I have four questions:
Background:
#1: I have eleven Langs and I thought they'd go into winter fairly weak. We've had lots of rain and the bee's foraging days have been cut down greatly. In the meantime I fed all my hives Megabee Patties and to the two weakest ones, I fed some syrup. In no time the populations of all the colonies exploded. One of my colonies is now stacked five mediums high. After an inspection this weekend, I found that the frames in the upper boxes are being filled with honey but the ones in the lower boxes are hardly filled at all - just a little in all the honey cells. I figured during the weeks of rainy weather we've had, the bees had been consuming the honey in he bottom boxes first. Is my guess correct?
#2: I run all my hives with open brood nests - no excluders at all. I didn't find one frame of honey that was capped. Half capped, yes. But none that were fully capped. And this one colony has brood all the way up the the fifth box! And some frames of honey in the sixth. I'll probably not be able to harvest any honey for myself, but I might take some frames to feed the weaker ones. Second question: Can a colony go into winter stacked five high?
#3: Short of checking or hefting every single box, is there a sign that I can look for to tell if the bottom boxes are getting filled up with honey?
#4: I have lots of bees and brood. Would there be any advantage to make splits this late in the season?
I think I'll go with excluders next year. Probably would make things easier.
Any advice about keeping an open broodnest would be greatly appreciated.
There are a lot of variables here, but I'll make some assumptions and give you some possible answers:
1. If you checked the empty supers earlier in the year and they were full of capped honey, then I'd say that the bees ate into it. If you never actually saw those frames with capped honey, it is unlikely (in my area at least.) I have actually run tests where I purposefully left honey on the bees just to see if they ate into it (as I had read somewhere.) I have never had them eat into it to such an extent that they ate a whole super of honey (in fact, most times there is no real change and only a few times did it appear that they 'ate' a bit off the top, so to speak.
Regardless, the only important thing is that they have a queen (or you have found eggs) and they have good stores for the Winter, which it sounds like they do.
2. I can't answer this question. I have run hives with two deeps and two mediums through the Winter, in Virginia (last Winter, in fact). But, the top two supers were capped in the prior Fall.
3. No, you need to check the bottom box to know. I think it is a critical task in September, in my neck of the woods. It's important to make sure each hive has a laying queen and adequate stores at this time (again, in Virginia) of the year.
4. I would consider it very disadvantageous. I find very few (if any, in many cases) drone cells at this time of the year. The breeding pool is poor (in Va) by September. We find the April/May months to be the absolute best time for getting a solid, local queen. If I actually had a hive that was clearly out of whack and raising bees like it was Spring (instead of Fall), I might take a frame of brood and give it to a hive that needed it - but it would have to be a weird situation (like a late August cut out that needed brood to get a good chance at building a population for Winter).
In general, I am not a fan of excluders, but here is a recent post where I did decide to use them next year to prevent what happened to you. Normally, my hives do not build up into the honey supers, but I had a few instances this year, for some reason.
http://beekeeping.varinagardens.com/beehive-observations/queen-excluder.html (http://beekeeping.varinagardens.com/beehive-observations/queen-excluder.html) (see the comments on this post too, for other ideas)
.
I have kept hives 45 years without excluder. It is long story to tell how it goes.
My hives use to be very strong, 5-6 boxes.
To split before winter is a wrong course.
When autumn comes and there is no yield any more on pastures, the size of hive collapses radically in 3 weeks and only wintering bees remain. it means that 6 box hive needs only one or two box for winter.
I like 2 box wintering colonies. They build up nicely next spring and cach early yield like dandelion or winter canola.
#1: Many will say that bees prefer to fill honey in starting at the top of a cavity. I have no direct experience with this. The most relevant factor here is the population explosion. Developing larvae eat much more stores than do adult bees. So bees feeding a lot of new larvae will deplete stores (esp. with no nectar due to rain), and nurse bees will start by taking stores close to the brood nest.
#2: Excluders do not have any impact on whether or how fast bees cap honey. But very high humidity does, as it slows the evaporation process in the hive. Are these 8-frame mediums? I assume they are since you seem to be running all mediums. If so, 4 8-mediums is the equivalent of the standard 2 10-deeps for wintering, and you might want to take one box off and distribute. If these are 10-mediums, you might want to distribute 2 or 3. See #4 below.
#3: No. Sorry, but weight or visual inspection is it.
#4: No. It is probably too late to rear good queens at this time.
BUT, you may be able to remedy this issue by equalizing some of your hives. One of your hives is 5 mediums high while others are comparatively weaker. You can donate frames of stores (capped or not) or brood from the hives you feel are too large to those that are weak. Replace empty or undrawn frames with full ones, or even move a whole box. It will take some lifting and some math, but you can simultaneously shrink the big hive to a size the bees can handle and strengthen your weaker hives.
If you do this, remember to be careful not to transfer queens. Also, either brush all of the bees off the frames you are moving, or place a layer of newspaper between boxes, if you are moving large numbers of bees. For just one or two frames with nurse bees, you can generally just pop them into their new box.
Quote from: Stone on September 13, 2011, 05:47:16 PM
I have four questions:
Background:
#1: I have eleven Langs and I thought they'd go into winter fairly weak. We've had lots of rain and the bee's foraging days have been cut down greatly. In the meantime I fed all my hives Megabee Patties and to the two weakest ones, I fed some syrup. In no time the populations of all the colonies exploded. One of my colonies is now stacked five mediums high. After an inspection this weekend, I found that the frames in the upper boxes are being filled with honey but the ones in the lower boxes are hardly filled at all - just a little in all the honey cells. I figured during the weeks of rainy weather we've had, the bees had been consuming the honey in he bottom boxes first. Is my guess correct?
#2: I run all my hives with open brood nests - no excluders at all. I didn't find one frame of honey that was capped. Half capped, yes. But none that were fully capped. And this one colony has brood all the way up the the fifth box! And some frames of honey in the sixth. I'll probably not be able to harvest any honey for myself, but I might take some frames to feed the weaker ones. Second question: Can a colony go into winter stacked five high?
#3: Short of checking or hefting every single box, is there a sign that I can look for to tell if the bottom boxes are getting filled up with honey?
#4: I have lots of bees and brood. Would there be any advantage to make splits this late in the season?
I think I'll go with excluders next year. Probably would make things easier.
Any advice about keeping an open broodnest would be greatly appreciated.