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Author Topic: Here's another fine mess I've gotten myself into...  (Read 1600 times)

Offline tjc1

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Here's another fine mess I've gotten myself into...
« on: June 26, 2013, 02:07:43 pm »
Long story short...
I left a super on the hive over the winter (I know, I know..!) plus an empty lower deep (Iknow, I know...! - it's amazing my bees survived me!)

In the lower deep (no activity all spring) I alternated drawn comb frames with foundationless frames to start the switch-over to foundationless.

In the spring there was brood in the super (as well as the upper deep), but after it hatched it was replaced with nectar.
Great I think, that took care of itself.

Lost my queen in May, hive requeened itself. She begins laying in the upper deep.  Still no activity in the lower deep. Super getting full so I added a second super of drawn frames.

Today's inspection showed beautiful solid patterns of laying in the upper deep, and, you guessed it, in the middle frames of the lower super...I assume that the bees either didn't have the population (with the requeening process's loss of brood) to build out the foundationless frames and/or decided that they'd just use what was already drawn in the upper boxes rather than draw more downstairs.

Questions: I'm going to replace most of the foundationless frames for now so that I have bordering frames of comb in the center of the lower deep, to encourage downward motion. Should I put a queen excluder between the supers to keep her from moving farther up? Should I move some full frames of honey/pollen from the upper deep to the lower to encourage a move down, or maybe even a frame or two of brood?

Offline Spear

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Re: Here's another fine mess I've gotten myself into...
« Reply #1 on: June 26, 2013, 04:03:45 pm »
I have no experiance but I would think that moving some brood would be you best bet at getting them to move down - bees go to tend brood and see all the space for building & Bobs your uncle. I don't know maby someone who has experiance can give better advice...

Offline iddee

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Re: Here's another fine mess I've gotten myself into...
« Reply #2 on: June 26, 2013, 04:59:31 pm »
""Super getting full so I added a second super of drawn frames.""

That was your only mistake. Bees will ALWAYS fill from top down. They will only go into the bottom deep when the top is full.
"Listen to the mustn'ts, child. Listen to the don'ts. Listen to the shouldn'ts, the impossibles, the won'ts. Listen to the never haves, then listen close to me . . . Anything can happen, child. Anything can be"

*Shel Silverstein*

Offline tjc1

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Re: Here's another fine mess I've gotten myself into...
« Reply #3 on: June 26, 2013, 11:53:27 pm »
Thanks, Idee - and I thought I had read somewhere that they like to build DOWN...!  Aaarrgghh! So, seems to me that I should put a queen excluder on to keep her from moving up into the second super...yes? No?

Interestingly, after the brood hatched out of the super, the upper deep frames got big crowns of honey, and again, I thought I read SOMEWHERE that the queen doesn't like to cross honey to move up, so I thought I was safe.

Offline Better.to.Bee.than.not

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Re: Here's another fine mess I've gotten myself into...
« Reply #4 on: June 27, 2013, 12:02:22 am »
they do build down, they don't like crossing big gaps like that though between one box and another all the time when doing it though, and like he said, they will do it when the upper box is filled. it also depends on the micro climate inside the hive.

Offline iddee

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Re: Here's another fine mess I've gotten myself into...
« Reply #5 on: June 27, 2013, 12:29:00 am »
Excluders are a whole new ball game. I won't get into them, except to say you should not use them until you fully understand them.
"Listen to the mustn'ts, child. Listen to the don'ts. Listen to the shouldn'ts, the impossibles, the won'ts. Listen to the never haves, then listen close to me . . . Anything can happen, child. Anything can be"

*Shel Silverstein*

Offline tjc1

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Re: Here's another fine mess I've gotten myself into...
« Reply #6 on: June 27, 2013, 12:31:00 pm »
Thanks for saving me from another mistake...!