Good evening here from Northern California. I have 2 questions for the group. This is our 5th year attempting to harvest honey with the flow hive. We’ve had a plethora of issues over the years and this is the first summer we’re actually able to harvest. We’ve harvested 2 frames thus far and it was one of the most rewarding moment of our farm. My first question is regarding activity in the frames. We have 3 of the 7 frames that are capped and ready to go (harvested 2 of them last week). The other 4 frames have bees on them but there is no honey distributed at all. It’s like they’re just walking around them. On the capped ones there were also a few strips about 1/2” wide that had nothing in them. Is this normal? How do we get them to store honey in the other 4 frames. The second questions is regarding mite treatment. We tend to lean more organic and natural so we’re wondering if we should treat. We treated a few years ago and didn’t get any honey the next year and then last year we had a virgin queen through the winter and hadn’t treated and this is the best year yet. Thanks for the input.
Hi Scott and welcome! Congrats on your first Flow harvest - it is a rewarding moment indeed
July is typically a time of dearth in the general region of the East Coast, so honey storage won’t be possible again this year, unless your area sees a late-summer or early fall bloom of flowers like asters and goldenrod, and it’s not too dry by then. If there’s been nectar, your bees have probably been storing it in the brood area so it’s handy - that’s also why you are only seeing it concentrated on the few frames.
There are several key factors involved in ending up with a full, juicy Flow super. In my apiary this season, swarm buildup started in March and didn’t let up til mid June! So I had just an array of colonies in different stages of growth as the nectar flow was setting in, plus we’ve had long stretches of cold rainy weather when bees couldn’t forage.
Still, I was confident in placing Fsupers on 3 of them, but only one of those has filled completely. The other two are much like you described yours to be, levelled off at the central areas of three center frames. Since one went well, I chalk the low fill of the other two up to slower colony growth, leading to fewer workers available to bring in nectar on the intervening good days.
When I inspect this weekend, I plan to harvest what’s there and ensure that the bees can store any late summer forage for themselves for winter in the brood area. Taking off the Fsupers that are underused will help free up the workforce to focus on pest control and robbing defense.
Speaking of pests, I don’t recommend not treating for mites, but I understand not wanting to use miticides. So, I make oxalic acid sponges and place them in my hives in June - the bees walk on and chew away the sponges over the course of the season, which distributes the OA throughout the colony. Testing in fall has shown very low counts and I’ve had 80-100% winter survival since using these.
You can read more about mites, oxalic acid and other treatment options by searching in Pests and Diseases
