Above or below

[drewbhoy1]

Hi i will be over wintering on a national double brood box and thinking of leaving a super of stores . I beleive you leave the super of stores under the double brood but can someone correct me if i am wrong ?
Drew

 

[Erichalfbee]

You're wrong
If you are using a super for stores put it on top and take QX out. Then a nice slab of insulation on the crown board. The queen will be laying in there come spring but that's no problem.
The only time to put a shallow under is if you have uncapped honey to move up into the brood box (if there is room) in the Autumn
Having said that a double brood is ample without the super. It's your job to make sure the bees have those stores there, not into another box

 

[enrico]

You have to think how bees work
They will store honey from the top down so that they can eat it from the bottom up and then start laying from the top down! The reason is that the warmest part of the hive is at the top so as they start to run out of stores then need to use less energy, if you put the stores at the bottom they will just move them to the top, a real waste of effort unless you want to empty the super.
The best thing to do is extract the super and feed sugar, as Finman will tell you honey is far more expensive than sugar!
Whatever you do the queen will end up laying in the closest part of the hive to the stores from the top.
Hope that makes sense!
E

 

[Ian123]

As above if they are on a double brood there is certainly no need to leave them another super of stores. Many areas will still have nectar flows to come of varying degrees

 

[drewbhoy1]

Thanks chaps for the advice . I think i will take all supers off and feed .
Drew

 

[enrico]

You don't need to be feeding yet. It is still midsummer. Leave a super for them to work with with a couple of frames of stores in just in case. We have ages to go before feeding starts. I may have misunderstood, maybe you don't mean feeding now!!!!! Sorry, a bit ambiguous!!!

E