Objective of Fall Feeding and Brood Nest Management

The goal of fall feeding is to ensure your bees store enough syrup to survive the winter. Once daytime temperatures drop into the 50s or below, bees drastically reduce their syrup consumption. For this reason, fall feeding should be completed several weeks before temperatures in your area historically reach those lows.

In the southern half of the US, aim for each hive to have at least 30 lbs. of honey in the second brood box and 3–4 frames of honey in the lower brood box by the time daytime temperatures are consistently in the 50s.

In the northern US, the same guidelines apply but target 50–60 lbs. of total stores. Once that goal is met—whether through feeding or from the bees’ own foraging—you can stop feeding. Continue checking every few weeks to make sure the hive still has sufficient food.

Avoiding Honey-Bound Hives in Fall

As the air cools, your bees are busy packing away food for winter. That’s exactly what we want—plenty of honey to keep them fed through the cold months. But there’s a catch: sometimes a hive can store so much honey that the queen runs out of space to lay eggs. This “honey-bound” situation is more common in spring and summer, but it can still happen in October, especially after a strong fall nectar flow or heavy feeding.

The tricky part in fall is balance. We want the hive to be well stocked, but we also need open brood space so the queen can keep laying until the season naturally winds down. In the southern US, you might have another month or more of brood production. In the northern states, you may have only a couple of weeks left.

Signs of a Good Balance

When inspecting frames, look for capped brood in the center, some open cells where the queen is actively laying, and honey or nectar stored around the edges. A brood nest with 4–6 frames of open space for eggs and larvae is ideal going into winter. If the bees start backfilling every available cell in the brood nest with nectar, it’s time to act.

How to Fix a Honey-Bound Hive in Fall

• Redistribute stores. Shake the bees off a frame of capped honey from a healthy, overstocked hive and give it to a weaker one that needs food.
• Avoid breaking the brood nest. If you replace a honey frame with empty comb, place it on the outer edge of the brood nest—not between brood frames.
• Stop feeding. If natural stores are more than enough, take a break from syrup to keep the brood area open.

Going into winter, the perfect fall hive has full honey frames along the outer edges and a healthy brood pattern in the center, with the queen still laying. This balance ensures they have the food they need and the population to make it through the cold months ahead.