How to help the bees in the heat

Previously, it was considered how heat affects bees. Therefore, the location of the apiary is of great importance. It is better to place bees in shady places, protected from constant winds. If the temperature rises to a critical level or it is impossible to put the hives in the shade, the beekeeper must help the bees - it is necessary to shade the hives, improve ventilation, reduce the temperature in the hives in other ways.

As a rule, in the arsenal of a beekeeper there are a number of activities that can help bees in the heat.

Hive shading

You can make a canopy of reeds that will shade the hives.
You can throw armfuls of freshly cut hay on the hives, the process is laborious, but not without meaning - freshly cut grass piled on the hive will protect not only from heat, but also from robbing, at the same time you can dry hay for the winter.
For nucleus, you can simply put screens made of plywood or other material - reed mat, etc.
The experience of planting several rows of Jerusalem artichoke a meter from the hives is not without meaning. Rows of hives and Jerusalem artichoke are placed parallel to each other, Jerusalem artichoke is planted on the sunny side and shade the hives in summer. In autumn, Jerusalem artichoke is a good pollen-bearing plant.

How to cool the hive in hot weather

There are more universal ways to protect the hives from overheating.
In the presence of pollen traps at night, it is necessary to turn off the pollen grate.
When migrаtоrу beekeeping, when the bees have to be placed in open places, try to place the hives entrances so that in the very heat the shadow from the hives falls on the alighting board.
Paint the roofs of the hives white, often with white and silver paint. In addition to roofs, honey super or upper hive box, can be painted white. In addition to white paint, you can use paint of a different color, but most importantly, the paint should be light.

You can use a different design of hives - in the heat, a large subframe space, an empty honey super placed under the brood box.

You can use additional hive box or honey super. An extra empty hive body or two honey super stacked on top of the honey chamber, with the burlap slightly folded over, is enough to survive the heat.
You can use sheets of foam, which is a good thermal insulator. Styrofoam is sheathed on the top of the roof of the hive, sometimes they simply put a sheet of foam plastic and press it down with a brick, you can strengthen the foam sheet with self-tapping screws. Or a sheet of foam plastic is placed under the cover from the inside, strengthening it with self-tapping screws, and so that it does not crumble into the hive from time to time, the foam plastic is closed with a sheet of plywood or fiberboard and the whole structure is reinforced with 8 * 8 mm slats. Use foam with a thickness of 0.5 to 5 cm, which one can get. You can use another synthetic thermal insulation material, such as penofol, reinforced according to the same principle.
You can put a sheet of corrugated slate on the roof of the hive. Slightly tilted forward and maximally advanced also forward. This will help with the southern position of the entrances to shade the front wall of the hive in the middle of the day. In the morning and in the evening the alighting board will be illuminated. And the slope is necessary so that in the rain the water does not form puddles behind the hive, where the beekeeper's workplace is. But at the same time, there is a lot of fuss with slate, bricks that will have to be piled on slate, so that it would not be torn off by a gust of wind.

 It is better to make the bottom of the hives removable and put a screened bоttоm board in the summer. In a hive equipped with a screened bоttоm board, bees almost never get out of the hive in the heat. At the same time, such a bottom helps to remove the tick from the hive, it simply falls through the mesh, like a wax crumb, which prevents the development of a wax moth in the hive. The screened bоttоm board is convenient when bees roam, improving ventilation and preventing bees from steaming.

 

Water for bees

Do not forget about installing a drinker for bees, this is important both at the bee yard and especially on a migrаtоrу beekeeping. Bees need water to evaporate it, lowering the temperature in the hive. Without the supply of water, the queen will stop laying eggs. Do not forget at 38 C almost 90% of the bees switch to water collectors. . During a drought, natural water bodies can dry up and bees will visit livestock farms and other places in search of water. So use intra-hive drinkers or stationary drinkers in an apiary with quality water. Poor water supply leads to overheating of the nest in the hive and can contribute to the occurrence of a number of bee diseases in the apiary. You can not rely on water from unverified sources, the water of the bees must be clean. It is important that the water in the drinker is constantly, if the drinker dries up a couple of times, then the bees will look for water anywhere, but not on the drinker. For the water supply of the apiary, a large capacity of 20 liters or more with floating rafts is quite suitable. Thus, it is quite simple to organize a watering place for bees in the heat.

Heater in the heat

As strange as it may seem, you should not remove the insulation - the pillow, it, like a thermos, keeps heat from the roof of the hive and does not let heat into the hive itself. If the design of the hive provides If there is spacer, then put the insulation in the spacer over the frames. You can use an empty honey super with insulation instead of a spacer. The best insulation is a moss pillow, which is good both in winter and in summer.

Hive ventilation

Do not forget about the organization of ventilation of the hives. How to improve the ventilation of the hive in the heat? hive entrance should be wide open, all except those in the honey chamber. Often, the entrance reducer are completely removed. But you need to use this carefully, if there is a good honey collection, then nothing will happen, but if the honey collection is interrupted, then bee theft will robbing, weak families can be plundered. In addition, through open entrances, the queen can penetrate into the top box and, when pumping out honey, the beekeeper will find that, in addition to honey, there is a lot of brood in the honey combs, except that the honey collection is especially stormy and the bees quickly fill all the cells with honey.  You also need to take into account the weather, it can be hot during the day for 40, and at night it’s pretty cool, if at the same time all the entrances are open, then there is a chance of brood getting cold, especially in weak families. Wasps can start robbing honey from the hives with all open entrances, by August there are already a lot of them and they are not averse to getting honey from the hives. So weigh all the pros and cons when opening all entrances to the full width.
When using multi-hull hives, you can raise the top magazine by three millimeters and put stops (sticks). In this case, additional ventilation of the hive will be carried out in hot weather, while the gap is too narrow for wasps to enter the hive through it. But such ventilation of the hive in hot weather is possible only when there are honey collection, otherwise the hive will be looted during the honey collection-free period.
Here are some simple tips on how to protect bees from the heat, preventing overheating of the nest, which are used by beekeepers.