Acquired my bees in May 2019. Installed into new hive with foundationless frames. Kept them in this for the remainder of the year and now here we are with full box, full frames and spring has arrived. Flowers are coming out, trees are starting to bring on leaves, grass is growing.
Missouri State in the southeast end. Temps have been varying from 60-70’s during day and have gotten down into the mid 30’s at night.
Girls are bringing in pollen and have for a few weeks.
I am seeing pest evidence in the tray below.
My question is…
I have another brood/super with foundationless frames in it and the flow hive super as well… Would it be better to add the FHSuper first or just add both and call it good?
TIA Mary
Hi OzarkSerenityAcres,
Congrats on your progress. If I understand your question there may be actually two things here to look at. 1st, what sort of pest evidence are we talking about? What was your pest treatment schedule/what did you do as preventative pest treatments? That will help inform my recommendation for your second question about the 2nd box add. My general guidance here would be to suggest if you want to grow your Apiary beyond a single hive you have a good opportunity to lookup online Walkaway Splits and simply pull 1/2 the frames out of the existing hive and put in replacement foundation less frames in the old box and then put in the ones you pulled into your second brood box. Having two hives is always better than one! After the bees fill most of the new frames up then I would add the Flow Hive super to one of the hives. That just means you need to have either another honey super from Flow, or add a langstroth honey super without the flow devices in them on the second box when the time comes. Then you have the best of both worlds— comb honey AND flow hive tapped honey. But again, the pest issue has to be examined first.
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First off my pest treatment preventative or otherwise is of the organic type. I am not a chemical type person due to allergies and the like.
I have an order for bees coming for my second hive which is a horizontal hive with flow hive system in the middle.
My interest is for my bees health of course. I would like to have honey this year from my first hive.
I am wanting to know if I should add the flow hive system or add the extra super and the flow hive super as well. To me it makes sense to add the flow hive super until the hive is bigger then add the second one later for them to winter over with.?
Yup, I’m organic based too and care a lot for the bees. Live bees are way better than dead bees. So again, depending on what pest you are talking about I was going to offer suggestions but you sound like you have a plan already so I’ll leave you to that. My advice still stands— solve the pest issue first before adding more room as you may create stressed bees that become more vulnerable by giving them too much space if you haven’t gotten the pest issue solved. I would add the 2nd brood chamber first before the Flow Hive Super at a later date. If you care about your bees as a priority I wouldn’t be worried about the honey situation for the season and I think you will actually find that they’ll make a ton for you this season anyway. But that way you are ensuring you have enough honey in the 2nd box for wintering rather than pulling the flow super off and hoping they store enough in the fall in the 2nd box.
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