Aquired another hive. But some questions.

[Dexterjc]

 So, I got another hive today (italians). It was a package that was hived last may. The man that I acquired it from had purchased it for his yard and had a more experienced beekeeper with him to get in the hive for every inspection. He didn't harvest any honey last summer although he could have. Two weeks ago the hive " may have swarmed" because the owner of the hive chose not to add a super ( he only wanted his fruit trees pollinated). His neighbors did not appreciate this and asked him to remove the hive (as he had it on their property line about 25 ft from there back door.) He told his mentor, who told me, and now I have a slightly used (new to me) colony. These guys are doing great. They have two brood chambers And there is no room to spare. The mentor said the hove has been healthy, just slightly neglected as he was only supposed to get this guy started. The hive is coated in propolis. This is new to me as I only have two starting hives. I started in on a quick inspection when I got home but about 4 frames into it I came to the conclusion that I am going to have to spend alot of time cleaning up frames. They are the completely plastic frames (yuck) and they are coated with propolis. So my questions are:

1. Should I just plug away with cleaning everything up little by little?
2. Some of the frames in the bottom box are stuck to the frames on the top, how do I go about unsticking them?
3. If they swarmed about two weeks ago, could the new queen be laying yet? If not what is the timeline?
4. The top chamber was full of honey and nectar (the four frames I looked at), should I do something to give the queen more room to lay?

I may have more questions later but that is all I can think of as of now.
I put a super on at the end of all of this just in case you are wondering.
Thanks in advance.

[thegolfpsycho]

I would put the deep on a bottom board.  Swing the 2 bodys full of bees on top so they can work down.  Give them a couple weeks, then gear up, get some piano wire, plenty of fuel in the smoker and enough time do what needs to be done.  Take the piano wired and work it between the hive bodys that are glued together.  Liberal use of smoke, slow and easy, cause they are going to get mad.  You can move the body when seperated away and work on it some distance away, and at least some of the field bees may return to the parent colony.  Then start going through it.  Clean things up.  Make sure the queen doesn't get mashed or misplaced (thats why waiting a couple weeks helps cause they should push her down)When you get to the center, probably be some brood.  Give em a couple frames of foundation frames interspersed, and spread the honey out to your nucs when you put them in a 10 frame box.  Then reassemble things and walk away gingerly! 

[VolunteerK9]

If I had another medium, I would just put it on the bottom-maybe place a drawn frame or two . Not really any reason to break them apart right now anyways so I would leave the two stuck together. And also IMHO, no reason to set in scraping all the propolis off either. They will just do it all over again but if its something you just really want to do, wait til winter whens its super easy to get off. Add another hive body and just let them bee  :-D

[Brian D. Bray]

Propolis only needs to be removed when it gets to the point it interfers with reomving and replaceing frames or in frame spacing.

Take the curved end of the hive tool and scrape the edges of the end bars and the rabbit ledge of the boxes to remove the excess  propolis.  I remove some propolis in just about every hive I have every time I go into them.  Constant maintainence where it's needed need not be a big chore, but a series of small ones.

The piano wire to separate the 2 boxes is a good one but expect to find a mess of open burr comb on the top of the lower frames and the bottoms of the upper frames, and agitated bees.

[thegolfpsycho]

His problem is he can't clean the rabbit ledges, because he can't remove the frames.  He can't remove the frames because the burr comb, and the bee glue, have things pretty much like a bomb shelter.   I would let them fully push down into the bottom deep, then pull the top and work it.  As far as finding a mess of open burr comb at the bottom, what do you think he will get by forcing out a frame or 2?  A mess of open leaking burr comb each and every time, each and every frame.  Each time possibly starting robbing, each time possibly crushing the queen.  But it's true.  My suggestion will be a big job for a new bee keeper.  When you start manipulating comb that is very rigid from many brood cycles, propolis that has winter hardened and a large population, you'll find out pretty quick if you really want to be a beekeeper.  Whatever you decide to do, I hope it goes well.

[Dexterjc]

Thanks for the responses. It really gives me a good starting point. The propolis is not what was impeding the inspection. It was just making the brace and burr comb much more challenging to remove. One other question. I found one single bee with deformed wing virus. Is this common to see regardless of the amount verroa mite in the hive? Meaning if you see one, does that indicate a large mite load? Or can any amount of mites cause this? I will do a sticky board count once I put the hive on it's permanent sbb. Thanks everyone.

[thegolfpsycho]

I have seen varying amounts of DWV in untreated colonys coming out of winter.  The colony seems to overcome it when they start heavy brood rearing in the spring and don't see to much of it the rest of the summer.  However, those same colonys begin to collapse come fall and are winter loses.  Some colonys seem to do better than others, but the tipping point seems to come between the 2nd and 3rd year.  I have not documented this, just an observation.  I'm sure others will have more to say on this.