Yes – your bees need honey stores to get them through the times when there is no nectar available. The number of frames of honey that you should leave depends on your climate. We recommend you consult with local beekeepers as to how much they leave for their colonies over the winter.
The Flow Frames make it a lot easier to see how much honey is in your frames at any time, so you can learn to manage how much honey to harvest and how much to leave for the bees.
Watching the honey level change every day is quite fascinating and can help you feel more in touch with the bees. You’ll probably find you can’t help but look on a daily basis. You can also take a small amount of honey if you choose, by draining one frame or part of a frame.
Some beekeepers feed sugar syrup to their bees to help them get through the cold winter months. It’s not recommended to feed honey to your bees as this can spread disease (if it is taken from other hives, or store-bought), and is a lot more expensive than sugar.
