how much to feed nucs

Hello everyone. Its good to be back. Just received my 2 nucs last week. I've re homed them into brood boxes. There about 3 brood combs on each.

Question is: how much should they be fed?

I've made up 1:1 syrup from 1 bag of sugar.

I'm guessing this should last them both about a week. I don't want to over feed them as I don't want them stowing the syrup into much needed empty cells as I don't want this to effect the colonies.

Feedback appreciated.

Very kind regards to you all

I think you'll find that syrup will be gone much quicker than a week.
Little and often feeding is a good approach. Keep feeding until they are starting work on the last frame of foundation. You might need a good few bags.

An expanding colony will not clog up the broodnest with stores - that is a myth. A clogged broodnest is usually a hangover from a colony that has struggled a bit overwinter.

There is also a myth that bees build comb for no purpose; they don't - they either build if for brood expansion or food storage.

Another myth is that number of frames equates to size of colony. Again it does not; number of bees reflects the colony strength. Bees are not made by a feeder, they are brooded by nurse bees using either the stores being collected or collected previously. The queen's lay rate is often governed by the number of house bees to service the current brood area.

Think about it and you might come to some conclusions regarding your target outcome.

oliver90owner said:

Bees are not made by a feeder

Click to expand...

True.
However, a feeder on a hive will boost the population by increasing the average lifespan of adult bees. Foraging is the death of them eventually.
Feeding is also an old trick for paid-pollination colonies as it's supposed to change the balance of nectar gatherering versus pollen gathering effort. More available pollen may well mean more brood rearing.

Many thanks for the replies. A little often then I reckon

How have you rehomed them? 5 nuc frames and 6 frames of foundation?

better off, especially with current dire weather, adding 1-2 frames of foundation as needed; dummying down and insulating.