What exactly are honey bees doing inside the hive all winter? Following their recent discussion about condensing hives, Dr. Jim Tew and Anne Frey return to the fundamentals of wintering honey bees. They begin with the temptation to judge bee comfort by human standards. A cold wooden box may look miserable to us, but honey bees have evolved a remarkably effective system for surviving long periods of cold weather.

Anne and Jim explore how the winter cluster expands, contracts, moves upward through stored honey, and circulates bees between its warmer interior and colder outer shell. They also discuss elevated CO2 levels, insulation, and why observing the cluster without disturbing it remains difficult.

The conversation turns practical as they consider what beekeepers can still do once winter begins. Adding top insulation, supplying honey, and carefully timing oxalic acid treatments may still be possible, but opening a colony for major manipulation can cost bees and disrupt the cluster.

Jim and Anne also look at winter moisture, how bees access thick stored honey, cleansing flights, and what snow around a hive can reveal about colony activity.

Winter may look quiet from the outside, but inside the hive, the colony is anything but inactive.

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Thanks to Betterbee for sponsoring today's episode. Betterbee's mission is to support every beekeeper with excellent customer service, continued education and quality equipment. From their colorful and informative catalog to their support of beekeeper educational activities, including this podcast series, Betterbee truly is Beekeepers Serving Beekeepers. See for yourself at www.betterbee.com

We'd like to thank Vita Bee Health for supporting the podcast. Vita provides proven tools for controlling Varroa—from Apistan and Apiguard to the new VarroxSan extended-release oxalic acid strips—helping beekeepers keep stronger, healthier colonies.

Thanks to Bee Culture, the Magazine of American Beekeeping, for their support of Honey Bee Obscura. Available in print and digital at www.beeculture.com

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Honey Bee Obscura is brought to you by Growing Planet Media, LLC, the home of Beekeeping Today Podcast.

Music: Heart & Soul by Gyom, All We Know by Midway Music; Christmas Avenue by Immersive Music; original guitar music by Jeffrey Ott

Episode artwork created by Jeff Ott with ChatGPT by OpenAI. (Jim's regular cartoonist, John Martin, is on vacation and will be back!)

Copyright © 2026 by Growing Planet Media, LLC

For generations, many northern beekeepers have been taught that winter colonies need upper ventilation to allow warm, moisture-laden air to escape. But what if that familiar advice is working against the bees? In this episode of Honey Bee Obscura, Dr. Jim Tew welcomes Anne Frey to explain the condensing hive concept and why it has caused Jim to reconsider some long-held wintering practices.

Anne explains that a condensing hive isn't a special piece of equipment. Instead, the concept relies on substantial insulation above the colony while allowing the hive walls to remain cooler. Moisture produced by the bees can then condense on those walls rather than on the ceiling, where water might drip back onto the cluster.

They also discuss eliminating—or greatly reducing—the traditional upper entrance, the role of elevated CO2 in lowering winter metabolism, and why moisture inside the hive isn't automatically harmful. In fact, bees may use condensed water to help consume stored honey.

Anne adds an important practical caution: without an upper exit, dead bees, snow, or ice can block the lower entrance. Her own approach leaves a very small upper opening as insurance.

Jim and Anne close by considering insulating quilts, warmer climates, and whether top insulation might even help colonies during summer heat.

______________________

Thanks to Betterbee for sponsoring today's episode. Betterbee's mission is to support every beekeeper with excellent customer service, continued education and quality equipment. From their colorful and informative catalog to their support of beekeeper educational activities, including this podcast series, Betterbee truly is Beekeepers Serving Beekeepers. See for yourself at www.betterbee.com

We'd like to thank Vita Bee Health for supporting the podcast. Vita provides proven tools for controlling Varroa—from Apistan and Apiguard to the new VarroxSan extended-release oxalic acid strips—helping beekeepers keep stronger, healthier colonies.

Thanks to Bee Culture, the Magazine of American Beekeeping, for their support of Honey Bee Obscura. Available in print and digital at www.beeculture.com

______________________

Honey Bee Obscura is brought to you by Growing Planet Media, LLC, the home of Beekeeping Today Podcast.

Music: Heart & Soul by Gyom, All We Know by Midway Music; Christmas Avenue by Immersive Music; original guitar music by Jeffrey Ott

Episode artwork created by Jeff Ott with ChatGPT by OpenAI. (Jim's regular cartoonist, John Martin, is on vacation and will be back!)

Copyright © 2026 by Growing Planet Media, LLC

The bee yard is a familiar place during daylight. After midnight on Halloween? That's a different story. For this special episode of Honey Bee Obscura, Dr. Jim Tew reaches back into the archives and invites Jeff Ott to join him once again for a few spooky—and very funny—stories about what happens when beekeepers find themselves working bees after dark.

Jim begins with an encounter in the attic of an old Ohio State farm building. Armed with a questionable flashlight and surrounded by forgotten beekeeping equipment, he discovers that the mysterious shape waiting in the darkness is a fully grown raccoon backed into a corner. The raccoon wins.

Then Jim recalls working alone late at night near an abandoned facility, preparing colonies for apple pollination. Nothing actually happens—which somehow makes the growing feeling that he isn't alone even worse. Eventually, Jim abandons the bee yard entirely, smoker and all.

Finally, there are southern bee yards, rattlesnakes, black widow spiders, watermelon pollination, and Jim's brother mistaking a vibrating phone on his belt for a striking rattlesnake.

No monsters. No ghosts. Just beekeepers, darkness, bad flashlights, overactive imaginations—and a reminder that a familiar bee yard can feel like an entirely different world after midnight.

Happy Halloween!

______________________

Thanks to Betterbee for sponsoring today's episode. Betterbee's mission is to support every beekeeper with excellent customer service, continued education and quality equipment. From their colorful and informative catalog to their support of beekeeper educational activities, including this podcast series, Betterbee truly is Beekeepers Serving Beekeepers. See for yourself at www.betterbee.com

We'd like to thank Vita Bee Health for supporting the podcast. Vita provides proven tools for controlling Varroa—from Apistan and Apiguard to the new VarroxSan extended-release oxalic acid strips—helping beekeepers keep stronger, healthier colonies.

Thanks to Bee Culture, the Magazine of American Beekeeping, for their support of Honey Bee Obscura. Available in print and digital at www.beeculture.com

______________________

Honey Bee Obscura is brought to you by Growing Planet Media, LLC, the home of Beekeeping Today Podcast.

Music: Heart & Soul by Gyom, All We Know by Midway Music; Christmas Avenue by Immersive Music; original guitar music by Jeffrey Ott

Episode artwork created by Jeff Ott with ChatGPT by OpenAI.

Copyright © 2026 by Growing Planet Media, LLC