Remember to clear hive entrances after this freezing spell.

Jan. 1st, 2026! Happy New Year!

Depending on where you are located in Western Washington (or elsewhere), you may have just experienced your first week of freezing weather this winter, as SnoKing did here in the Maltby Apiary. Photo below is the Maltby Apiary 10:30AM on the last day of 2025. Night temperatures have been in the high 20s F and day temperatures have been below 40 F this week.

If you have been checking your bees and have not found dead bees blocking hive entrances up until now, we warn you to keep checking! It is not unusual with a warm fall for the older forager age bees to live until ambient temperature drops to and stays at freezing for a number of days and/or nights. Suddenly, more older bees may die in so short a time period that the "undertaker" bees fall behind removing them, particularly if it is too cold for them to leave the warmth of the cluster. If too many fall at once, the lower entrance of a hive stack may be completely blocked, particularly if the beekeeper is using the condensing hive system.

So, don't stop checking those hive entrances that the "mortician" bees have kept clear until now. During this unusually warm Fall of 2025, they could keep up with the mortality rate and even fly the corpses out and away from the hive. This hygienic behavior is an important part of colony immunity.