I have had my flow hive for a couple of months. When doing a visual inspection today I noticed a couple of SHB in the flow cells when viewed from behind. The bees look like they are actively containing them. The bees are working all the frames, though I can’t see any capped cells yet. There are a lot of dead SHB in the oil tray under the hive. Is this normal?
How many is a lot? How are the (bee) numbers in your hive?
Hi Mike, I’m at Buderim. Hive beetles are a fact of life around here. It sounds like your oil tray is doing the job for you that it’s designed for. I’d advise to keep checking the oil tray, to monitor how many beetles it’s catching.
cheers
60-80 beetles in the tray. The hive is doing well, I presume about 30 - 40,000.
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Thanks Jeff, I actually purchased my nucs off you in Jul. I will clean out the tray tomorrow, add new oil and monitor it.
Well done Mike, it’s great to find you on the forum. You could probably strain the beetles out & reuse the oil.
cheers for now