How many supers

[nhbloke]

Hi, a hopefully simple newbie question I have one hive which is a 8 frame medium set up, on it at the moment are 3 supers full of bees and stores and 1 super which is nearly empty of stores but fully drawn do i need to take the 4th super off now for the winter or should I see if they fill it more then remove and what do I do with the honey in it, I don't have an extractor can I freeze it and put it in the stack of emptys with moth cystals and then feed it early next year? also I could not find any brood when I looked last weekend is this a major issue.  Thanks in advance John

[pdmattox]

I don't know much about your area but if the fall flow is over i would take the empty one off.  No brood could be bad if there  is also no queen or eggs.

[Brian D. Bray]

Good choice of equipment.  I'm slightly concerned that there is not brood but from your discription of the situation I think your hive is still in a dearth mode where the queen will stop laying eggs to conserve stores.  The empty, drawn super suggests that.
I would begin feeding to fill the empty super with stores which should also stimulate the queen to begin laying again if she's still alive.  You should know within a week to 10 days if that is the case.  If you have another hive you might want to take a frame of brood from it and swap out an empty frame.  Be sure to place the brood frame where the bees are clustered or the brood will chill and die.  What the bees do with that frame will tell you if you have a queen etc.

[nhbloke]

The top super is one that i had extracted a couple of weeks ago by a local bk, i put it back on to clean it but they seemed very busy bringing stuff in so i left it on to see what they would do, i peeked inside a couple of days ago and saw some of the cell with a small amount of honey in them. i think  the queen is still alive not that i saw her but by the mood of the hive very mellow compared to the time i did not have a queen. i did remove one frame from the brood chamber and relace with a drawn frame last week so i will try to check this weekend if poss, can i open the hive in the rain?

thanks john

[Brian D. Bray]

Bees do not like to take bathes.  they get proddy when caught without a towel.

[Michael Bush]

Because of queen rearing I often have to open the hives in the rain, because it's the day I have to do what I have to do.  Usually they take it pretty well.  Sometimes they are not in a good mood.

When I wasn't rearing queens, I never opened the hive in the rain.

[nhbloke]

Thank you, do you think 3 full supers of store be enough for the winter and it is meant to be sunny tomorrow so i will take a peek then