Spacing of Frames in the Brood Chamber

[Galaxy]

I am establishing several colonies in eight frame medium hive bodies.  These hive bodies are the width of those sold by Brushy Mountain.  They were actually made by a beekeeper in Illinois. 

When I place the eight frames in the hive body and push them together so that the frames touch each other there is substantial empty space left on each side of the hive body. Enough space that it appears that the bees could build additional comb there.

Alternatively, I could space the frames evenly across the hive body so that the frames do not touch each other.  This would leave approximately ¼ inch between the frame end bars.

Which would be the best way to place the brood chamber frames?

Thanks

[Mklangelo]

I have questions about that also.  I have the standard 9 5/8 inch hive bodies with 9 1/8 inch frames in them. I understand "bee space" to be 3/8 inch.  But my girls are building comb between the bottom bar of the upper frames and the top bar of the lower ones.  I suppose it's no big deal but it's a mess.

[Michael Bush]

Crowd them together in the middle.  Better yet, cut 1/16" off each side of each end bar and put 9 in.  That's what I do.

If the space worries you, you can also make a follower board.  Just cut a piece of 1/4" luan plywood the silhouette of a frame and put it on the end with a 1/4" or so space on each side and, of course, you need a 1/4" space to start off anyway.  Now the follower will be easer to pull out to get started inspecting without rolling bees.

[Galaxy]

Michael:

I like you idea of a follower board or even nine frames. 

It seems to me that the primary reason to jam them together is to produce frames of comb that when placed tight against any other frame will maintain a uniform bee space (3/8 of an inch).  In other words, it will produce frames of comb that are interchangeable with any other hive.  Moving frames of brood to strengthen weak hives or to reduce swarming of strong hives appears to be an important hive management tool.

Thanks, 

[doak]

If using for brood, do the follower board. If for honey use the board first then when you put the frame/comb back in take the board out and space evenly. They will draw futher out and fill with honey. These a easier to uncap. JMO
doak

[Shizzell]

Personally:

I like to use 10 frames for brood with no spacers. I usually don't ever open up the brood chamber, and when I do I usually only look at 2-3 frames and it doesn't really matter if they are messy. Thats also why I use duragilt on my brood chambers because they don't build uniformly on duragilt usually but duragilt stays together and I can use it over and over. I would use 9 frames with spacers for ur honey supers. I learned the hard way not to use duragilt for honey supers because of the reason I described above. Their messy with duragilt and don't like to build on it much. Also, 9 frames allows less building for the bees and they can draw it farther out, allowing you to uncap a whole frame less, which if you have a LOT that may be of an advantage.

Jake