Bailey Comb Change

[youngyoungs]

Question for those more experienced Beeks.

During our our practical beekeeping class last week, we "performed" a Bailey Comb Change on a number of hives, and having found the queen in each case, we moved her into the new brood box and placed a queen excluder underneath and on top of this brood box.

This week, when examining the hives, we were debating whether having two queen excluders hindered themovement of beers around the hive, and whether this affected the speed at which they could draw out the comb in the new brood box and the super above.

We could have left a single queen excluder in the hive - on top of the new brood box. What do others do, and why?

 

[Surreybeekeeper]

Are you saying a QE in the middle of the 2 hives and then one on the top of the top box or that latter one being on the bottom of the bottom.....sorry wasn't too clear.

Either way I can't see them having a huge impact....

James

 

[VEG]

did the hive have supers on it?

 

[MuswellMetro]

i would only use two QE if you have a super on

SUPER
QE
NEW BROOD Q+ foundation
QE
OLD BROOD

because i don't like crunchy honey as the queen will move up

however if you use one QE with a super

New Brood Q=foundation
QE
SUPER
OLD BROOD

you will create kind of reverse demarre and you will find they make Queen cells in the lower box

The Demaree effect is more pronounced with 14x12s

I think any lack of drawing is likely to be old foundation or bees yet to complete drawing the top super

 

[Ruary]

Think of whaat you are trying to do with a Bailey Frame change:

The object is to move the queen onto clean comb with minimum loss of brood.

If you place the queen on her frame into a box of comb (drawn) and there is no excluder to stop her going down to the lower box where the brood nest is you have no idea where she is.
Therefore you need the queen excluder between the new and the old brood boxes.


If you have supers on then you also need a second queen excluder to stop her going to the supers. If you don't have supers then you don't need the excluder above the new brood box.
Simple really
Ruary