I am currently feeding my bees a syrup which seems to really be working well for them. We are approaching winter in the UK and the rains have started.
My question to the below picture would be to try and understand how to tell if the bees have stored Honey, Nectar or Syrup in the Flow Super? It tastes very much like nectar however I am unsure that we would have this much at this time of year. Ideally I’d like to keep feeding in the winter as it is cold here in the UK and I’d like to give the bees a strong start for summer next year.
The photos I have shown is the same in 3 of the frames in the Super. Theres a touch of wax in there as if they were about to start capping however unsure. I am sure it is not the syrup that they have stored as it doesnt have that nasty taste.
Thoughts on wether or not to keep the super on or keep it off for the winter and let the bees stay in the brood box? The bottom picture is of one of the outside frames in the brood box. I was previously recommended to take the Flow Super off but I did not think there would be that much in the Super.
You will probably find most of the answers you need in this post, but in short, take the super off:
For next year, you may want to consider “brood and a half” or double brood boxes, so that they have sufficient stores for winter. Otherwise you are going to have to monitor closely over winter and give them candy or fondant once the weather gets colder. When it is consistently below 13°C at night, they won’t take syrup any more, because they can’t fan and dehydrate it enough to store it
Cheers Rob. I like that idea. I certainly think I got honey in the frames as you can see by the colour in the pictures below after i did some extraction.
