Hawke’s Bay is, for the first time in several years, experiencing a very dry, late-spring-early-summer and this has prompted me to write about drought and how it affects beehives. (Editor's note – since submitting this story, John has reported rain through the holiday period, easing drought concerns in his area – for now).
Drought can be soul destroying for both farmers and beekeepers and droughts can be a fairly common occurrence here on the East Coast. As far as beekeeping goes, the bad ones are pretty bad, but the really cold wet miserable summers tend to be worse and at least you’re not getting stuck all the time in a drought.
One year there was mud over the top of your gumboots until the end of October and then it didn’t rain again for six months, not anywhere in the Bay, even in the normally summer safe country. Every day was perfect with no wind and the bees did a moderate crop as it dried off.
Probably the biggest effect from that season was the number of really weak hives the following spring. These hives went into winter with really high bee numbers, but the reality was that they were mostly old bees that had no work to do over the late summer, and with no autumn flow, there were very few autumn bees (you know the ones that survive winter). If natural stimulation is not available in autumn, then it is a really good idea to feed some sugar, whether they need it for stores or not, so that you have a cohort of young bees to survive the winter.
The Positives
Some parts of Hawke’s Bay are just too dry on average to provide a good honey crop. Dry to the point where everything is dead, is obviously not a good thing, but just a bit dry can be surprisingly good. Clover in particular yields best when it is a bit on the dry side and, providing you’re not overstocked, hives can often find damper gullies and South faces to work. One year I remember particularly was a bit like this and farmers in the dry country had largely destocked when a few showers started occurring, just enough to keep the clover alive. With no lambs hoovering up all the flowers, those areas did a huge honey crop.
It also needs to be a bit on the dry side around here to get a good autumn honey crop. It’s a long time since we had a really good autumn honey flow but they can happen and nothing kills an autumn flow faster than rain. Drought stressed plants concentrate on reproduction rather than vegetative growth.
A Move May Not Be the Answer
It can be very tempting to shift hives away from drought and I have no doubt there are some areas where this would be worthwhile, but round here really severe drought is usually accompanied by continual rain just on the other side of the mountains. And, if hives are going to starve over the summer, it’s a lot easier to feed them in the dry. A dry start to the season can very quickly turn into a wet finish and a wet finish is when dry country can shine.
A Subjective Term
Drought is of course a somewhat subjective term. A few years ago I was visiting a beekeeper friend in Shropshire and he was complaining about drought. His hives were pouring the honey in and, when I tasted it, it was clover. He had never had clover before and went on to get another box per hive.
Similarly, when I lived in the Waikato many years ago the farmers would be crying drought and yet everything was still green. Round here drought is when the hills are all golden brown and bad drought is when all that golden grass is eaten and the hills turn grey.
Talking to beekeeping friends, there are quite a few areas around here that are still reasonably green and there have been a lot of showers about lately (all of which have missed me). Personally, I am an optimist… which I think you need to be to keep bees. I think most of Hawke’s Bay could be in for a really good season, but only time will tell.
Be on Your Toes
If you do get a drought then you still need to keep an eye on things. I have many times seen areas that I thought would do nothing, fill up because a thunderstorm went through the area or some unknown weed in the riverbed decided to yield nectar.
If you do autumn requeening you may need to bring your start date forward. Around here I normally start on 15 February and do the colder mountain areas first, but in severe drought I might start three weeks earlier and in the driest parts. It doesn’t matter how good the weather is, if all the drones have been kicked out you will not get any mating.
Drought can take away your whole year’s income, but in the past it often did some long-term good. When I was young there were subsidies on sheep farming which meant most farms were very heavily stocked and all the clover flowers got eaten. When the subsidies came off, fertiliser use declined dramatically, but stock numbers stayed up and there was even less clover. I think another couple of years like that would have driven us under, but we had a very severe drought and farmers were forced to rationalise their sheep numbers. The next few years were amazing and, before they brought in the weevil that destroyed the nodding thistle seeds, droughts were often followed the next year by huge autumn thistle honey crops.
Since I started writing this we have had a week of rain. Around here it’s been cold and miserable, but we have only had 17mm. Not enough to make any real difference, but I do live in one of the driest parts and in a lot of the Bay clover flowers will be popping up like little miracles.
Last Thoughts…
Be extra vigilant with fire safety, especially your smoker. I carry an extinguisher and a bucket with wet sacks inside. In extreme conditions I just don’t use a smoker.
Go away for a summer holiday. I really enjoyed the only one I ever had (except for the continuous rain).
Don’t worry, be happy. There is nothing you can do about the weather and at least it’s not raining.
John Berry is a retired commercial beekeeper from the Hawke’s Bay, having obtained his first hive in 1966, before working for family business Arataki Honey and then as owner of Berry Bees. He now keeps “20-something” hives.
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