Clearer Board Not Clearing?

[PhilK]

I've got a question about my clearer boards. I know you in the US don't use them that much, and prefer fume boards but we don't have those down under.

We extracted honey last Friday and I put the stickies back on the hives to be cleaned and repaired. 24 hours later I put a clearer board on (Saturday afternoong), and then 24 hours later (Sunday afternoon) I went to check if the supers of stickies were cleared.. they weren't. Still plenty of bees in there. I figured they just need more time so left them on and wasn't able to check again until yesterday (Thursday).. there were fewer bees than before but still a good 100 or more.

Why? Have those bees been in the super that whole time? Why haven't they exited to go on a cleansing flight or visit the below supers? I was very surpirsed that after almost a week there were still bees above the clearer board..

These boards are the ones with 4 triangular escapes - one in each corner

[rwlaw]

The best time to use the boards is with cooler nights in the forecast that's when I've had the best results. That said, I've never had boxes that were completely free of bees, I figured that the bees left after I used the escape boards were either too stubborn or too dumb (sorta like "where'd everybody go, oh well, I'll wait for em to come back") to leave the boxes and blew them out with my leaf blower.

[Oldbeavo]

Go and check early in the morning, it takes cold weather to end up with zero bees, Victoria late Autumn with 4-7 degrees nites.
In summer we would be out to take honey off by 6:30-7:00 am and with a strong hive 100 bees would be OK
Turn the lid upside down on the ground, some smoke on the remaining bees, then drop the super from about 6" onto the lid dislodging some of the bees, what remains after that you put up with or break out the blower, which isn't 100% either and takes a lot of mucking around.

[Acebird]

Go and check early in the morning, it takes cold weather to end up with zero bees, Victoria late Autumn with 4-7 degrees nites.
In summer we would be out to take honey off by 6:30-7:00 am and with a strong hive 100 bees would be OK

Harvesting in the fall works great for me but one time I tried it in the summer and got the same problem.  I was thinking of pulling the box off and putting the escape board on top of the box with a small amount of dry ice in the bottom to get the last 100-200 bees out.  I didn't do this so I don't know if it will work.  The best you can do in the summer is harvest as soon as there is light in the morning.

[Oldbeavo]

When dry ice melts the result is CO2, may not be good for bees.
May be a freezer brick under the lid may push them down but you will still have to get up early next day.
We have had clearer boards or bee escapes on and had a warm nite and left them for another day if the next nite would be cooler.

[Lancej]

Hi oldbeavo, may l ask how many hives you would use clearer boards on in a day.

[Acebird]

When dry ice melts the result is CO2, may not be good for bees.

My thinking is it would work like a fume board if the escape is on top of the supers.  The dry ice doesn't melt instantly and CO2 is heavier than air so the depletion of oxygen would occur slowly giving the bees time to get out.

[Oldbeavo]

Lancej
About 80 hives has been our max. so far. We took off 120 supers of honey.
I have attached a photo and if you look close or can blow it up you will see the clearer boards as blue or orange lines between super.
They are painted bright color so you don't miss one or leave it behind.

[PhilK]

Thanks guys - I guess I was just amazed that those bees haven't left for 6 days.. don't they need to go to the toilet?!

[Lancej]

Thanks oldbeavo,
Another simple idea that makes things easier, something else I wouldn't have thought about until I left some on.