[cloddopper]

Now the first real frosts are are occurring & it's the harvest moon tonight you'll all  need to get your mouse guards on without delay.
 For it won't be long before the mice will soon be seeking the warmth of the bees as well as their stock of brood , bees & stores .

[Justin]

My first season as a beekeeper, just feeding the final lot of syrup and this is a good reminder as I'd forgotten to order some guards, thanks.

[cloddopper]

Putting four or five bricks on the hive lid  and staking the hive down with stakes & a pair of cheap ratchet straps can be handy in wind swept places too .
 If your hives face the south to catch  rising & setting sun it help the hive take cleansing flights if things warm up enough .

[Justin]

The hives do face south and I've a couple of straps ready to go on once I take the feeders out. Currently debating whether to make some insulated covers as I have some spare sheets of 2" celotex I can cut up.

[cloddopper]

Be careful you don't want make it a condensation sweat box  as it will turn the bees mouldy & they will die .

The best way is to think of nature in a tree bole . They have an open space for air to circulate out any warm moisture produced by the bees as they consume th honey & stores.

 I myself feel that top insulation other than the crown board & the lid is detrimental to the bees plus it costs you money thus reducing your profits .

Years ago people used to make straw filled doughnuts out of ex WD blankets & shove them on the hive each winter so they sat around th syrup feeder .  All that did was kill hive after hive & harbour diseases .

So ensure the top vents are not propolised up if you have bee escapes the crown boards clean them out so that the vital air can flow freely through the hives .

A healthy cluster of bees will keep the brood & queen warm as the mass moves over the stores . I used to take the cooling /cold metal queen separator out for over wintering as well.

[Justin]

Thanks for that. Insulation is a bit of a debate at the moment as I'm reading different opinions on the forums. I'm down in Devon so the temperatures are reasonable, we rarely get snow, but we're up on a hill near the coast and receive more than our share of rain and damp.

I figured that any insulation would help keep them warm and hence use less stores but there's the need for ventilation. I'm using national hives with mesh floors with a solid varoa board.

[cloddopper]

Bees produce a lot of high humidity in hive during winter that do not have a goo through flow of moving air .
Every day that the ambient temperature is above 50 oF (10 oC ) some of the bees will have a cleansing flight and also collect water for the hive off near by leaves , puddles & ditches etc .

Here inthe UK where it condenses in the hive it gets wet & often turns to a feint greeny bluish  mouldy haze on the less walked frames  .
Once the temperature rises a few degrees the mould will produce zillions of spores that will infect the hive . Your bees are then living on borrowed time , they will need more food to fight the infection then as they consume fmore honey for energy the  hive temperature rises , even more mould spores are released ,  bees die and the whole hive gets sick never to recover .

 In a dry airy hive the bees need very little honey to keep the over wintering  cluster & brood warm .

 You might find some interesting reading about hive ventilation when you look up about the use of polystyrene hives in Norway, Germany ,  Iceland & Sweden .

 Also look up about using all year round use of Varroa floors which give tremendous air flow through the hive .

[Justin]

Thanks again for that. I think I'll leave the hives uninsulated this year and see how they manage. They've been fed loads of syrup and I just need a nice warm day to open up and remove the queen excluder then batten them down for the winter.