Beekeepers will often need to feed hives before they are ready to overwinter. The hive may be light on stores, or even need to draw out comb. Those are really the only two real reasons to feed in the fall. Some may disagree with the need to draw comb in the fall, however if you have hives that need stores for the winter and they also lack the drawn comb to store it, there is a need. Another good reason to have bees draw this comb in the fall is to have extra drawn comb available in the spring for splits, or nucs.

First we'll cover the need to feed the hives that are in need of winter stores. There are really three options here. The first method, and probably the best method is to simply give frames of honey from hives that have more than they need for the winter. This gives the hives a natural, and more healthy food source to get them through the upcoming winter.

The second option is to feed 2:1 sugar to water syrup. When using this method, don't neglect the opportunity to draw comb if other hives are in need of drawn comb, or if you plan to increase your hive count the following spring. If you don't need any frames drawn, or you simply don't have the extra frames to spare, you can simply feed each hive that needs it.

However if you do need more combs drawn, the best method is to pick the hives that are the strongest, and have proven themselves to be good comb builders. You can rob frames of honey from these hives and give them to hives that are in need, or you can extract them for the honey, and save them for next spring. Replace these frames in the hives that they came from with foundation, or empty frames if you don't use foundation. Feed these hive an abundance of 2:1 syrup, or HFCS. When the bees run out of drawn comb to store this syrup, they will start drawing the empty frames in order to store this abundance of syrup.

When feeding any hive, it is very important that you don't overfeed. Overfeeding will cause the hives to backfill the brood nest when they run out of space to either store the honey, or draw more comb. This can happen very quickly. Another important thing to keep in mind is that a lack of incoming nectar can trigger robbing behavior. It is important to open the hives for only a very brief period of time, and do not spill any syrup. During this time of year, I prefer to use division board feeders. This allows me to open the hive and refill the feeders very quickly to avoid a robbing event.

Another option that others may disagree with is working at night. I use a head mounted red flashlight when opening the hives. Honeybees can not see red light and this allows the beekeeper to open the hive. Any bees that get on you will become defensive, however they can not fly without a light that they can see. This allows me to open the hives without the risk of triggering a robbing event. It is important to remember that this is not a good time to do a brood inspection, or to remove any frames. Simply place a feeder in the hive if using another method, or refill the old feeder and close the hive.

The third option for fall feeding is to not feed in the fall at all. In some cases I use the Mountain Camp Method (see Winter Feeding). I use this method to overwinter nucs. This allows me to ensure that nucs have a supply of winter feed, without having to move them to larger equipment that the cluster may not be able to keep warm.