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thank you for the replies... I am loathe to open up again to put half underneath brood... so i'll go with finman's opinion - do nothing! (for now)

Sorry, maybe lost in translation? Well, I would not want to trap her above qx would I? So do I put a qx in or not?

The box is full of bees, all 11 frames - so if I put in a qx will I need to find the queen in case she's in the half, and put her 'downstairs'?

The 11 frames in the brood box were full of bees, so I added the 'half' to give them more room. I have been led to understand that you need brood and a half in order to have a big enough colony to take through the winter...

New beek alert! I recently put a super on top of my single brood box, turning it into brood and a half (no QX). The bees have started building comb in the middle frames of the half, and I have BIAS in the main brood box. During my inspection on Saturday I couldn't find the queen, though I did...

So brood spacing is different to super spacing? I never knew that!

I have the same setup (thornes starter) - I think you are mistaken about the supers. Castellated super has the same spacing as the Hoffman and is fine for brood and a half. Just put it on top of the brood box with no q- I think the setup is one super for brood (half) and one for honey later...

Oldmech that's a hard lesson learnt! But at least it gives you a great story for regaling your mates in the pub!

The news was good because it means I now have bees, my first colony. :) I didn't realise the reaction could change tho :(

I finally picked up my first bee colony yesterday. Unfortunately I forgot my gloves, and took a sting to the back of the hand. At least now I know I'm not allergic! I'm looking forward to my first beekeeping season! :winner1st:

Thanks finman, I have a lot to learn!

Solving laying-worker problems * move the entire colony 200m and take out all the frames * shake the frames onto the ground and brush all the bees off them * set aside any frames with drone brood or eggs to deal with later * return the bee-less hive to its original position and place a frame of...

To my (admittedly limited) knowledge, what you have here is a case of laying workers. The queen in unable to lay eggs or has died, the colony has been unable to raise a new queen so have become queenless. The ovaries of some workers enlarge and they start to lay eggs. Not being able to mate...

IMHO clipping queens has no place in modern beekeeping... Just saying...

http://www.wbka.com/pdf/a010makingincrease.pdf

This week's talk is "Checking for Nosema". Meet 7.30 Goytre Village Hall. (I'm also hoping to aquire my first colony soon from one of the members so looking forward to it!)

lol, that's funny, giving them a hard time for not being able to predict the future. maybe they can give us next week's lottery numbers too?

Yep it was very interesting... got me thinking about using at least a few foundation-less frames in my supers later on...

This Thursday (11th April), Gwent Beekeepers are having a talk on "Organic Beeswax" - sounds interesting, I assumed all beeswax was organic! 7.30pm Goytre Village Hall, anyone else going?

I wasn't going to go because of the snow here, but after digging the car out and realising the main roads were clear I went with my 7 yr old daughter. I was glad I went, we really enjoyed it. Failed to meet any forum folk but had an interesting chat with the bbka lady doing the demonstration...