Two peaks and a trough

A beekeeping year is not a flat stretch of steady work, it has a shape, and learning that shape is most of what separates a calm season from a reactive one.

• Growth builds through March and April as the queen ramps up laying.
• A first peak crests around swarm season in May, when the colony can outgrow its box faster than you expect.
• A main nectar flow follows through June.
• A summer dearth sets in by July or August, where forage all but disappears.
• A second peak comes in late summer: harvest, mite treatment, and winter feeding compressed into a handful of weeks.
• From November through February, the correct amount of hive work is almost none, external checks only, because opening a cluster in winter costs the colony more than it could possibly tell you.