Move hive to a Flow hive?

Hello! I am so new and nervous, feel like I have no idea what I’m doing…. We purchased a Flowhive but wasn’t able to set it up in time to use it. We installed the nuc into a different short box. Is there any way I could set up my flow hive and move them into it?

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You got this. Get suited up so you feel safe, light your smoker and go slow.

Move your temporary hive to the side. Put your new flowhive in the exact spot and orientation the temporary hive was.

Transfer the frames over in the same order and close up.

You won’t need the flow super yet but likely will need a second deep box after your first brood box is full.

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No worries - temporary rigging and on-the-spot problem solving are part of what make beekeeping fun! There’s always some new situation to figure out - once I had a caught swarm housed in a beer box for about a week until my new gear came :smile:

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Wow!! Thank you! I didn’t think we could do that… but it sounds easy enough. I hate the thought of getting our new Flowhive and having to wait till next year to try it out.

One other thing that I don’t quite understand how to do… the Nuc we got was in a shallow box. How can I put those in a deep box? I don’t think I’ve seen any setups where the bottom box was shallow and the next was deep. I don’t know if I can put the shallow frames in with deep frames in a deep box?

It all sounded so easy when we took the class… but now seems so confusing! I just want the best for our bees. They are so awesome and adorable! I love getting suited up and being able to stand among them!! So incredible!!

Thank you so much for your help!

Wow! I can’t wait to have that kind of confidence to do something like that! That must have been fun!

Thank you for your help!

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Any chance you can measure the height of the box? I suspect that it will be a Langstroth medium. Some people use 3 medium boxes for brood, rather than 2 deeps. In that case you just transfer the nucleus to a medium box, then decide whether you want to stick with all mediums for brood, or put a deep on top when they need more space. :blush:

This one is sold out, but here is the concept:

Do NOT put shallow frames into a deep box. The bees will likely extend the frames down, but when you inspect, the comb will probably fall off and could squish your queen. :cry: You can put a deep box on top later if you want to. Mixing box depths is no problem, as long as you have the right frame depth in each box :wink:

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This is exactly what I want to do next.

A month ago, I opened up my Langstroth hive and found it bursting at the seams. So I removed some drone comb from the bottom of the frames, and added a second brood box. Then I closed things up when I heard a change in crescendo.

This time, I opened things up and found lots of honey in the new box, plus sealed brood. I added some disposable beetle traps, and just as I was going to inspect the lower box, a big fig beetle came bumbling by, excited to discover such a treasure trove. My instinct was to swat him down and grind him into the gravel so he wouldn’t tell his friends. I felt kind of bad because I’ve always liked these little guys.

So the next time I disturb my bees will be to move them into their new Flow Hive home. I’m considering trying to do a split, but need to figure it out.

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Personally, I wouldn’t split at this time of year. If they need more space, put a super on. You can always take it off if they haven’t used it by the end of September. :blush:

They have plenty of space in the 2nd brood box. They’re just starting to build it out, but there’s lots of honey and some sealed brood. I don’t want to destroy their momentum, so back to the original plan of swapping out the Langstroth for the Flow Hive. At some point I’d like to do a split to repopulate the Langstroth to try to head off any swarming. But I guess that can wait until next spring. Thanks!

Good plan. You could reconsider if you start seeing swarm cells, but that is less likely at this time of year. Drone populations are beginning to drop off a bit in our hives, and probably won’t pick up again until mid-December. Six weeks after that is when the risk of swarming increases significantly. :wink:

You have done very well to nurture such a weak package into a strong hive! :blush:

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Thank you! I haven’t carefully examined each frame in the lower box for queen cells —that was my plan yesterday until the fig beetle attack! A couple of weeks ago I saw some drones doing orientation flights. They caught my eye because their flight pattern was fast and jerky, as if they were flying in short, straight segments, while the worker bees are lilting and almost seem to float in the air.