Welcome, Guest

Author Topic: Added third super on about 3 weeks ago, now 50% honey, 50% brood!  (Read 2913 times)

Offline dwbrinton

  • New Bee
  • *
  • Posts: 10
  • Gender: Male
Have a busy hive, spring inspection showed healthy brood pattern filling up the 2nd super, so I put a third super on with last years harvested honey/comb about 3 weeks ago.

Now there are about 4 frames centrally filled with brood and the surrounding frames are capped honey/uncapped curing honey in the other 5 frames in the top/3rd super.  The bottom two supers also have brood but not as tightly packed or as densely packed.  No swarm cells.

Do I just leave it alone and hope that the queen moves down into the bottom 2 supers?  Any advice?

Thanks,

Dave
Salt Lake City, UT

Offline don2

  • Doak
  • Field Bee
  • ***
  • Posts: 536
  • Gender: Male
Re: Added third super on about 3 weeks ago, now 50% honey, 50% brood!
« Reply #1 on: May 20, 2013, 09:36:17 pm »
3  medium supers = 2 deeps. you should be ok. This is where the do's and don't s come in about the queen excluder. I use a 1 inch drill bit and put a hole in the super before putting it on when I use an excluder. put the hole on either side and above the holding cutouts.

Here is the other option, when harvest time comes have an empty super to put the  capped honey in. Replace those with frames of what ever you are using, leaving any frames with brood in the hive. Push the brood frames together into the middle after you have finished.
Hope this helps. It has worked for me.  :) d2

Offline Steel Tiger

  • Field Bee
  • ***
  • Posts: 563
  • Gender: Male
Re: Added third super on about 3 weeks ago, now 50% honey, 50% brood!
« Reply #2 on: May 20, 2013, 09:48:38 pm »
put the hole on either side and above the holding cutouts.

 Wouldn't that running the risk of squishing bees with your palm when you pick it up?
 Why not below the handhold...or in a corner of the box? I doubt the bees would care where it's located as long as they find it useful.

Offline Finski

  • Galactic Bee
  • ******
  • Posts: 3928
  • Gender: Male
Re: Added third super on about 3 weeks ago, now 50% honey, 50% brood!
« Reply #3 on: May 20, 2013, 10:05:22 pm »
.
Difficult to say what is happening there.....you use supers as brood boxes?
What is in lowest box? Pollen, brood....

You have langstroth brood box or only mediums?

Ok but  you have brood and upper brood box has honey  almost full.

So I see the lack of space between brood and capped  frame.

When you add a third box,  you should add it between brood and capped honey.
So the queen lays again into combs  but in third box  brood emerge and you may extract rippen honey.

You may add the second box too so that you lift capped frames off and put instead empty combs. You lift capped honey into third box in one solid group.

Sounds like the hive is too tight. There should be more free combs where to put nectar and to lay.
Put another box lowest to the hive and bees may use it as they like.
It gives pollen store place .

Let the hive grow and take care that they have free combs all the time.

But otherwise things are very normal now.




 


.
Language barrier NOT included

Offline Kathyp

  • Global Moderator
  • Universal Bee
  • *******
  • Posts: 20371
  • Gender: Female
Re: Added third super on about 3 weeks ago, now 50% honey, 50% brood!
« Reply #4 on: May 20, 2013, 10:11:33 pm »
you are fine.  they will store honey up there as they need the room for honey. they back fill that top stuff thinking toward winter storage.  she must have needed the room.
but
what are they doing under that.  what's going on in the deeps?  most of the time they will work their way down, but very once in a while you'll get a hive that abandons the bottom and stays in the top. 

let us know what you find. if that's the case, you can consolidate the brood a little more and keep the top most supers for honey.  you only want to do that it there is room below.

Someone really ought to tell them that the world of Ayn Rand?s novel was not meant to be aspirational.

Offline Finski

  • Galactic Bee
  • ******
  • Posts: 3928
  • Gender: Male
Re: Added third super on about 3 weeks ago, now 50% honey, 50% brood!
« Reply #5 on: May 20, 2013, 10:13:27 pm »
.
Now you should look inside the hive every week that if they are going to make queen cells.

 And now look the second brood box too. If you have there honey frames, lift them up and give to bees foundations to be drawn.

Pollen frames should be next to brood.

.
Language barrier NOT included

Offline dwbrinton

  • New Bee
  • *
  • Posts: 10
  • Gender: Male
Re: Added third super on about 3 weeks ago, now 50% honey, 50% brood!
« Reply #6 on: May 21, 2013, 03:05:37 pm »
Thanks for the advice.

I have three hive "bodies" currently, I just refer to them as "supers".  They are the large/standard size (9 5/8").

I expect kathyp is correct, they needed the room and the queen went up into the top hive body to lay.

The bottom two deeps have a mix of capped honey and pollen on the outer frames and less densely packed brood in the center frames (compared to the newly placed 3rd box on top).  So hopefully the queen will move back down into the bottom deeps and backfill the top super with capped honey.

Thanks again for the advice, what a great community, bee keepers are awesome!

Offline Finski

  • Galactic Bee
  • ******
  • Posts: 3928
  • Gender: Male
Re: Added third super on about 3 weeks ago, now 50% honey, 50% brood!
« Reply #7 on: May 21, 2013, 06:16:03 pm »

The bottom two deeps have a mix of capped honey and pollen on the outer frames and less densely packed brood in the center frames

so you have deep boxes too inthe hive.

It is vain to hang capped honey in lower box of hive.

First, take them away and put foundations to bees. It is no use keep "honey store" there.

When the queen is laying in those foundation combs, bees clean stores away and move honey to supers.

When bees have cleaned enough  combs, break the capping of honey, spray water on honey crystalls and put 2 frames between brood frames.

Bees clean frames, but not during nectar flow.

Gradually you may clean combs from old honey.
Get an extractor and extract honey away in time.

That mesh with unextracted honey will lead to the situation that beekeeping is not any more pleasant hobby. Yes, I am myself in that trouple.

.
.
.
Language barrier NOT included