INTRODUCTION & INTRODUCING: Indoor Storage of Honey Bees: an online home for all things indoor storage

The past year has been one of unexpected changes for most of us. One thing that remained, however, was the resiliency and dedication of beekeepers. Despite all obstacles, hives had to be managed and crops had to be pollinated. Beekeepers adapted to changing conditions to keep up with demand and keep their operations strong. As we enter another season of almond pollination, it is clear that beekeepers as busy as ever and still looking for solutions to the ever present challenges of mites, nutrition, and overwintering.

At the Bee Research Program at Washington State University, we’ve been keeping busy as well finishing up current research projects and looking forward to future ones. You can expect results from us soon regarding the use of CO2 in indoor storage for Varroa control, queen banking in indoor storage in summer and winter, and a big collaborative project with the Bee Informed Partnership looking at colony health and survival in winter storage. We are excited to announce that we will be able to update the beekeeping community on these results as soon as they come out all in one place.
We are very excited to announce that the future of the indoor storage guide lies online! Housed on Project Apis m.’s website, the “Indoor Storage of Honey Bees” page will be a one stop shop for the most up-to-date research on indoor storage. Readers can expect monthly updates with new information including research results, discussions with beekeepers, updates on regulatory issues like colony inspections and transportation into California, and more. We know this flexible format will give us the opportunity to update the beekeeping community on a more frequent basis with the most relevant information. In addition to housing The new webpage will be live on February 15th, 2021 and will live at GET URL FROM PAm. [LINK]

​In the meantime, we are pleased to bring you this second edition of the indoor storage guide for honey bees in the United States. We begin with a summary of indoor storage demographics, a survey effort in collaboration in a bee broker. This is just the start, as we hope to implement more regular surveys of beekeepers using indoor storage to understand the supply and demand, and the pros and cons of the practice. We then discuss wintering strategies for backyard beekeepers, as we’ve received a lot of interest from beekeepers of all shapes and sizes wanting to optimize their overwintering strategy. Finally, we discuss the potential for Varroa control in indoor storage. This is a highly requested topic from beekeepers who recognize the massive money and labor saving potential of treating hives while in storage.