A silly experiment?

[Rory Fields]

Like everyone else, I'm faced sometimes with the bees refusing to work fresh foundation in supers, regardless of how well developed and teeming the supers above might be. I usually leave the QE off for a decent while to allow Queen Footprint Pheromone etc to disseminate more readily and I don't always have one spare drawn comb to go in the new super, or else they ignore it still. I was wondering if, since I mark and clip all my queens and tend to put them in a queen clip if I find them early on whilst inspecting, it'd make any difference to how swiftly or willing the bees would be to work new supers if instead of just leaving the QE excluder off until well into the OSR flow, I also released the queen into the top super so she then had to walk back down to her broodnest, presumably spreading QFP as she does so - does anyone have any data on this or is it a completely stupid experiment to try outr? I'm in Northumberland so the OSR is really just coming into its own. Cheers

 

[Do224]

Would a drop of lemongrass oil have the same effect (or the same lack of effect, as the case may be…)?

 

[JamezF]

Would a drop of lemongrass oil have the same effect (or the same lack of effect, as the case may be…)?

I suspect it might irritate rather than encourage in a queenright colony.

James

 

[Do224]

I suspect it might irritate rather than encourage in a queenright colony.

James

Me too

 

[Sutty]

Maybe a light spray of syrup on the foundation would encourage them.
I've never had a problem getting them to draw foundation though, maybe change supplier?
I was making up frames in the garden last year and bees were investigating the foundation, from modern beekeeping (?maisemore).

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

I've never found bees 'refusing' to draw comb in the supers - although they won't waste time doing so until they need the space

 

[madasafish]

I mix undrawn foundation with drawn.. speeds up drawing.