So I’ve decided I’m going to disassemble the flow frames and clean them all out. I feel sorry for the brood I’m currently freezing to death (literally) and I’m not sure how or if I’ll be able to collect the honey that is in the flow frames (maybe strain if I disassemble in a bucket?).
Having gone back into the hive after work today I was happy to notice the following:
- In 3 days the bees have been busy shifting nectar around the hive. One frame that had been all nectar/uncapped honey is now nearly all eggs - the nectar/honey has been shifted elsewhere.
- I didn’t do a full brood inspection but the movement to free up space for brood seems to have also occurred on another 2 of 3 frames that I inspected
Now, the thing that did intrigue me is that I’m not convinced all brood in the flow frames was going to be drones (every other post I read across threads on this forum related to brood in FF’s talked only of drones). As a consequence of this I’ve currently left 1x FF with brood in the hive and only pulled 2 (I’ll pull the one I’ve left after I clean these two up or after the next inspection, whichever comes first). I’ve got photos below for people to take a look and form their own opinion (so I’d be interested in what everyone thinks, including regulars across this forum: @jeffh, @Dawn_SD, @Rodderick, @skeggley, @adammaskew, @peter48, @Anon, @busso, @Semaphore, @Michael_Bush ) .
You will see some obvious cells that are drones and you’ll see capped honey. However, you’ll also see quite a number of ‘flat’ looking cells that I’ve concluded are worker brood and not drones. The hive is healthy and (currently) strong.
