Flow Hive 2 stand results with hive beetles

General Bee Chat
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I’m sharing an observation with my 4 flow hives and my 2 flow 2 hive stands vs my 2 original Flow Hive stands. The back story to my observation. Last year in May we had the lock down and torrential rains and a tornado here in Nashville TN. Power outages abounded and closed bee supply businesses. So life was all overwhelming for many in my area.

I took a short cut which did not pay off which I’m sharing because in this instance my best thinking got me in bad situation. I wanted my bees to have some fresh frames because there were many that were just so dark looking and caused me to worry about it’s healthiness. My hives swarmed 7 times during a 4 day power out so I could not open my freezer to grab some frozen frames. I captured the swarms and and place them in cardboard nuks using my primo frames were in my hives. I then replaced my frames with new frames (which the bees did not like) for the bees to rebuild new frames for brood and stores in my hives. I cycled out the hive frames.

The lessen, I did to many frames and it was to much work for the bees because my hives were not strong enough. Now what happened was hive beetles abounded! I hate those bastages! I had traps with oil and many in each hive. But the hives which conquered the beetles best were the flow 2 as I filled the bottom boards with oil and the number of SMB it killed was a lot and it was disgusting.

So the lessons I learned this last year were many.

  1. Don’t give your hive to much rebuilding to do with frames
  2. Keep your bottom boards filled with oil.
  3. There are no short cuts
  4. To much bee space is a recipe for problems
  5. Keep learning but not the hard way if possible.

In conclusion, the flow 2 stand vs the flow 1 stand is easier to fight unwanted pests.

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Martha, it’s good to see you, and I’m glad you made it through such a time! This information is gold for new beeks and so interesting to hear about the design differences. Nice work taking down all those SHB bastages :muscle::japanese_ogre:

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Hi Martha, I’m also pleased to see you.

Just so I understand. Did the beetles actually take over the hives? I mean did they slime them out? Or did you just find a lot more “bastages” in the two hives you mentioned?
The reason I ask is because from my experience, beetles don’t normally lay eggs in new frames that bees haven’t worked on, stored any pollen in or laid brood in. I also don’t see the extra space as an issue with hive beetles either.

cheers

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Hi Jeff, There were an extraordinary amount of shb which the bees chased down or up into the hives. They did not take over the hive which amazed me. The two much bee space was in regards to the fact that I possible should have removed a brood box (we run two 8 frames here) for the bees to rebuild. In the nucleolus of the brood boxes I had 4 frames for brood top and bottom and 4 new frames on the outsides for the bees to rebuild on. That’s what I mean by to much bee space so my terminology may be non pro bee speak. :smiley: I don’t think the bees like the pre made frames I bought as well and that may be why they did not build them out. At any rate, last years theory was not productive. My hives have attracted beetles by the large numbers. It’s a big fight right now.

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Hi Martha, some of my hives attract beetles in large numbers also. The bees chase them until they find somewhere to hide. I squash them as fast as I can while doing inspections. A popular hiding place is between the hive mat & top bars.

While removing the hive mat, I squash as many as I can. Then if a lot scurry onto a frame, I’ll remove it before tapping it on a flat lid in order to bounce the beetles onto the lid where I’ll squash them. I’ll keep doing that until the frame is empty of them.

The beetles must come from one direction because the front hives get more beetles than the hives at the rear.

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