I'm not sure that is the right way to approach a subject line but...
Around July I did a cutout with help from an experienced beek. We held the comb in deep frames with rubber bands (7 frames) and another 5 frames in medium. Any extra space was taken up with foundation frames. I'm guessing you all know the situation later on. A lot of bridging, etc.
The colony seems to have done well. The hive is heavy now and I am hoping for the best for the Spring.
In the Spring:
I've been giving a lot of thought to straightening things out in the Spring. If I place a deep of either foundation or empty frames (with starter strip) between the deep and medium, do you think the colony will build that deep into a brood area so that I will be able to remove the original deep (mess) and then insert another deep? Thus changing out and encouraging a more manageable situation?
i have had this happen with cutouts when the brood comb leaned a bit and everywhere it got close to the comb next to it, they built wonky stuff. the messed up comb is usually brood comb and that can make getting them off of it harder. if it's just a few frames, the easiest thing to do is cut the messy part out. they will rebuild it and usually straight. you will probably cut through some brood, but that's ok. if you can cut the frames apart and put some straight drawn comb in between, that also helps straighten things out.
if you don't want to cut things up, you can find your queen in the spring and move her into the new box with some drawn foundation. put an excluder between her and the messed up comb. wait for any brood to hatch out. pull the frames and cut the comb out. put the frames back in and let them redraw them.
you have to wait and see what you have in the spring. it may not be as bad as you think once you start pulling it apart.
Thanks K.
Who knows what I might find next year!
I've tried my hand at cutouts recently, myself. I found that it is preferable to only put in the brood comb. All of the cutouts I did only had a couple of frames of brood worth mounting. I pitch drone comb/brood and don't mount honey/nectar comb because it is a horrible mess to deal with. I'll mount comb with bee bread though. Usually it only amounts to 3-4 frames tops. I throw all the other comb in a bucket and lay it out away from my hives for the bees to rob out the balance of the hive I fill with drawn out frames of comb--but only just enough to give them a place to stand. If you have SHBs they will over-run the hive if you have more frames than you have bees to cover them. By only using enough of the old comb to make it seem like home, you'll have less screwey comb to deal with later. Also they don't glue down the new comb to the frame enough to withstand the weight of honey and brood when the frames get full. The bees chew through the rubber bands or else incorporate them into the comb. If the bands are removed (by you or the bees) the comb can fall out when you pull them out to check/manipulate them. It has happened to me. Another reason to use as little of the old comb as possible. I try to remove the original comb as soon as I can, as they will distort the adjacent combs to match the irregularities of the original stuff.
Kelly
Thanks Kelly,
A lot of valuable information. I'll do things different next time I do a cutout.
In early spring, the cluster is almost always using only the top super. You could take off the bottom one and put a super on top with drawn or undrawn foundation. Then next year, do the same thing. That would be the easiest way.
Quote from: heaflaw on October 26, 2009, 11:38:14 PM
In early spring, the cluster is almost always using only the top super. You could take off the bottom one and put a super on top with drawn or undrawn foundation. Then next year, do the same thing. That would be the easiest way.
Thanks. That does sound like an easy solution. At least when I get the old comb cleaned out I guess I'll have plenty for the traps I have been planning.