Hello GUYS, I have my flow hive for almost two years. but my bees have never stored or use the flow hive.
They are active on the flow frames they have sealed all the inner joins and around. But they have never store anything. They have grown and swarmed. re queen , and yet they go to the flow frames but have never ever stored anything.
i watch somewhere and said sometimes they only store nectar and hoeny on regular size bee cells and NO the BIG Drone cells like the flow hive? any truth on that or any suggestion? HELP!!
If you use the magnifying glass Search tool at the top of the page, you will find many posts telling you how to get the bees to use the Flow frames. However, to get you started, here are a few ideas:
Take a frame of mostly honey from the brood box, and use it to replace a Flow frame in the super for a week or two. The bees should smell the honey, and get the idea to store it up there.
Even better, if you have a medium (or deep) super of honey, put it above the Flow super. Bees do not like gaps between resources in the hive, and the chances are that they will move the honey down into the Flow frames to fill the gap between the brood box and the upper super. The Flow super will now smell of honey, and they will willingly use it in future.
These ideas should get you started and there are a lot more on the forum. However, if you have a Chinese copy of the Flow super, even these thoughts may not help. It seems that the bees have a lot of trouble adjusting to the smell of the Chinese super and plastic frames.
I have been having the same trouble, however this past season for me in South Australia was an incredibly dry one creating a significant dearth. So honey production has been a fraction of past seasons.
Generally my bees have avoided my flow super, so these tips will indeed come in handy once the winter passes. Overall its been a tough season. I hope next season will be more positive regarding a nectar flow. Time will tell.
Thats too bad, First make sure the frames are “closed” really well in the hexagon shape. Then you could try enticing them with spraying sugar water on the frames or dripping honey on the frames. you can try rubbing some lemmon grass oil over them. If they still don’t take to it. You could try mixing it into another deep box and checker board them with real wax comb. After that, I have no idea
Ive tried numerous avenues but i just know deep down Bees will do what they decide to do regardless, you cant force them.
Ive had luck with conventional frames anyway, harvested honey and honeycomb in the time ive had my hives. So its a shame about the flow super but the experience has been rewarding all the same.
I just gotta be patient, restrict my flow hive to a single brood and the flow super, hope i have favourable conditions for a honey flow next season too. Its interesting how in two seasons ive experienced polar opposites but its how it goes condition wise . You cant have it all.
I am in Miami , Usa. So not sure we are in summer and my bees were inside the flows the sealed the aides lf the flow hive bit never ever put nectar or bee bread!
They built some honey on the brood frames but i guess they ran out of spakce and swarm .. i just removed the flow. Box and i am going to get a second brood box to increase the size of my hive then add the flow box and see what happens. I think the issue is the size of rhe cells my beeds dont like that big size they disnt put nectar of any of the drone cells either!
It’s unlikely that the cell size of Flow frames has anything to do with your colony not using them to store honey. They are about the same size as regular honey comb bees build for themselves. The Flow super in total is definitely a very large space in comparison to a medium or shallow Lang super, one that a colony focused on reproduction and population increase will certainly not have the worker force to fill, regardless of nectar abundance. But, that’s true of any type of super when the colony is busy getting ready to swarm
Swarm management is key to having enough honey to harvest. Along with the great tips from others, especially regarding judging when to put the super on, it’ll help you a ton to get familiar with the brood cycles in your area and the universal signs of swarm prep all colonies display, and the ways you can pre-empt swarming so your colony maintains honey production.
Question for you - what does the sealing in your Fframes look like? Can you send a pic? Reason I’m asking is, bees will close up the cells using propolis rather than wax at times when they deem the super an unwanted extra space. Hopefully, they did use wax - which means you are ahead of the game for next time!
