Due to climate anomalies many areas are experiencing unusually warm days during the winter months.
Beehive entrance reducer winter.
In the winter the hive should be fitted with mouse guards.
For brood to survive and thrive the hive should be kept around 96.
Bees maintain this temperature in a variety of ways.
They can still come and go but it keeps them from wanting.
There is less.
Another reason to use an entrance reducer is during the winter months to protect the hive from becoming too cold.
Entrance reducers are often used in the winter to reduce drafts through the hive to keep snow and rain from entering and to discourage small mammals such as mice from entering.
A metal entrance reducer with minimal traffic going in and out.
Simple rules for using entrance reducers 1 when installing your package of bees for the first time.
So when you add the smaller reducer for the hive entrance it still allows the bees to move in and out easily but stops the entrance from being so large which reduces the amount of wind and cold that can enter the hive.
Mine give the recommended 7 5 mm maximum aperture width.
3 when the hive is being robbed by another hive.
2 pack entrance reducer and mouse guard for 8 or 10 frame bee hive for beekeeping with no rust universal stainless steel metal design for winter and year around use on a beehive buy on amazon.
The bees are not strong enough to move the entrance reducer out of the way.
There isn t any need to remove this one based on the amount of traffic.
However yesterday when cleaning hive floors after the winter i found a dead pygmy shrew on one floor.
Perhaps it managed to squeeze under the mouse guard but once it was fat with bees could not get out.
Reduce the size of the hive.
An entrance reducer gives the hive a smaller entrance making it easier to defend against these dangers.
I m going to talk about when to do all of this winterizing in greater detail a little further down.