Hi all a few things to ask.
- All my Nucs are now Full 10 frame box should i try to jam all the bees in an 8 frame Flow or will this cause them to swarm .
2 . Has anyone left the flow hives Natural red cedar .
Cheers Pete
Hi Pete,
My inclination would be to go “double deep” rather than cram the bees in. Or you could split and set up extra hives, or donate/sell your extra frames of bees to another keeper. I wouldn’t want to squeeze them down in brood space and in doing so, risk making them want to swarm.
I have western red cedar hives at the moment. They are Tung Oil sealed, but otherwise natural colour. I have had WBC hives in the past, and the outer layer of “lifts” were also cedar, but unstained and unsealed. They turned a sort of silvery grey over the years, but never rotted.
Dawn
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I also run a double-deep on my main Langstroth hive - I find that it is much easier to manage, much less chance that the queen will run out of brood frame space and want to swarm.
@gullieshighlander if you chequerboard and go double deep now, in 21 days and on you will have more bees to forage.
So if you double brood now after the Australia day 26th you will be bursting with bees
Thanks for your input ladys my problem is all i have are 10 frame boxs. Well looks like more money lol Wife will love this …
Yeh Hubby can’t complain it’s my money, LOL - and he just bought a posh car so the subject is moot
As a cheap temporary fix, I suppose you could use a nucleus introduction board on top of your 10 frame hive, and put the Flow brood box on top of that. Wouldn’t be very waterproof though, and would certainly spoil the appearance.
In the end, I guess I would just bite the bullet and buy the extra brood boxes and frames.
Yes Dawn think i just bite the bullet (from wife’s gun) and buy 3 more 8 frame boxs. lol
Well, if the brood boxes come with dinner, chocolates, flowers and wine, you might be able to dodge the bullets!
Dawn
Well just looked at beethinking an thay have 3 pack med supers would that work 1 full 1 med for brood . ? haha Dawn
Hi Peter, looks good (the boat), the hives also looks good. I’m thinking you could easily put the bees from a ten frame hive into an 8 frame brood box. You may even find that the outside frames only contain honey. What I would do is select the 8 best frames to put into the brood box & let the extra bees move into the honey super. If the 2 frames you leave out contain brood, you might be able to use those to strengthen another weaker hive.
You could also start a new colony with 2 frames of brood & bees from each hive. Just evenly mix the frames in a strange box & lid & move it a few kilometers away. Bring it back home after a few weeks. That’s my line of thinking. cheers
Hi Jeff
Yes the outer frames are honey i was just going to take them out and move the lady’s in but though I would ask some advice because I though I mite cause them to swam. An I need more boat time but these bee’s keeping me busy .
Cheers
Pete
You could also start a new colony with 2 frames of brood & bees from each hive. Just evenly mix the frames in a strange box & lid & move it a few kilometers away. Bring it back home after a few weeks. That’s my line of thinking. cheers
An Jeff. With this plan would I order a new Queen or will these guys make there own …
Pete
No Pete, just let them make a new queen unless you want things moving more quickly & you have access to a new queen. I just let them make a new queen. If I wanted more queens, I’d split that nuc in a weeks time making sure I had plenty of queen cells in each nuc. I did that twice a few days ago.
If that boat is a fishing boat, I’d be very careful. Beekeeping is highly addictive. I met a bloke a couple of years ago, all he could talk about was fishing. Since then he got into bees & now all he talks about is bees.
That’s great thanks Jeff an yes 5.7 mt an my wife just said last week u haven’t taken your boat out. So yes I love doing the bees but I need more hrs a week for fishing …lol geez if we could just fit all the fun things in .
Cheers
Pete
I haven’t been out for 20 months, by boat is sitting at a marina gathering barnacles. I’ll have to sit myself down & give myself a good talking to & try to rearrange my priorities.
@gullieshighlander You can only make a new Queen if you have larvae less than 2 or 3 days old or better still eggs.
Unless you have a laying bee, which I doubt. Very, very much.
You can’t just swap frames out and think you will get a Queen. It doesn’t work like that.
It will help you to understand the life cycle of the Queen, workers and drones. All larvae are feed Queen jelly the first 3 days of life so any fertilized eggs can become Queens. Drones are not fertilized so no Queens from drone eggs. As you can see a bit more complex than just taking out a couple of frames.
Oh is that right Valli . Well i have ordered 10 new Queens for next Wednesday so i will use one of them with the frames and make a few Nucs while iam there .
I guess i learn as i go
cheers
Pete
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Why have you ordered so many Queens??? I thought you only had 2 or 3 hives??