Question for beeks with a picture.

[Southern Gardener]

I checked my hives this morning and the hive on the right is usually a very calm hive. Today they were swarming all around the hive and very agitated. I opened the hive and, WOW - there were a lot of bees in that hive. The box on the bottom is the brood chamber - good pattern and lots of larve. The next box I added is a honey super, but I want to use it as a brood chamber so I put the queen excluder on top on the first white box (from the bottom). the top 2 are honey supers. My question is, is that ok to use that honey super as a brood chamber? Here is a picture.

the hive on the left is a mystery to me - there are bees and signs of a queen, but that top box has been on for months and they are not drawing out comb and no honey at all. Very bad brood pattern as well. Any suggestions will be appreciated!

 

[schmije]

Schmije DH here the bee keep....

Sounds like you may have a failing queen in the left hive. Generally the bees wont draw comb unless you have a good flow. That generally is NOT this time of year. you can feed them (which it looks like you are) and that may help, but no garentee.

I like to overwinter in a deep and 2 med with the top med being full of honey. that has been most successful for me. Ive tried 2 deeps with 4 frames of honey in each and found it more difficult to manage.

So useing a med for brood is no problem. one of my hives is nothing but med supers at the moment. i usually overwinter that one in 4 med.

you might consider moving the empty super ontop of the left hive to the right one and put a super of honey on the left one. see if that improves things for the hive on the left, and see if the hive on the right draws comb as it seems to be a stronger hive.


FYI, beesource has great forums, were i usually hang out for my bee keeping stuff. (schmism)

 

[schmije]

oh, i use 10 frame equipment... is yours 8? they look more narrow... if they are 8 frame youll want to increase my recomendations by 1 super due to less space in 8 frame vs 10

 

[Smiles Jr.]

In my opinion it is OK to use a medium box for a brood chamber. Some folks only have mediums and never use a deep so I guess it works.

The fact that you have lots of bees in the hive is a good thing and indicates that you have a very productive queen in there. If it was my hive I would use a deep for the second (top) brood box and start to think about adding one more beep above as well (three deeps). Then start to stack the honey mediums above that. I never use an excluder so I have no comment on that.

 

[Southern Gardener]

Yes, I do use 8 frame equipment. That left hive has never done well from the beginning - I'm going to see about getting another queen next month at my bee meeting.



you might consider moving the empty super ontop of the left hive to the right one and put a super of honey on the left one. see if that improves things for the hive on the left, and see if the hive on the right draws comb as it seems to be a stronger hive.


going to do that!

thanks so much!

 

[Smiles Jr.]

SG - how are the bees doing? Did you re-queen the hive on the left? Is anything blooming profusely in NW Louisiana these days? Here in SE Indiana the goldenrod bloom is coming to a rapid close and the white and purple asters are hanging on but we have had several very frosty mornings and everything outdoors is starting to look like our blossom season is quickly coming to a close until spring.

 

[897tgigvib]

Beeks talk a whole other language!

It'd be kind of nice to have a topic with the basics of it and a glossary.

 

[JimWWhite]

Beeks talk a whole other language!

It'd be kind of nice to have a topic with the basics of it and a glossary.

Marshall, I'm really surprised you're not a beekeeper with your setup. Do you have bees that are coming in from neighbors or maybe a feral colony somewhere nearby?

Jim

 

[897tgigvib]

For the honeybees around here, there seem to be 2 kinds, but I know next to nothing about bees. One kind of actual honeybee is the shorter all mild orange, i guess ya call it orange, that dusky mild soft orange with soft small darker bands kind. The other kind of actual honeybee is a bit longer with the dark bands more dominant. Both of these seem very friendly to me. I would guess they must be feral or wild. I do not know where their colonies are. Maybe in hollow parts of Oak trees is my guess. Probably high up, and probably in small colonies. I think that only because there are no major bee colonies I've seen.

Yes, I would very much like to have a few bees. Not sure if I can though. There are lots of people in summer around my garden.

Is it possible that there is a kind of bee that would be no worry about stinging someone or their child? Also, a kind of honeybee very simple to care for by a beeginer? A lot of honey would not be important, but having a little bit of honey would be real nice. Maybe even get a little bit of those other bee products like beeswax, and maybe some of those health food products.

I also have other bee kind of bugs. My cabin has a wasp problem, and so far I'm doing hoodat's Indian friend's method, and just living with them. There are also wild yellow jackets here, and some several kinds of hoverflies and hoverbees, at least one kind with shiny colors on it. Some of these I'm not even sure are in the bee family. There also seems to be two kinds of bumblebees, big and small, one with more fuzz, one with less.

 

[Southern Gardener]

SG - how are the bees doing? Did you re-queen the hive on the left? Is anything blooming profusely in NW Louisiana these days? Here in SE Indiana the goldenrod bloom is coming to a rapid close and the white and purple asters are hanging on but we have had several very frosty mornings and everything outdoors is starting to look like our blossom season is quickly coming to a close until spring.

I didn't re-queen the hive, but on the advice of a memeber of the bee club, I switched the hives - put the strong hive on the left and the weak on the right - so that the field bees would come from the strong hive to the weak. However, I did miss the part that he told me to take out a frame of capped brood from the strong hive and put in the weak.

I have no idea if this helped and I plan on checking them today or tomorrow - I hope the rain holds off long enough. The goldenrod is also blooming here and several wildflowers in my area - I'm also feeding them. The weather is typical here for this time of year so the highs are in the 80's and several things in my herb garden are still blooming.

Marshall - I find that beekeeping is very easy - the only drawback for me was the startup cost. As far as the bees bothering - mine do bother me, but then my garden is located in between the hives and my fountain thats in my herb garden that they drink from - they are constantly flying back and forth from the hives to the fountain, and with the high temps over the summer they took over my fountain. they will buzz around you to see if you are a tasty flower - as long as you don't flail your arms about and run screaming like a girl - they will leave you alone.