Adding hives

[jimmy_in_texas]

Hello again All,

It looks like my first year of beekeeping is going to go into winter in good shape, much thanks to advice from this forum, the feral hive I brought home in late spring (which was just a little unnerving cutting combs when you have no bee experience)
has grown from maybe the equivailant of just 2 brood frames worth of bees and comb to 2 deeps completely full of drawn comb,bees and honey,

I wonder if 2 full deeps is a little much for the mild winters we have here in Willis? these days we have only a few mild freezes even in January or February, or is it better to build the colony as large as possible?  there must be a limit to what the queen is capable of.

I put a shallow super on last weekend in the off chance there may be some kind of fall flow here, otherwise all the other honey is theirs for food.  if they do make any late summer honey it might not taste so great because there are acres and acres of yellow bitterweed close by and I've  read the bees will work it.

Now for my main question, I have 2 new complete hives ready for this coming spring which will give me three total and I'm not sure which would be the best method, I do want a honey crop next year also ( we love it and I eat it by the tablespoon fulls).

1. do some kind of split (I'm a little worried about the new queen meeting up with AHB drones, I also have 5 grandchildren over a lot).
2. buy package bees
3. do both

I think I've read too much information about the subject and now I'm at a loss to decide.

Can anyone tell me how long it takes before you can post pictures? I have a few.

Thanks anyone for taking the time to respond.

Jimmy

[TwT]

being your first year, why not see about buying a queen now and splitting the big hive, that will give you 2 hives this year and next year you can get a package or a nuc, sometimes its best to take it slow and watch and learn whats going on, after a few years and a few more hives it will be easier... I wouldn't  care about raising queens in a AHB area but one day the way they are moving we might all have to, just my 2 pennies worth!!!!

[Understudy]

Two deeps for brood on a hive is fine. I would say leave it be. This is a good strong hive. You can add box for honey on it and let them fill it up. You can also add another box for brood let her fill that up, buy a mated queen (No AHB issue) and do a split.

Sounds like everything is going well for you.

Sincerely,
Brendhan

[jimmy_in_texas]

The lady at R Weaver told me I should probably leave them alone for now, since R Weaver is only an hours drive for me, I'll get 2 packages this spring, can you get any honey first year from a package?   this frame from the upper was fully capped honey 3 weeks ago, now it looks like the queen has discovered it.

still feeding SW, have been all year non-stop, they are starting to slow down on it though.

[qandle]

Yes, you can get honey from a first-year hive from a package. We have pulled 3 packed medium supers over the summer from my brother-in-laws first-year package hive.

I got plenty of honey from my first-year package hive last year.

Quint