Getting ready for winter....already???

Dearth
 A scarcity or lack of something.
Synonyms: lack, scarcity, scarceness, shortage, shortfall, want, deficiency, insufficiency, inadequacy,
paucity, sparseness, meagerness, scantiness, rareness, infrequency, uncommonness.

Long gone spring flowers

In the world of Honey Bees it means...A nectar dearth in some areas means there is a lot less forage than before, in other areas, it means nearly a complete absence of nectar. We are now in the dearth here.
I started feeding our bees in July, which is insanely early and we have never fed that early before. But with 2 full months of cool temperatures and rain, i felt it was a necessity to help out the bees.
I also started giving the bees in their syrup, Pro Health stimulant, to help build them up. It aides in overall health and helps builds up nucs and packages and assists in drawing out comb. Anyways i had never used anything like this before so decided i had nothing to lose. I must say, i was quite surprised when i  checked the bees a few days ago. They had almost or completely drawn out the 10 brand new foundation i had put in a month before. The population had increased and considering all the rain and lack of foraging time...they seemed to be putting up a lot of pollen and nectar. So i was pleased.

Nice brood pattern in one of our hives

August is when you remove the extra honey and extract it. We are not taking any honey this year. Any extra frames i will save it and give it back to them in the spring. All our bees were new packages this year so normally you don't get a lot of extra honey the first year. August is also the time you check for Varroa and treat if necessary. I will start testing next week if the weather is good. Near the end of the month i will also be switching to a thicker syrup for them. It will be a 2:1 ratio. You make it thicker in Sept so the bees have time to process it and get the humidity levels down so they can cap it.  Somehow the bees know when the honey is at the right humidity level, (usually around 17% humidity) at that point they cap it with wax. I don't have that ability so i have to use a refractometer to tell if its 17%,
Anyways this is just a short ramble this time. Lots going on right now. In the next post, i will be telling you about our bee inspection, mite tests and getting more prep done for winter in our new place.
Bye for now. Bee Happy