Using dead hives

[alfred]

I have had several hives die off this winter. I have ordered some packages for delivery in late april. I am thinking that I could simply install the packages into some of the dead hives. Provided ofcourse I don't see any sign of disease. This would give them a head start with comb building and some of the hives even have some honey stores that could be used.

what do folks think of this idea?

[JP]

If you can rule out any disease transference use them, I have many, many times over. The bees will clean house according to their preferences.

The honey should be good if it is sealed, don't feed fermented honey.


...JP

[Bee Whisper82]

The weather was in the lower 50's today and I done my first check to see if the girls were doing alright on honey stores and check the sugar that I had added on before winter.  Well when I got out there, there were 2 hives going good and was not seeing any from the 3rd hive. I wanted to wait to check that one last because I kind of knew what had happened so I get to it and see that they had starved because they couldn't move to more honey stores. 

   Thanks JP for posting on here that we could use the same wax if there wasn't any sign of disease.      That saved me a lot of work.               

                                                                                            James

[rickomatic]

I have decided to do the same thing with my dead hives. One of them has a frame or two of uncapped honey. Should I let them have that too? Or is that going to be a problem? It doesn't "seem" to be fermented. What are your thoughts on that?

[Scadsobees]

Use it all, just knock as many bees off as you can (don't matter if there are a lot left).  That honey and any leftover pollen is just extra food that they don't have to rush out and collect.

[luvin honey]

So, will the new bees pull the dead ones out of the comb and clean house? Thanks :)

[JP]

So, will the new bees pull the dead ones out of the comb and clean house? Thanks :)

Yes, they will clean house.


...JP