Bees staying in lower deep

[Pond Creek Farm]

I am troubled.  I checked the hives today and one of them has issues.  There are plenty of bees, but they will not leave the lower deep.  I put a medium full of emplty frames with wax starter strips on the deep over a month ago, but they have not done anything with the frames at all.  I am concerned in that I wonder if they will have enough time to draw out the medium and fill it with stores for winter.  Is this a feeding situation?  Should I be planning to pinch the queen and combine the hive with a stronger one?  When should I take action?

[NWIN Beekeeper]

If your frames aren't drawn, I'd not be afraid to feed until they were.
Then I would extract and use the combs to catch the next flow.

One thing you could do is remove one frame from the deep and one from the medium (from the same frame location in each box).
Then I would hang the deep in the medium box to 'bait' the bees up.

You could do both of these things to expedite the movement.

[Pond Creek Farm]

Great idea!  I was wondering how to bait the medium since I had a deep below, and I never thought of hanging the deep iside the medium.  I will do that tomorrow and place a miller feeder full of 1:1 on top.  Hopefully this will encourage them.  I cannot extract, however, in that I do not own an extractor.  The next flow is coming very soon, however, in that goldenrod is starting to bloom now.  I suspect the maximum blooming will occur inthe next 2-3 weeks.

[Brian D. Bray]

Just remember to switch the deep frame back after they start working the super.

[NWIN Beekeeper]

However, if you don't remember, its call varroa control.

It is likely the bees will try to build some comb on the bottom of the deep.
However it is probably going to be drone comb.
If you scrape it off, you may loose a batch of varroa!

I don't really suggest varroa control by drone elimination (but some do).

-Jeff