Honey Bee Losses - Survey 2013-14

摘要

It was starting to look like the winter of 2013-14 was going to be a repeat of the previous winter "long & cold". The exception being that the pollen foraging conditions in the fall of 2013 were much better than fall 2012. In 2013, there was ample pollen late into the season to allow the colonies to produce the necessary "winter bees" (a.k.a. fat bees) that have a longer lifespan and capable of living beyond the winter months. These "winter bees" are necessary to allow the colony to successfully repopulate the following spring. Whereas in 2012, the early spring combined with extremely dry conditions during the summer caused a premature shutdown of pollen in the late summer, thus creating a pollen dearth at the time when "winter bees" would have normally been produced (i.e. September and October bees).