I have two hives that are heavy in weight in the top deep hive body but the bottom deep hive body of both hives are light. Should I continue feeding them and they will fill down? Or should I feed and reverse the hive bodies?
Brood doesnt weigh that much, so if it is heavy I would dare say it is close to being full of syrup. Have you checked inside to see the amount of stores they have? Being in Texas,my guess is that you could stop the feeding as you may be plugging the brood nest up.
I am seeing brood on frames. And there is also stores of honey. My concern is they aren't moving down. Could it be that the bottom has lots of brood if I were to break into it? Last time i looked there wasn't much brood in either. But last weekend there is some now in the upper body.
Some people reverse hive bodies coming out of winter-others don't. They will move down in the lower deep on their own as they need the space. But I would still quit feeding if your top hive body is heavy. You should be having and have had good temps where you are from so Im sure that there is at least a sleight nectar flow going on. My thoughts are that they may very well be on their way to honey bound and no room for the queen to lay. I would suit up and go in for a good inspection.
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Bees use to consume strotes from down to top.
Quote from: johnwm73 on April 06, 2011, 01:51:07 PM
I am seeing brood on frames. And there is also stores of honey. My concern is they aren't moving down. Could it be that the bottom has lots of brood if I were to break into it? Last time i looked there wasn't much brood in either. But last weekend there is some now in the upper body.
Bees will develop frames, comb, brood, etc, at the rate hive population forces the bees onto adjacent frames. Bees only work as much space in a hive as the bees can cover, if you have a double 10 frame hive but only 8 frames of bees the bees will only work those eight frames.
Bees rebuild the hive in the reverse order they consumed the stores during the winter. That is, they begin brood rearing and honey processing in the upper box. When enough new bees have emerged to force the population down into the lower box they do so. It takes about half the time to fill the lower box with bees as the brood area gets doubled as the population explodes.
Place your 1st super on the hive when the lower box is half full of bees as the hatching bees will fill the remainder of the lower box on the hive quickly.