Got my first flow hive up and running in April. No foundation on the frames and the bees have done a great job drawing out the comb. I put the super on a couple days ago and one concern I have is they are not going up to it much. I have left the queen extractor off for now to encourage them to go up but nothing yet. Also today I noticed a lot of bees congregating on the front of the hive. Is this a concern? Are they thinking of swarming?
See pics for some more detail.
The queen is still laying because I have seen the eggs and larvae’s.
In your climate, you should probably be running double deeps for brood. Davis is the academic heart of agriculture for California, so have you asked any local advice? I only see two boxes on your hive, and if the upper one is a super, you need to fill a second brood box first.
Please don’t use a queen “extractor”… A queen excluder is much kinder! Joking aside, whenever you put the Flow super on, you really should use a queen excluder. Even strong proponents of not using queen excluders (like Frederick Dunn) agree that you should use one with Flow frames.
Looks like minor bearding. I guess it was hot today? Like high 70s or 80s? Second brood box will help a bit with that in the first year too.
That is a hoary old chestnut (= often answered question) here, and you can check this thread for a ton of ideas:
By the way, your external feeder worries me for 2 reasons:
You shouldn’t be feeding when you have a super on the hive
External feeders encourage robbing. I would find an internal feeder of some sort. You can use the Forum search tool to look for in hive feeders
GREAT HELP! All the answers I was looking for. In Davis it was 95 degrees today. It gets extremely hot here. Good thing is I have another brood box I need to put together. Guess now is a good time to do that.
I agree with the internal feeder. This was a quick add on when the hive was starting with the intention of getting a top feeder.
Joking aside, whenever you put the Flow super on, you really should use a queen excluder. Even strong proponents of not using queen excluders (like Frederick Dunn) agree that you should use one with Flow frames.