Australian Stingless Bees - The End of Hockingsi !!!?
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- Опубликовано: 2 окт 2024
- G'day Guys. We're back with another video. This time we deal with a couple of struggling Tetragonula Hockingsi colonies. There have been heaps of colonies lost all over South East Queensland and beyond and mostly Hockingsi. Is this natures reset ? Tetragonula Hockingsi were never in South East Queensland before favourable weather and human movement allowed it to happen. Tetragonula Carbonaria and Austroplebeia have always been the endemic species. Are we now seeing nature rebalance the tables ? Carbonaria are making a big comeback after being dominated by the Hockingsi for the last 15 years. Now the Hockingsi are dropping like flies. Interesting times ahead.
Drop a comment if you've lost bees in the last year. I'm interested to know the species, number of colonies lost and approximate location.
Cheers guys,
Alex.
Shame to see. I’m finding similar issues with our Hockingsi. Lost 3 hives in the last year ( also 1 Australis ). Have to see what happens. I sometimes swept our weaker hive position with a stronger one to boost bee numbers. This seems to help at the moment. I’ll keep on monitoring them. Thanks for sharing Alex you’re always informative and inspiring. TrickyTrev👍🐝🍯
@TrickyTrev01 that's a shame Trev. It's so widespread. Swapping positions works great 👍
The majority of my hives are hockingsi, any carbonaria end up being hockingsi after a time. All seems ok at the moment fingers crossed. Brood has shrunk over winter on some - I have a couple that are fairly weak but not worse than other years. I am in a cold area of Brisbane too (in terms of winter lows - days are hot).
@PracticalPrimate we're in Brisbane too and normally we would have had multiple take over attempts by now. We haven't had Hockingsi attack anything for over 2 years. Not only that but we've had our Australis take over a Hockingsi colony.
Hi Alex, that’s an interesting video. My 2 hockingsi hives seem to be very active but I have to admit I haven’t opened them for a peek for about six weeks so god only knows what’s going on inside. I would normally be in the middle of splitting my tc’s now but I’ve found most of them aren’t ready yet, they all seem to have used a lot of their stores and don’t have very big broods even though they are all very busy coming and going, so go figure.
My AA’s also haven’t done very well over winter so I’m keenly keeping a close eye on them as they seem to be low on numbers and aren’t very active, I hoping for some warmer weather to kick them along. Cheers
Ashley
@ashleystephenson9081 It was a pretty harsh winter Ashley. A lot of our AA's shrunk considerably but that's pretty normal. Our TC's seem to be powering along pretty well so far with no casualties. Our Hocks are hit and miss. I'd say 50% are on the edge, 30% are fair and 20% are good. Food availability is terrible in Brisbane atm.
Hi, I have had exactly the same thing happen to my 4 year old hockingsi hive. Was thriving a year ago. Even spawned 2 new colonies somewhere nearby in successive years between 2021 and 2022. But i noticed fewer bees towards the end of summer this year Opened it in August and found about 10-20 bees and a queen with a small tennis ball size brood - not in very good condition. Very few stores. It was being attacked by Phorid fly relentlessly. Have hooked it up to a mother hive and it seems to be doing better with bee numbers up. Have read large numbers of posts in Facebook sites about exactly the same thing. I’m in Brisbane.
@francesberndt3627 thanks for the feedback. It seems every 2nd post of the Facebook groups is about dying colonies.
You need to see the Surgeon again and have that nodule removed from you chest.
@compdad but this one is a useful nodule. Maybe some cammo paint 😄
Noosa hinterland 100 hives in forests and 150 on acreage. 100 European hives. Last year's winter hit hard dry this year's cold th in nature dropped 80% over 2 years but in warm areas have thrived after the early summer kicked in spring this year. They are going gang busters. Through the grapevine people have lost 450 hives 150 etc livelihood and $ on a pension. Kinda nice to have a reset when honey is set @$500 a kilo $25 a pop is now ..... but the ones that have suffered the most both natives are in cyprus and or 25mm boxes and logs with less than 25mm thickness. Hoop pine 50mm only for me. Most native bee hives out there are cofins. Ps lost Australis 30 hives last year won't bother again rather go for a surf.
@robertfranc2365 very interesting. Thanks for the comment. Very strange to loose AA. How thick were the AA boxes and what sort of winter position were they in - full sun, part sun, shade ?