After robbing the hive, I would like to place new foundation in a hive body for the bees to draw it out. I will leave all the bees, 2 full deep hive bodies on each hive... My thinking is that there are 10's of 1000's of bees in the hive at this time. With little or no drawn comb. WILL they go to work drawing the comb out? I will be treating them and can leave these deep frames in the hive as they will be for exchange old brood frames out next spring.... Is this a possible problem or a good thing??? Is there a better way to get new drawn comb for the hives?? Thanks for all help and replies.. Queen Bee
Unless there is a honeyflow going on they will not do a great job in drawing new foundation.
All this extra space may present a problem if you have small hive bettles in your area.Too much space and the bees will not be able to control them very well.Also as stated above unless you feed them 1:1 sugar syurp they will not draw it out.
Although it is a good idea I think you would do better by adding a few frames of foundation this spring and remove the old to help prevent swarming..
Just a thought.
We will have 5 acres of feild peas, 3 acres of buckwheat, 4 acers sunflowers, clover is blooming --We have had lots of rain, so everything is blooming right now. It would only be one hive body per hive. I would think the bees that are in the hive (most have at least 3 full supers and one that they are now filling) could would take care of hive beetles, moths etc... or Not??? Thanks QB
Robbing the hive is usually done late in the season, after labor day. Putting on a super with only foundation is a bad idea for the simple reason that the bees may rob there own winter stores to begin building comb, especially if there is a small late honey flow in your area. Putting on foundation after harvesting is tantamount to a death sentence.
It is better for spring production to leave more honey than to try such experiments. Brood build up in the spring is dependent on the timing of intial honey flows and left over stores with which to feed more brood.
Dave Cushman has a refernce on his site to feeding honey to a hive to get them to draw and store comb honey after the flow. I have not tried it.