chances of a super being drawn or filed at this time of year ?

Hi All

Based on earlier advise treating soon , but going to defer until Saturday week.

Weather here is fantastic, and is due to continue much the same until well into next week, above average temps, and mainly dry, also seems also to be a fair amount of good forage around the gardens and parks locally.

Thinking possibly if I put a couple of supers of foundation frames on stronger hives they might at least draw them out giving me a head start for next year and ( am i dreaming ?? ) fill them or part fill them.

Ivy does not nseem to to be in full flower yet so maybe could sneak in some honey before it peaks ??

Thanks

Brian.

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You should prepare your hives for winter. It is not right time now to them draw new combs. Bees draw combs if they need them, but they never need them for future.

You should save your bees that they are in strong condition for wintering. Comb building does not make them stronger. It is hard job.

As Finman. There is a considerable difference between filling drawn comb, and drawing that comb then filling it. Space under the brood is likely better at this time of the year - they would only use it if every nook and cranny is filled above (surprise, surprise!).

Removing the odd stores frame from a box and replacing with a frame of foundation is OK. It could be re-exchanged at some point, if necessary.

Treatment is a priority now. To late is too late - unless you are a better weather forecaster than the supposed experts, get the treatments done now is my advice. You need healthy bees for over-wintering, not bees that have been incubating varroa mites during pupation (so already infected with all sorts of viruses).

RAB

Put a super on a hive because there was an ivy flow on and bees had no room left in BB. The super which had new frames and foundation was drawn and filled in a week!

If you are on single-brood nationals, there is no harm in putting a shallow box (with foundation, since you have no drawn comb) UNDER the brood box.
If they need/want to use it, they will. (The fashionable word for such a box is a nadir, rather than a super.)

Ideally, they should be hoffman frames on rails, but if you haven't got, you haven't got. Wider spacing (like 9 or 10 frames to the box) would be extremely optimistic - and may not be drawn 'nicely' if at all.

Alabamaeee said:

Put a super on a hive because there was an ivy flow on and bees had no room left in BB. The super which had new frames and foundation was drawn and filled in a week!

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Why their do not the same in summer?
5 summer months...and then in a week
.

Fin, I have extracted 4 times this year already and had taken off the supers but the bees found ivy.

I checked two colonies for a beekeeper yesterday. He had placed supers back on these hives after extracting and they have stuffed them with stores over the past three weeks (some now partially capped) and have also drawn out a lot of new comb. His supers had a number of undrawn or partially drawn frames when we extracted his honey but now the frames are all drawn out. His brood frames have a healthy arc of honey and pollen and there is a huge and expanding amount of sealed brood in his hives - the bees are really taking advantage of the supers and are moving some honey up out of the brood box to give space to raise bees.

Very interesting, noted on my visit yesterday to MAQS treat, both hives in one Apiary I have , frenetic coming and going with pollen and I guess nectar probably Ivy which is in good bloom now.

This extended good weather spell has really given them a boost, now I know what it must be like to be a Beekeeper in a nice mediterannean climate !

BrianO said:

This extended good weather spell has really given them a boost, now I know what it must be like to be a Beekeeper in a nice mediterannean climate !

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Except in Italy

Except in Italy

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Worst summer in over 100 years in parts, just back from there, go every year, still weather now there is cracking ! . So still foraging weather for Bees well into October.

Yields higher

I was alluding to SHB, unfortunately

Shb ??

Small hive beetle, now residing in Italy.

BrianO said:

Hi All

Based on earlier advise treating soon , but going to defer until Saturday week.

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What was your reason for treating so late ?

My mother died

BrianO said:

My mother died

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Sorry to hear that Brian.

Thank You

Difficult times, back to Bees

Treated second two hives in communal apiary on Allotment, again 1strip each.

Friends hive observed about 100 dead/dying bees on landing board, blocking entrance I cleared, is this indicative of a problem with treatment ?

On my second hive treated , stupidly forgot to bring QE to place under super , that MAQS strip would have laid on ( so laid it directly on top of frames in B.Box ) any potential problem here ?

Thanks

BrianO said:

On my second hive treated , stupidly forgot to bring QE to place under super , that MAQS strip would have laid on ( so laid it directly on top of frames in B.Box ) any potential problem here ?

Thanks

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No.

If you look at the instruction leaflet, you will see the drawing clearly shows that the MAQS strips go directly on top of the frames, and below the queen excluder.

So if you had put them on top of the queen excluder, you would have got it wrong.

Dusty

BrianO said:

Thank You

Difficult times, back to Bees

Treated second two hives in communal apiary on Allotment, again 1strip each.

Friends hive observed about 100 dead/dying bees on landing board, blocking entrance I cleared, is this indicative of a problem with treatment ?

On my second hive treated , stupidly forgot to bring QE to place under super , that MAQS strip would have laid on ( so laid it directly on top of frames in B.Box ) any potential problem here ?

Thanks

Click to expand...

Maqs is known to kill bees and make queen go off laying and even killing the queen. At most I had 15-20 dead bees out of 1 hive.