Adding supers

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newbe

New Bee
Joined
Jun 10, 2012
Messages
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Location
Isle of Wight
Hive Type
National
Number of Hives
3
Hi

This is my first year keeping bees. They swarmed in May and I split the colony in to 2 and now have 2 strong colonies and both have 2 supers on them.
There is 1 empty frame on the first super and 4 empty frames on the second.
Do I add another super? Or remove the capped honey and replace with new frames?
I am aware the first super is the bees winter food supply.

Can you leave the second super on over winter too? I am not in it for the honey.

All advise appreciated
 
If you leave 2 supers on there will be too much space for them to heat. I would remove the full one and put another one on. They should have had an empty super on by now as you said they dont have much room to store it they will fill up the brood area which will limit the queen laying and can cause them to swarm.
 
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13 posts of unhelpful garbage deleted,some offensive, and not very pleasant for a new beekeeper and forum member.
 
as veg had already given good, clear advice, the thread wandered off target, as many do.
 
Hi, I'm a new-ish beekeeper myself. This is what I know:

1. In preparation for winter, give them a small-ish space to heat i.e. brood box and 1 super.
2. Bring in the outside undrawn frames closer to the middle of your super and let them draw these frames and lay down honey.Only when super is completely filled add another
You can do this once each super is full as we may get nicer weather toward the end of August than during June/July. I am delaying harvest a little this year because of this.
3. You can store honey outside if you don't want to harvest but put a crown board on top of your brood box and super blocking off holes so no heat is lost and they can't get to the second super.
4. Make sure your bees have 1 brood box and 1 super on over winter - to ensure they are well fed and buy in some fondant for extra supplies.
 
13 posts of unhelpful garbage deleted,some offensive, and not very pleasant for a new beekeeper and forum member.

:iagree:

No need for it so why they do it who knows...
:cheers2:
 
Missed them thank god, but what I do is put a new super on the bottom/ above brood box and put your full one on top with your clearing board under it so when you remove the super you don't disturb the other supers and bees
 
You answered a question i was going to ask.
Thanks Redwood

I have found this to be the best way to do it. Then, if you put the super back on for clean up only, there is minimal disruption.
 
I know this is slightly spurious to the original question but in summer, if I am unsure on how good the flow is I will put a feeder board with a hole in above the super they are filling, then an empty super. They don't tend to use it unless they run out of room, it stops them funnelling up the middle and only filling the centre frames but gives them somewhere to store food if they are bringing it in faster than than I thought. A strong hive can fill a super in a week in a good flow,( not that you would believe it this year!)
Just one of my tips...take it or leave it!
 
Another point to note is that the bees need space to dry the honey prior to capping it.

As I understand it - they spread nectar over a number of cells, evaporate it and then scoop it into one cell ready for capping. Therefore if you have only one empty frame and a strong flow, their job can slowed down considerably.
 

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