NEWSLETTER #17 (English) from Urs & Izzy: It is fall... and ... so what for the bees?
- Izzy the busy bee....
- Oct 7, 2022
- 4 min read
September & October 2022 (Issue #17)
That's it! The end of the summer is upon us! The bees are preparing for over-wintering. They know it better than us, as their 'supermarket' (the fields with blossoms and flowers) is now depleted, and they will have to live on their honey reserves. We have also other articles -- have you seen any movies featuring bees? We suggest some for your lazy weekend entertainment. Also, why the Royal bees were officially informed of the death of the Queen of England, and much more!
Are you enjoying the newsletter? Don't be shy, tell us at baerenhonig@gmx.ch , or whatsaupp us, if you prefer. We'd love to hear from you!
News from the Beehives
The temperatures are dropping, days are getting shorter, and the last blossoms of the year are now just a memory. The bees start already their ‘hibernation’ period. The Queen has already slowed down on the laying of eggs – The bees born from the fall’s eggs are ‘winter bees’. They are morphemically different than the summer bees – they are thicker, and they have more body fat. They also have a much longer life span – up to 6 months, if compared with the 6 weeks of the spring & summer bees.
Winter bees do not work – or at least, they work differently—they do not go out looking for nectar; their main function is to keep the Queen-bee and the hive warm, at about 32C – 35C.How do they do that? By shivering!. Yes, as soon as the temperatures drop, they form a cluster around the Queen, and they maintain the temperature by flexing their wing muscles continuously. Pretty exhausting! .
Where is my Honey...?
Your honey is being eaten by the Bees as we speak 😊 From October until February, Bees feed on the reserves of honey that they have gathered during spring and summer. That is why it is so important to make sure that we, as beekeepers, do not remove too much honey, as they need to have enough to eat during the winter. Each colony needs between 14 – 20 kilos of honey, as they will eat it most of it, depending on the length of the winter.
Opening a wax-sealed honey reserve is easy for us (a finger nail would open it instantaneously), but bees need to 'chew away' the covering thin layer of wax, and that is something that might take a good 15 minutes to various dozens of bees, working in turn. It is like if you would like to tear down a brick wall with small hobby-hammers....
Facts & Figures
Bees have been the stars in several movies – beyond the famous Swiss move “More than Honey”, or "Honeyland" which are cautionary tales on the importance of maintaining the natural ecosystems, bees are a feature of animation movies or children's series (Maya the
Bee), and, in some cases, comedies, like the most recent one, by Mr Bean, 'Man vs Bee' (technically speaking, the computer-animated insect is not a bee, but a bumblebee!).
Yet, most of the times, bees are featured in horror movies, as you can imagine, as swarms of killer bees. Whereas there are some types of very aggressive & vicious bees, bees are shy and curious insects. The aggressive bees are called 'Africanised', although there are some pretty aggressive bees also in Asia!
Did you know that...?
The beekeeper of Buckingham Palace had to inform the Bees of the death of the Queen?
Some newspapers mocked the news, but his is a very old tradition (dating back to the middle ages, remember we talked about that in one of our past newsletters). As everything is official in England, it was shared that “the royal beekeeper has informed the Queen’s bees that the Queen has died.”
Did bees need to be told about human affairs? Would they have any sort of opinion on the matter? “Telling the bees” is a standard practice that goes back centuries, with potentially grave consequences if not followed. The tradition dates back to the times when most of the families would have several beehives, and honey (as daily staple) and wax (for the candles) were pillars of the household wellbeing. Bees, as members of the family, should be informed of major life events in the family, especially births and deaths. Beekeepers would knock on each hive, deliver the news and possibly cover the hive with a black cloth during a mourning period.
Swiss Bees
Swiss bees are a sub-species of the Apis Mellifera Mellifera (de Honey Bee). They are very distinctive vs their cousins, the Italian Bees (golden), and the Carniola Bees (light brown, originally from Austria/Slovenia). Swiss bees are small, and black. At first sight, they look like flies! We are happy to report that one of our colonies has an amazing Swiss Queen, and all of her descendants show the phenotype of the Swiss bees. (Which means that the drones that she mated with were also Swiss!) Look at the photo...and try to find a blond one! (LoL).
Look how dark and beautiful they are! There you have it, a Swiss-genetically powerful colony, producing nice honey, and being very sweet and docile. Let’s hope they hibernate nicely, and they survive the winter. We will report back about them in Spring.
p.s. >> the colony is called Izzy... even if they don't share any of the character traits with the human Izzy!
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