Thanks, I have read this piece before & I agree with your philosophy of minimum intervention & not inspecting too frequently, but if you are able to see from ‘external’ observations that there are issues developing, you need to inspect more closely & take action. If you don’t your interventions will eventually have to have a much greater impact on the bees than a more regular 10-15 minute inspection of frames. Having to remove comb which may contain brood, or valuable honey & pollen stores, the potential loss of such will have a far greater impact. The amount, of SHB on a bottom board or inside a lid is not necessarily going to indicate just how many of them are inside.
As is quoted in the article you referred to "I don’t actually inspect frame-by-frame unless I detect something amiss"
and this is what I meant by my original comment, there’s a visible need to inspect frame by frame & you can’t tell the full story unless you inspect frame by frame.
Also as a new beekeeper it is difficult to know what those external signs are telling you about the internal state of the hive unless you have seen it.
Hi Kirsten, I pretty much agree with everything you said as well. Over time we gain experience and knowledge and in the meantime I’m trying to spare the bees the consequence of my lack of expertise while I do this. Sometimes you go too much one way and other times too much the other 
I have just one colony right now and have pretty much experienced what Rusty, in the aformentioned article is describing here:
“if the hive is so full of bees you can’t see a blame thing, if it boils over when you lift the lid and the sky goes dark ’cause sunlight can’t get through the cloud of bees, then is it really necessary to check your brood pattern?”
I would get rid of the drone frames. They make great Christmas gifts for any non-beekeeping friends lol.
Hi @Anon , I think that might be a good plan. I originally got drone combs because they were advertised as "an easy way to eliminate a large number of varroa mites " but they have caused a different problem altogether.
To survive, bees need a cavity…nothing more; they’ll take care of the rest. Everything else, i.e. frames, reducers, excluders, etc., is just for us.
Sometimes it’s tough to wade through all the advertisements and determine which stuff is just “hive bling” and which stuff is a good idea.
I just completed my 4th week inspection and one of my 3 hives continues to build burr comb on the exterior side of the outer frames, however this time there is connecting comb between several frames.
This box has 2 frames with foundation and 6 without. They have about 75% built all frames out.
What is the reason behind all of this craziness? I did not remove any of the comb today as I felt the need to inquire here first! I have removed all burr comb prior to today, but it appears they have the upper hand on this one and seem to be in full force! One week since removal and they have trippled the burr manufacturing!
Last inspection they had wonky comb on one of the inner frames so I placed a rubberband on it to bring the comb back into the frame. This hive seems to have a creative side don’t like to stay within the parameters of their hee space!
The girls are great framerworkers, but they are making me crazy!
Didn’t you know? That is what bees are born to do! 
It is normal bee behavior. Until every frame is fully drawn with full width comb, they will continue to do this. Granted, some hives seem to do it more than others, but that is just a deliberate plot by the bees to keep us confused. Personally, I keep tidying it up until it is as straight as possible.
Thanks so much for the confidence! Time to clean those girls up and guide them to better housekeeping! Lol
After many inquiries with local Beekeepers I am left to my own device to decided to keep it or remove it. Many here say leave it alone, however inspecting the frames becomes messy and angers the bees more as they are packed with syrup and pollen!
Can this be placed anywhere for the bees to recycle or is it trash once removed?
They will not recycle the wax. If you leave it outside the hive, they will clean up the wax within a day or two, but you risk encouraging robbing by bees from other hives. You could also leave it on top of your inner cover, with the hole in the cover left open so they can clean it up. However, there is a risk that they may start building comb in the roof if you do that.
I usually do one of two things. If there is a lot, I take a kitchen sieve out to the hive with me, and a container of some sort. I actually use a 6 quart dough bucket, but any kind of bowl or pan would work. If the comb just has honey in it, I put it into the sieve over the bucket and take it into the house later to crush and strain for my own use. 
If it has eggs or larvae in it, I put it into a Ziploc bag and freeze it until I have enough wax to make it worth rendering a batch. The remaining wax from the crush and strain joins it in the freezer after the honey has finished dripping into my bucket.
I like to use all the scrapings I get from my girls. If it has a little nectar in it I leave it in a plastic container near the hive for a few hours. Then it gets washed and goes into the wax bucket, a 20L plastic one with a tight fitting lid.
Sometimes my girls build cross comb. I try and cut it out then put it back into frames right way round. Sometimes I need to use rubber bands to hold the comb in place. Leftover bits get crushed, strained and washed. Sometimes I keep little bits of capped burr comb in a sealed bucket to blend with stuff I’m crushing and straining.
Right now I’m in the UK near a lovely place called Rickmansworth. My son and his wife live nearby, aboard a narrow boat on “The Grand Union Canal”. There’s a festival happening at Rickmansworth this weekend and it’s all very entertaining.
I am missing my bees though, My thanks to @Webclan for keeping an eye on them while I’m away.
Sounds lovely @sciencemaster! Nice to see you back here too.
About burr comb, I just completed a third inspection on my two new colonies and was able to put the Flow super on - woohoo!!! After rubbing the frames with some wax I also used some bits I scraped off during my looksee & left them on top of the QX, just to make them even more curious to see what’s up there 
