Your First Year Beekeeping: Month-by-Month

The hardest part of your first year isn't the bees. It's not knowing what "normal" looks like.

Is my colony growing fast enough? When should I add a second box? Why aren't they building comb? Should I be worried? Every first-year beekeeper asks these questions—often at 2 AM, staring at YouTube videos trying to figure out if they're killing their bees.

This guide gives you a realistic month-by-month timeline for your first year. I'm assuming you're in the northern half of the US (zones 4–7); if you're in the deep South or Pacific coast, your timing shifts earlier. Adjust by 2–4 weeks based on your local climate.

❄️ January–March: Preparation Season

Your bees haven't arrived yet, but this is when your first year really begins. What you do (or don't do) in these months determines whether you're ready when spring hits.

January

Order your bees NOW. This is not optional. Good suppliers sell out by February. If you wait until March thinking "I'll order bees soon," you're waiting until next year.

Decide between packages and nucs (nucs are usually better for beginners—see Packages vs. Nucs vs. Swarms). Find local suppliers first—local bees are adapted to your climate. If you must order shipped bees, order now.

Order your equipment. Hive woodware, frames, foundation, covers, bottom boards. If you're buying unassembled, you need time to build and paint before April.

February

Take a beekeeping class. Your state extension service, local bee club, or online courses all work. This single investment pays for itself in reduced mistakes. A 6–8 hour beginner course covers what would take you months to piece together from YouTube.

Join your local beekeeping association. Dues are usually $20–$40/year. You get access to experienced mentors, equipment to borrow, and people who can help when things go wrong. Worth every penny.

Assemble and paint equipment. Don't wait until April. Exterior latex paint (any color, but light colors help with heat) needs to cure. Assembled frames need to be ready. This takes longer than you think.

March

Scout your hive location. You need morning sun (helps bees get going early), afternoon shade (prevents overheating), wind protection, a nearby water source, and easy access for you. Don't place hives where the flight path crosses a walkway, driveway, or neighbor's yard.

Set up your hive stand. Hives should be 12–18 inches off the ground—easier on your back, keeps predators out, improves ventilation. Cinder blocks and landscape timbers work fine. Level is important.

Buy your protective gear. Make sure it fits. Practice lighting your smoker—this takes some skill, and you don't want to learn when bees are arriving.

Stock up on sugar. You'll need 20+ pounds for a new colony. Buy in bulk. A 25-pound bag from a restaurant supply store costs less per pound than grocery store sugar.

🌸 April–May: Installation and Establishment

Your bees arrive. This is the most intensive period of your first year—and the most exciting.

April (or early May, depending on location)

Pick up or receive your bees. If it's a nuc, transfer the frames into your hive body within a day or two. If it's a package, install them following the supplier's instructions (see How to Install a Package of Bees).

Start feeding immediately. New colonies have no honey stores. Mix 1:1 sugar syrup (1 pound sugar to 1 pound water by weight) and keep it full. They need to draw wax comb—this requires 8 pounds of honey to produce 1 pound of wax. Without feeding, they can't build, and without building, they can't grow.

Leave them alone for one week. Seriously. Don't open the hive for 7 days after installation. Let the queen acclimate, let the colony settle. The urge to check "just real quick" is strong. Resist it.

Week 2: First Inspection

This is your first real hive inspection. You're looking for one thing: is the queen laying?

You don't need to see the queen herself (though that's nice). Look for:

• Eggs—tiny white rice grains standing upright in cell bottoms. Hard to see, but if you see eggs, you had a queen 3 days ago.
• Larvae—curled white grubs in cells. Easier to spot than eggs.
• A nice pattern—eggs/larvae should be in a roughly circular, solid pattern, not scattered randomly.

If you see eggs or young larvae: congratulations, you have a laying queen. If not, and it's been more than 2 weeks since installation, you may have a queen problem. Contact your mentor or supplier.

May: Weekly Inspections

Inspect every 7–10 days. Each inspection, you're checking:

• Is the queen still laying? Look for eggs/larvae, good pattern.
• Is the population growing? More bees each week = good.
• Are they drawing comb? New wax should be appearing on frames that were empty.
• Do they need more space? When 7–8 of 10 frames are drawn and covered with bees, add your second box.
• Any signs of problems? Look for abnormal brood patterns, dead larvae, foul smell (these are rare but serious).

Keep feeding. Don't stop until they stop taking it, or until you've added a second brood box and it's filling with bees. A strong nectar flow may cause them to ignore syrup—that's fine.

☀️ June–August: Growth and Vigilance

The colony is established and growing fast. Your job now is managing that growth and watching for problems.

June

Watch for swarm signs. A healthy, crowded colony's instinct is to reproduce by swarming—half the bees leave with the old queen to start a new home. Signs include queen cells (large peanut-shaped cells on frame edges), congestion, and bees "bearding" heavily outside the entrance.

Swarming isn't a failure (it's natural), but it sets your colony back significantly. To reduce swarming: ensure adequate space (add boxes before they're desperately needed), consider reversing brood boxes if the top is full and bottom is empty, and don't let them get congested.

Add honey supers if you haven't already. When both brood boxes are established (7–8 frames of bees in each), add a super for honey storage. In your first year, this honey is probably going back to the bees for winter—don't plan on harvesting yet.

Stop feeding (usually). Once you add honey supers, stop sugar syrup—you don't want sugar in your honey. Exception: if there's a nectar dearth (hot, dry summer with nothing blooming), you might need to feed.

July

Do your first mite count. You should have been doing alcohol washes monthly, but if not, July is the last chance before mite populations explode. The threshold is 3 mites per 100 bees (3%). Above that, treat.

Many first-year beekeepers skip mite monitoring because "my bees look fine." They're not fine. Varroa mites are invisible at low levels but growing exponentially. By the time you see obvious damage (deformed wings, spotty brood), it's often too late.

Summer dearth management. In many areas, July–August has minimal nectar. Bees may become defensive (they're protecting limited resources from robbers). They may slow brood rearing. This is normal. Don't panic.

August

Mite treatment window opens. If your mite count was above threshold, treat now. Late August gives treatments time to work before fall brood rearing creates your "winter bees"—the long-lived bees that will carry the colony through winter.

Treatment options depend on temperature and your philosophy. Common choices:

• Formic acid (Formic Pro): Works when temps are below 85°F. Kills mites under cappings.
• Thymol (Apiguard): Works in moderate temps (60–77°F). Gentler on bees.
• Oxalic acid dribble: Can use anytime but only kills mites on adult bees, not under cappings.

See Varroa Mites: Complete Treatment Guide for details.

🍂 September–October: Winter Prep (Critical)

This is the most important period of your entire first year. What happens now determines whether your bees survive winter. Most first-year colony losses trace back to failures in September and October.

September

Mite treatment is non-negotiable. If you didn't treat in August, you MUST treat in September. Mite populations peak in fall just as colonies are raising winter bees. High mite loads during winter bee production = dead colony by February.

Do another alcohol wash after treatment to confirm it worked. You want less than 1% mite load going into winter.

Assess honey stores. Colonies need 60–90 pounds of honey to survive winter (lower end for southern areas, higher for northern). A full deep frame holds about 8 pounds of honey. A full medium frame holds about 5 pounds.

Do the math. If your colony is short, you need to feed—heavily and immediately. Switch to 2:1 syrup (2 parts sugar to 1 part water)—this is thicker and easier for bees to store.

October

Final feeding push. Once temps drop below 50°F consistently, bees won't take syrup anymore. Get as much into them as possible before that cutoff.

Reduce entrances. Install entrance reducers to a 1–2 inch opening. This helps bees defend against robber bees (desperate colonies looking to steal stores) and reduces drafts.

Install mouse guards. Mice love wintering inside hives—warm, protected, surrounded by food. A simple hardware cloth guard keeps them out without blocking bee access.

Optional: add insulation. In cold climates (below 0°F), some beekeepers wrap hives or add insulation boards. In moderate climates, bees handle cold fine—it's moisture that kills them. Upper ventilation (a notched inner cover or moisture board) is more important than insulation.

⛄ November–December: Wait and Worry

The hardest part of winter beekeeping is doing nothing. The bees are clustered, eating through stores, and generating heat. Your job is to leave them alone.

What's Happening Inside

The winter cluster is remarkable. Bees form a ball around the queen, vibrating their flight muscles to generate heat. The cluster maintains roughly 95°F at the center (where the queen is) even when it's -20°F outside. As outer bees get cold, they rotate inward. The cluster moves slowly through the hive, following their honey stores.

What You Should Do

Check occasionally for obvious problems. On a warm day (above 40°F), take a quick look at the entrance. Dead bees on the landing board are normal (bees die inside and workers drag them out). Completely blocked entrance from dead bees is a problem—clear it.

Heft the hive monthly. Lift the back slightly to feel the weight. Heavy = good stores remaining. Light = they may be running out. A hive that feels dramatically lighter than it did in October is cause for emergency feeding (fondant or candy boards—liquid syrup won't work in cold).

Don't open the hive. Every time you break the propolis seal and let cold air in, bees spend energy re-warming and re-sealing. Don't inspect unless there's a specific problem to address.

On warm days (50°F+), watch for activity. Cleansing flights—bees leaving briefly to defecate (they don't poop inside the hive)—are normal and healthy. If your neighbors have warm-weather activity and yours doesn't, that's a concern.

December–January

Order more bees. Even if your colony survives, having backup bees ordered is smart. If they don't survive, you're already in line for spring delivery. You can cancel orders if your colony makes it (most suppliers allow this).

Prepare for spring. Use the downtime to repair equipment, build more frames, read another beekeeping book, and process lessons from your first year. What would you do differently? What questions do you still have?

Realistic First-Year Expectations

Let's be honest about what your first year will—and won't—look like:

You probably won't harvest honey. A new colony needs to build all their comb, establish a population, and store enough to survive winter. Any surplus is bonus. Expect to leave all honey for the bees in year one.

You will get stung. It happens. Most stings are minor—equivalent to a fire ant bite. Wear your gear, work calmly, and don't panic when it happens.

You will make mistakes. You'll drop a frame, squish some bees, forget to close the entrance, or leave a tool in the hive. Bees are resilient. Learn and adjust.

You might lose your colony. The national colony loss rate is over 50%. Even experienced beekeepers lose hives. If it happens, figure out why, learn from it, and try again. Most successful beekeepers failed their first time.

Year two is dramatically easier. The steep learning curve flattens quickly. By your second spring, you'll be reading the hive intuitively and making decisions confidently. The first year is the hardest. It gets better.