Blog post - Serious Burr Comb

Rurification · September 02, 2012, 07:33:59 AM

We got some wild and crazy burr comb when we put the first supers on. Nutty bees.

http://rurification.blogspot.com/2012/09/serious-burr-comb.html

Here's a pic.

buzzbee · September 02, 2012, 07:58:46 AM

Are these foundationless frames they are building wild comb on?

buzzbee · September 02, 2012, 08:01:23 AM

This is why its a good idea to place foundationless frames between drawn combs to get filled out.
What you have doing this is not much more than an empty box above a drawn box.Perhaps some starter strips in the empty frames for them to start on?

Rurification · September 27, 2012, 03:24:28 PM

You can tell I haven't spent enough time on the forum this month. Just saw these replies.

Yes, they are foundationless. The problem is that our supers are mediums and the hive bodies are deeps. [Here's where Michael Bush says, "Use the same size for everything!" He's right! I wish they'd sell beginner kits with all the same size, 8 frame mediums] We just didn't have any medium frames with comb. We did cut outs of a deep frame and banded them into the medium frame after this inspection and the bees figured it out.

I'm a huge believer in checkerboarding - worked like a charm when we added the 2nd deep to the lang.

Jim134 · September 27, 2012, 10:52:27 PM

Rurification ...........

Did you have a good honey flow on ?
If not was you feeding ?

BEE HAPPY Jim 134 :)

Johnny253 · September 28, 2012, 09:26:03 AM

I would put a few medium frames into your deep between drawn combs. The bees will start building from the top of these frames and once they have started you can then move them back into your medium super.

Rurification · September 28, 2012, 11:09:01 AM

Quote from: Jim 134 on September 27, 2012, 10:52:27 PM
Rurification ...........

Did you have a good honey flow on ?
If not was you feeding ?

Hi Jim - We had lots of goldenrod. Now we have a lot of little white asters and a lot of eupatorium. I'm also feeding 1:1 syrup since this is the first year. They finally figured it out.

Quote from: Johnny253 on September 28, 2012, 09:26:03 AM
I would put a few medium frames into your deep between drawn combs. The bees will start building from the top of these frames and once they have started you can then move them back into your medium super.

Thanks Johnny - that's exactly what we did and it worked like a charm. Much better than doing the cut out. [Though the cut out was better than nothing.]