Notes on leaving flow super over winter

I havn’t either but I plan to make a few of them before this winter and use them. I think they are a great idea.

I decided to make a versatile Quilt box that can be used for Summer’s extra ventilation, 2nd top entrance with a close/open option or a Winter moisture absorption layer… They are from the 4 rims of the migratory lid that cost me $10 from the bees supply shop.

2 Likes

Looks good.
The only suggestion I would make (not a criticism) would be to either extend the mesh over the edges and tack it to sides or the more elegant solution of running a saw cut in the middle of edges , tuck the mesh into it and fix in place with wood or other material tapped into the saw cut. This would allow the box to have a flatter edge without having to bang the nails down into the edges to let it sit flat.

Thanks for the useful tips @busso … I wish I can be more capable on the carpentry with limited tools and skills … I should use staples instead of nails as I was sick of begging my hubby to borrow me one from his father! The gap wasn’t that bad since I put it in use, they haven’t used the top entrance so far with limited foragers at the moment.

1 Like

Here’s my quilt box in operation with a plastic ruler as a landing pad for the 2nd top entrance.

1 Like

That would be the simplest solution. And mostly my mind does not work towards the simplest solution.:face_with_raised_eyebrow::face_with_raised_eyebrow:

1 Like

@Semaphore I don’t know where you are, but napisan is OxiClean in the USA.

He is upside-down land, like you. :wink:

1 Like

you would have tried to make these out of giant posts probably? And installed with block and tackle?:wink:

1 Like

Love it:laughing::laughing::laughing::laughing:

After spending some time trying to get some crystallised honey out of my flow frames, I made the snap decision to put the whole flow super back on the hive and let the bees clean up the rest. I left the inner cover on and opened the centre hole a couple of centimetres and left it to the bees. Unfortunately, I then completely forgot about it. The last week I’ve tried to remove it when there was no activity through the windows. Yesterday at 8am and at about 8 degrees (somewhere in the 40’sF) I couldn’t see any movement and pulled the roof off. Seeing heaps of bees and instantly smelling their agro, I quickly put the roof back on.

There is no inner cover between the flow super and the gabled roof (with vents). I can hear the bees busily trying to seal up the vents during the day. I’m assuming they’ve moved up into the flow super (QX had been removed in Autumn). Any suggestions? Should I continue to try and remove the super or leave them to it - it’s unlikely to be warm enough to open the hive until September. The inner cover is still in place between the brood box and the flow super, but I’m not sure where the cluster is exactly.
Thanks in advance!

I’d try to remove it if I were you so they don’t gum it all up with cold weather for weeks ahead. It’s possible the queen is up on the Flow frames too so maybe why you got such displeasure.

What if you placed another table or stand directly in front of your brood box entrance and put the Fsuper on it but upended, so the bees in there would need to leave and could then go directly into the entrance? Put your roof back on the inner cover immediately to retain heat. You should also place a cloth or other manner of bridge between the Fsuper edge and the entrance if there’s a gap. If it’s very cold you could even put a blanket over the whole hive plus abutted super to give added protection to the bees migrating back in.

Best guess :crossed_fingers:Let us know what you end up doing!

Thanks Eva! I’ll nut the logistics out - it’s worth a shot. I also thought I might be able to reverse the boxes? Given there’s an inner cover between the two (to limit exposure to the cold). I could put a second base beside the hive and put the brood box straight on it, then swap the flow super over to the original base and sit the brood box on top. The fact there’s no inner between the super and the gabled roof might be an issue though as it means some level of exposure (on hopefully a sunny day over 10 degrees celcius. It may require some kind of interim blanket or wrap whilst swapping, but does it sound feasible? Thanks again

PS Heading back to the bees next week after a week’s holiday up north to escape the cold.

That sounds feasible, but I guess I’d be worried the bees would still not ultimately leave the Fauper (or shall we call it the Fnadir in this case :grin:) if it’s still connected to their brood box. Maybe worth a try before doing the forced-march thing?

1 Like

I hope you didn’t come to the Sunny Coast to escape the cold, because it’s freezing up here. I’m actually wearing socks under my thongs (flip flops), that’s how cold it is.

2 Likes

It’s still warmer here than home, but I have to confess, today is putrid!

Hi Eva,
Just a belated update. We had an unseasonably warm day in early August, so after way too much procrastination, I opened up the hive, took the flow super off, and just shook the bees back into the brood box. I had some contingency plans in case the queen was in the flow super, but she wasn’t and hadn’t been, to the best of my knowledge :sweat_smile:

As an aside, it was interesting to see a number of bees at work in the flow super before cramming them back into an already full brood box. Just as a reminder, I’d left my flow super on for the bees to clean up with the inner cover hole only open a fraction - say 10-15% (before forgetting about it).

It got me thinking, for reasons I won’t bore you with, I’m very keen to change brood boxes for this hive plus ALL the frames in spring. Watching all the action in there, I was wondering if it would be feasible to put another brood box on top (8 frame) with some honey, a couple of partly/fully drawn out frames with the remainder being new frames. If I keep the inner cover in between and partly/mostly covered again, it might enable the bees to start working the frames, without the risk of cold/space issues.

I had been planning on doing a Bailey frame exchange type manoeuvre thingy but thought this might be better by allowing the bees to move at their own pace. I would then remove both the inner cover and bottom brood box after the queen has moved up (theoretically). Eventually, I would add an ideal (shallow) super, followed by a queen excluder and flow super when ready, as that’s the hive set-up for winter.

Does this seem a reasonable option? I know I have to manage a split in there somewhere too.

Why can’t you put the new brood box underneath the old one? That removes the temperature problem and the bees will move down naturally. Once the brood is mostly in the bottom, swap the top one with the ideal and go from there.

Thanks Karby!
I was thinking this way (above) as it’s still winter and wanted to keep it out of their way when coming and going from the hive. The inner cover hole is still only open a fraction so I thought it best to keep it above for a few weeks to avoid the big bee log jam but, still enable them to climb up and work on it (based on the number of bees up there a few weeks ago). I suppose I could just leave the inner cover hole open and then remove the whole cover when spring hits.