we cut the top panels to hold a mason jar or a pickle jar, and it seems like we rarely lost a colony out of 400 hives , and now just getting back into bees after a super long 25 years +its like the whole world is changed , there’s beetles , wax moths that have been around forever but our hives we’re always full and moths were never a problem, it seemed like our bees years ago were hearty and a tad larger , I guess what I’m saying is I’m more stressed out now over making sure I do everything right in this new world modern bee keeping with this new challenge of parasitic destructors and by god I’ve never seen so many professional bee keepers as you do now on RU-vid and I don’t feel so prestigious as a beekeeper as I once did because in Maryland, Texas and Tennessee my family was in the respected hi ranks of beekeepers and natural gas wells , the Dentons were well known years ago and now everyone is a bee haver or bee keeper lol 😂 my youngest great uncle Parks Denton was my mentor, he made money with natural gas and made a living with honeybees, bees were the love of his life, I have always been fascinated with them and love honey 🍯 as much as Pooh bear but when I developed an allergy to bee venom I lost my nerve and the fear got the best of me but now I am over the fear and back into the bees , I keep telling myself I’m not going to have more than 30 hives and definitely not 400+ hives but I’m finding myself building and collecting 30+ hives in less than a year and just today I’ve talked myself into building a couple horizontal hives 🤣 and now I keep asking myself far too many questions and worrying about too many things , from to feed over winter or not feed , or how much ventilation to I keep over the winter ?? Just one small inverted entrance at the bottom?? I was going to make it simple and just keep bees like we used to but then my brain woke up and said I better research what works the best for well educated bee keepers like yourself and I should get with the times 😀

Great job.

Great video!!!

Great information most appreciated.

Thank you so much!

Great vdo

I am from Brazil, thanks for video. Please more videos with subtitles on english.

Thank you so much for this information. It helps so much! Quick question, how often do you feed your bees in the winter?

With my first winter 4 months away, this video was so helpful. Yet, I'm not certain which entrance or entrances you mentioned to keep open. Were you suggesting to only have a bottom entrance? Thank you my friend. I'm always grateful. Brad

Hi Mr Dunn, question about my hives when I went to them should I stack them on top of each other to keep the heat in or do you think it would be better to keep them single I'm in northern Michigan.

He is easy to listen to . In S.E. PA should I leave the screened bottom board open during the winter?

I really appreciated your winter prep segment. For 2 years I have used a vivladi board with burlap thinking i wanted the moisture to escape up top. This winter I think will try R10 styrofoam right ontop of the inner cover. Is there any harm in putting newspaper and sugar ontop of the frames in the late fall?

Can you leave the flow supers and flow frames on the hive through the winter as your bees stores?

MY bees made in through the winter here in Alaska.

Frederick I hope you are OK? Love the educational always interesting and entertaining videos . Normal cold weather here in the UK at freezing for a week. I have a bit of 70mm PVC pipe that allows 10 c to peculate into the underside of the open mesh floor. The lowest temp I've seen right above the cluster was 8.6 C so I believe they are still alive. I gassed 60 mites as I said but I'm anxious there were more left. I see the German's and others are into heating brood frames to 42 C to kill mites. One of their sessions is middle of April! I am still concerned on a warm day to Oxalic acid fume again at 160C. Fred when is the next time you will do yours again after the single treatment you did in the early winter of 2021? Best wishes and thank you sincerely.

You gotta be near me with snow like that (ashtabula),,,im gonna put syrup feeders where theres honey in brood boxes an put 2 brood boxes-10 frames of honey above for Jan-Feb,,,watchin ur fav show,,McHales Navy,,im an ex-electronics engineer jarhead

Would you recommend using a covered tarp (or a greenhouse hoophouse structure) to break the wind?

In the north (VT) could you insulate the hive. Or does the winter sun warm the hive enough.

How do you work out the timing of adding emergency sugar in winter? There's the possibility that someone may have to do it. So if they do, how would you work out checks for emergency sugar, the timing, and doing it?

I notice you have Flow honey supers on in the video. Do you keep your FLow Honey supers on over the Winter and let that be the second brood box?

So when I get my first nuc, (just 5 frames) should I wait to add the 2nd box until after they fill out the entire bottom brood box or can I add it right after the nuc has been moved to the hive? I am hearing different methods from different beekeepers in my area. I live in Northern Oklahoma if that helps......

Olá, sou do Brasil e tenho abelhas Jataí as sem ferrão e gostaria de saber se tem esse tipo de tecnologia para colmeia sem ferrão?

Hi Fred- I'm down here on Saddlehorn drive, Erie. I've got two colonies that swarmed late in the season. Is it too late to combine them, and load them up with dry sugar? They're about 100 yards away from each other.

Hello there, I've noticed that on some beehives the Flow Super stayed on the Brood Box during winter. I am not sure if the boxes were transformed into a second brood box or if it stayed as the honey flow box. I was wondering would it be possible to leave the Flow Super on for the winter with some honey for the bees to be able to feed on during the winter? So we wouldn't take all of it from them? Or it's not a good idea because then they would have too much space to heat up and it's contra effective? I am very new to this and we live in a similar cold climate as was illustrated in the video. Thank you

Hello, on a nice day in December or February when the bees can fly would you open feed just for a couple hours?

We can get -40C plus windchill. How can Canadians keep bees through winter? Your winter temperatures seem much milder.

I have a question, do bees go to the bathroom in the hive at all?

I keep forgetting your in the NorthWest as well. What are you Frederick? I forgot

Cant you add warmth and artificially feed i. Emergency?

I work shift work, 3 weeks on, 3 weeks off. I could only dedicate my time when at home. Could the hive be left for 3 weeks, unattended?

Can someone recommend a thermal camera that’s reasonably priced? Thank you

I have a hive inside the wall of my house any way i can get the queen to come into a box its going into 4 yrs ...cant break the wall just need them to go into the box

What is a feeder shim?

Hi Mr Dunn, so I started off really strong with four hives not exactly sure went wrong, long story short I'm down to two hives both Queens died during the dearth and I had to combine them it is now December 4th I have no Queen I found her dead on the bottom board cannot find anybody willing to help me out with a queen to save at least one hive bums me out what do you think the best way to go is to save at least this hive 20 frame hive now down to five frames of bees seems like they're dying out day by day when I look at the bottom board with my camera really desperate to get a queen in there to save at least some of my honey bees, are my hopes too high am I at a loss? I appreciate your time and effort and responding to all of your comments and questions have a good evening

Dear Frederick I cannot find any technical data re temperatures right above the cluster. I have a couple of digital thermometers with capillary tubes and probes. These are cheap as chips from China. I must say they are extremely accurate in deg C. I have one outside and one right above the cluster on the frame. I noticed this morning after the first bad frost the temp above the cluster was twice that outside but was 12.8 C. Do you take these temp at all? I am keen to know what is the average temp above the cluster when it's freezing? The day before and day by day before today usually their above cluster temp is 22C. The hive is all insulated -2" EXP -ali coated both sides. I admit there is a 3/4 hole in the top insulation. In the summer I covered that hole and the bottom sheet under the open mesh floor was vert wet. I removed the block and the hive has been relatively free of condensate wetness. Did you know a southern Welsh chap says he needs to make sure his hives have a little ventilation..... His climate is wet! He says he would never not have the open mesh floor with a small bit of ventilation. I realise this subject of a small amount of ventilation is controversial. Some say the bees will block up any top vent. These bees haven't blocked the small vent. Would they if they think they are cold I ask myself. They seem to have stopped taking fondant in the top feeder. which is also insulated. I saw a German vid that says they keep some hives inside at 5 degC and that helps in not losing colonies to the big freezes they have on the mountains there. Rather like bringing the sheep and the cows down to warmer pastures?

Why do they stay in there all winter? 'Swarm.

I so want bees... This year was chicken layers...meat birds next..than maybe bees..

You have some good info here that should be useful, but you fail to give it context by mentioning the date. For example, you talk about brood size as an indicator of probable survival, but you fail to say when this is. August? October? By the time we get to late September, opening the hive compromises the 90+ degree environment needed for brood. So, when are we supposed to be checking for these brood? We needed you to provide the context of date.

Hi all , we sell honey in saudi Arabia since 1986 hope establish business for pure honey with others

This is wayyyy too fancy and expensive to waste time on.

Please respond: Does real honey at all crystallize??