Contrary to what you may think, bees don’t hibernate during the winter. They cluster together in their hives, with the queen in the center, and they vibrate for warmth. They constantly rotate positions, moving from the interior to the exterior of the cluster.
The steps to prepare a colony of bees for winter survival vary from beekeeper to beekeeper. For the First Parish hives, located at the Wayland Community Gardens, the Bee Team adds absorbent materials just under the top lid to take up any dampness. And we wrap the hives in insulating material for extra warmth.
For fuel over the winter, the bees consume the honey that they worked all year to make. If they were especially industrious – and some of our colonies were – they made more honey than they need. And thus, we were able to harvest and bottle it to sell to the First Parish community. Just to be safe, our team places emergency rations inside the hives in case they run out of honey, in the form of damp sugar or sugar bricks, which are a bit like sugar cubes.
We also made and sold lip balm made with the beeswax that is a byproduct of harvesting honey. Selling these products helps fund our operation. We need funds to purchase new equipment to expand, to replace worn-out hive components, to buy treatments for parasites such as varroa mites, for extra gear as we onboard new team members, and other expenses.
Our mission includes education – such as annually teaching the “bee unit” at Creative Preschool – and donations of honey to the First Parish Lay Ministry team to distribute as they wish. We also donate a portion of our honey yield, or a portion of our profits, to a local charity such as Open Table Food Pantry in Maynard.