Mmmm If you are interested in such subject, then i guess you’re suffering of the same thing am having!
Well, hello all, This is Mohamed from United Arab Emirates, i bought few years back one Flow set and i tried to use it with bees locally, but guess what? the bees didn’t like it! yes, so simple! didn’t like it at all. Therefore, i decided to search on the net, and i found many different ideas on say for example we’re suppose to brush beewax on the frames; so that the bees would more accept the frames, but still didn’t work! I had to put the frame (brushed with bee wax in the brood box) but didn’t work.
well, so i had to take a parts some frames and cut them (thinning the depth of the frames to very small) something similar to the foundation thickness, and painted them with bee wax, guess what this time ha? mmmm Didn’t work again! <-- all this was happening on the left hand side of the brood box, so then i decided to insert one foundation fame, and guess what? they started building it the second day i inserted it!!! Second day guys!! where in the Flow frames/brushed with bee wax didn’t work for two months!! am serious two months and more! Am not here saying that Flow isn’t good! not at all, Flow is perfect, but I want to know what made the bees adopted soo QUICKLY the foundations, whereas the Flow frames not that much!?
What can we do so make the bees accept the flow frames more?
Can we make in the future the Flow frames smaller; so that bees don’t deal with it as something odd and don’t want to accept it? shall we make it thinner? softer? more natural for the bees to accept it? shall the Flow company for example send with the package when we buy from them, a pray that we can pray the frames with bees smell or something to make it more attractive for the bees and not to give us hard time struggling with the bees?!
Thanks all for reading, I want to discuss all this with all of you out there, please feel free to say what you have.
Hi Mohammed, @Martydallas is in Dallas, Texas in the US, as you can see if you click on the round circle photo next to his name. I agree with him, I love my Flow hives and so do my bees. It is very important to have a strong brood box, enough bees and a good nectar flow for them to use the plastic Flow frames. If you have all of that, you will have great success.
I guess i have to be very honest, I don’t have strong brood/bees, but good nectar thu not that good as you expect if were in TX of course!. So this might be the case with me unfortunately.
I think it’s the same with plastic foundation, put them in with wax or even foundationless frames and the bees will use them less. Give them no choice and they’re forced to use it.
Same principle with the flow frames, have a strong brood box that needs to expand somewhere, don’t give them a choice and they’ll have to use them.
Bees love wax foundation above plastic foundation from my experience. Especially in the brood box. It stands to reason that bees prefer it above plastic. Let’s face it, it’s of their own making. Wax foundation from a reputable supplier, of course.
It’s amusing to read one poster using the term “bee-centric”, while another poster says, “Give them no choice and they’re forced to use it”.
Up here in the Burbs SE of Seattle we had a late summer dreath for 3 years now. Doesn’t seem to matter wax, plastic or flow … bees did add earlier in summer but as supply of pollen n nectar decrease the ladies move what they have down stairs. Don’t give up the ship yet !!
I will try a way that was given to me by one of the local and i’ll paste a youtube video of it here, unfortunately it’s in Arabic, but am sure you’ll get what he wanna say.
using this way, I can have three queens breeding in three Nucs, once they lay the eggs i can take two queen and leave one, and take the separation board. and re do the same procedure again for the upper box, and then use my Flow Box
Great video on increasing brood … that would be great if we had flowers (a nectar flow). But a larger work force is also a drain in a dreath. More mouths require more food. Now this cool procedure would surely work (maximum work force) before a major guaranteed nectar flow I would think . Great video even if I don’t speak Ariabic Thankz for the share !
Cheers,
Gerald
P.S. I enjoyed two other of the video. One on Nuc’s
Absolutely! they don’t do this in any season just like that! no, they wait before any strong season starts, and they do this step (if God forbid the season delayed for any reason, say: rain, wind, bad climate, they compensate the bees with sugar water) but once the season starts! Boooom! lots of honey, you could say with in a matter of two weeks or three (depends on the resources of flowers/nectar) the upper box will be full and fully capped “according to what he said of course”
. Great video even if I don’t speak Ariabic Thankz for the share !