1st Gen Flow Hive Frame - 1st Season of Use

Hey Wilfred, I was miss reading ’ bug stuff’ as ‘big stuff’. Sorry, my eyes are showing their age:wink: I am guess what he is referring to is bridging comb. I’m looking forward to a photo to see what the ‘bug stuff’ actually is, the mind boggles.:laughing:
Cheers

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Sorry. my answer about using water to clean up a super was assuming it was, or had been, on the hive. By all means you can clean up a flow super before putting it into use. Any remaining ‘crap’ will be cleaned up by the bees so it won’t taint the honey. The cleaner the super is will be appreciated by the bees. It was only when I read @Dawn_SD reply that the penny dropped for me.:thinking:
Cheers

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I figured not to worry. Just cleaned them now will work on my beekeeping skills. Melting the wax I have not much but all I have. Going to lightly baste my frames as I do not have too much. Hope I have them closed and see what tomorrow brings.

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Dawn I just checked this am and lots of condensation in the flow super from me washing them?? I did see a bee on top. Will is ruin anything?? It may be gone by the end of day.

They should be fine, but I would pull out your slider and check for pools of water. If you see a lot, just leave it out for a day or two. :blush:

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Hey @neokeeper - welcome!! I’m excited for you to finally be able to put your beautiful Flow frames to use. I was curious if you started your colonies from packages, nucs or were they survivors? My first two seasons were busts (except for a couple frames of comb honey the second one) but last spring I got local, overwintered nucs and they exploded! I had three more colonies from splits AND put the Flow super on one, harvested in July.

Two of my Flow frames had loose wires - I did the pinch test Alan mentioned and then just followed along with Cedar in the video Dawn posted :blush:

Pre-waxing is a must - otherwise you wait around while the bees debate what these crazy plastic cartridges are doing in their attic and lose precious nectar flow time.

Good luck and let us know how it’s going! :sunglasses::+1:

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Hey Neuman, nice to see your post, it’s been awhile! :blush:

I don’t think the condensation will be a problem as long as there’s good ventilation. I had the same concern when I first looked in the observation window, then thought well, if there wasn’t a window I wouldn’t see it - and it might not even be there since that surface inside would all be raw wood that absorbs light moisture anyway :smile: Sure enough, next time I checked it was gone.

My Flow super is on my strong hive that survived the winter and made a new queen back in April. It’s been a beautiful spring here, lots of trees flowering and lasting longer with cool nights. Inspecting today & cant wait to see what’s what :+1:

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Eva it has been a journey. The flow hive got me into bees. So for the past several years I have been trying to get bees. My first colony which I bought was a wax moth mess and then I learned to catch swarms and did a cut out. The cut out lived and left and the swarms I did not catch the Queen great learning. Finally in April found a nuc to buy with a marked Queen and I just added my Flow super. Now to relearn and catch up on how to work with the Flow system plus how to inspect with the flow super. Nice to finally be doing what I wanted. The condensation did dissipate, :slight_smile: .

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