Hi all and happy new year.
Im up in Roleystone and Im still feeding my girls, is anyone else up here having to feed theirs? I checked my frames a couple of weeks ago and they were totally empty.
Thanks
Sharon
I try not to feed them and leave plenty stores in spring. Like your area we rely on natives. Summertime is lean pickings for them but the marri flow isnt too far away.
Im assuming the super isnt on?
Hi Skeggley,
I left the super on as I left them food stores for winter, thereās nothing in them and the brood box is empty. I was going to take off the super but thought it was a little late in the season for that now. Last time I checked it there was still some honey in there for them to have. 
I have spotted some trees up here that are starting to flower along peet road but its only one or two. Our jaraha trees havent flowered at all for us and we have been here 4 years now, plenty of buds but they just keep dropping and not flowering.
I saw jarrah flowering around a few places but not much.
Reason i asked about the super was that if you are feeding theres a chance they are putting it into the super which will taint the honey when you do extract.
If we get a week of rain then we will be in trouble as you say they are using what they bring back. I nearly lost a colony from starvation around this time when it rained for a week.
I like to feel the weight of the hives to check for stores. An empty colony is surprisingly light.
I know whay you mean. We had one frame totally empty of anything, even brood, but the queen was there and new bees were being born. Im assuming that they would fill up the brood box first?
Happy New Year @Sharon_Olesen & @skeggley and the silent lurkers 
It seems that the dearth back in the hills has been continuing forever!
I invited my neighbours 86 year old father over to look at my new design horizontal flow hive and at some flow frames as he had never seen any before. He was saying his bees, back in the hills, are struggling as well, but that he expected a flow to start soon.
He is a retired professional apiarist who only has 20 hives now. He started out with one at retirement and couldnāt help but split them regularly, he has been maintaining his genetic strain for decades.
He warned that if you take all the honey at once, the bees may blame the queen for losing the honey and kill her.
I interpreted that as him agreeing with my management practice of always leaving one fully capped frame for the bees as a reserve.
He also warned that it is important to rotate out older blackened brood frames to ensure the bees remain large and in good health.
To him, Flow Hives made frame rotation difficult and costly as you cannot rotate older brood frames into the super before cutting them out and rendering down the wax.
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You actually can. Not simple, but possible. Just add an extra box above the QX, and put the old brood frames in that. If you put it above the Flow super, they will likely move any honey down too. You can cut a groove or hole in the lid as an upper entrance, to let any drones out. The only problem is that you may get some crazy comb if you donāt fill the box. To prevent that, you can just put some new frames of fresh foundation in the empty space. If the bees start drawing it, so much the better for the next hive that needs some frames refreshed! 
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As Dawn says it can be done with a bit of extra work. To me there are two things that I regard as negatives for a Flow Hive. One is the extra hassle of rotating out old brood comb, but that can be worked around. The second is that a Flow Hive super doesnāt yield any wax for rendering down which is a saleable resource. Of course the + side is in the ease of taking the honey 
Iām still learning the tricks of extracting in a Flow Hive adjusting the drain tubing length down into the the bucket, the shorter it is the faster it will drain the honey. But I like the idea of the Flow hive draining while I can work elsewhere in the apiary on traditional hives.
Cheers Terence
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This is one of the reasons I am going horizontal with movable FlowFrames.
One of the goals has always been to manage the horizontal hive so that all excess stores go into the flow frame and the only honey not in the Flow Frames is in the honey arch in the corners of the brood frames.
The proposed Brood Frame Management Plan is to place new frames between the Qxās and the brood frames and rotate the old brood frames from the centre to the outside of the Qx, between the Qx and the flow frames. Once hatched and before too much honey goes into the old frame I can remove the hatched frame and push the Flow Frame back up against the Qx and recycle the old frame.
This is in a way similar to Dawnās suggestion, it sounds harder but is actually easier and you donāt radically change the volume of the hive or distract the bees from their main task by them trying to fill the space.
Terry
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Opened up the Flow Hive yesterday and disappointingly observed only one quarter of a frame of capped honey increase since my last look a couple of months ago. They still have the two full flow frames that I had left in from the spring flow, It is looking like a zero harvest for this summer / autumn.
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I know how you feel. The marri are all flowering up in the hills and I can smell honey in my hive but the top box is deserted! Ive been putting off feeding them as there is so many flowers at the moment. Though I am thinking I should just take the top box off.
Yes bad news Busselton way. I have removed the Flow super and wrapped it it shade cloth put in an airy spot and I am now thinking about next years bumper harvest.
I have this year (yesterday) but left it on for Winter last as it had quite a bit of honey, capped and uncapped, for the bees to enjoy over Winter.
If you are interested I wrap the whole super in shade cloth and place it on a couple of pieces wood X ways to allow air to freely move up through the box. The shade cloth is for wax moth but there needs to be fresh air allowed to move though the box to prevent mildew.
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We still have a couple of months until winter, there is a chance, a slim oneā¦ but still a chance.
I leave the flow super on over winter as I always leave a minimum of one full flow frame to see them through.
I am ever hopeful but compared to this time last year I am at least 50% down on volume.
I left mine on last winter as there was 3 frames full for them. Ill wait a little longer until the trees stop flowering then Ill do a full on inspection and then take everything off. I had hoped to have a least 3 frames for them over winter but it seems Ill spend the whole winter feeding them.
I wasnt going to take any frames for myself as they seem in such need. 
I wouldnāt write the season off yet fellow hillbillys, thereās plenty of time before it gets chilly, sure the Marriās not been great however with it being later this year it should overlap some of the other flowering gums on the scarp. Iām still expecting another couple of harvests before winterā¦
:wishful thinking:
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I have. There is enough blossom around during Winter to maintain the hives. Being reasonably isolated from other houses ( 1.5 to 2 km) there is not a plethora of flowing plant around. The early settler decimated the Jarrah/marri/sheoke forest to pretty much all Marri with a smattering of other species so when the Marri flowers its all go for the bees. I harvested 25 Kg with one brood box in the first year, not so much last year but none this year. I am concentrating on keeping them strong for the massive flow of nectar next year. 
Wow I canāt wait. I can also dream, but hey thatās more exciting eh.
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Definitely not as productive as last year for sure but will be harvesting again this weekend from another colony, according to records I should be doing my second harvest of the same hive by nowā¦
The last lot is jarred and tubbed now and Iāve gotta say it is the best tasting yet. (Maybe even in the world.)
I see and taste different honey from different frames of the same hive so it seems a shame to mix it altogether but have enough low volume candied buckets lining up to be meaded.
If I come down your way this Easter @busso Iāll bring you some honey if you like.
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