Brood and a half - how should it be done?

[Pete Nicholson]

Hi all - went into the winter with brood box on top of super (with xs stores to keep them happy) as have been advised by this forum.
NOW the question that arises is how and when should I go for change and SHOULD I change?
Reasoning behind this is brood always goes to the top as it is the warmest place so it follows logically that if I were to continue a brood and a half I should not disturb my bees and leave the super on the bottom to let them (the queen) expand if they need to. So why in all the books I read do they say ADD a super on TOP of the brood box. I'm confused and any advice accepted tho I am sure I will get conflicting replies.
Have not done any inspections yet as too early but each of my two hives has gained 1kg in the last fortnight and yesterday they were buzzin and bringing in lots of golden (crocus/snowdrop pollen?) so I'm assuming there is brood being produced. It is a most unusual start to the year and I am sure we are in for a few surprises temperature wise.
So I keep watching and learning hopefully.
P.

 

[Finman]

.
The best system, absolutely, is 2 brood. It is flexible system to change the order of boxes and move frames in the brood space.

Bees do not use all. The lower part is cold and bees store there pollen.
To prevent swarming turning the order of brood boxes is important.

Here many professionala and hobbyist uses only super dmension in their hives.
= Medium Langstroths. They winter bees in two or in 3 medium boxes.
This makes again the furniture flexiple to use.

HOW TO DO

Fist you let the hive grow in Spring. Bees start in upper box. Then it begin to expand downwards. The the lower box is half full brood, turn around the order.
The queen gets new laying space and it moves the desire to swarm.

When the upper box is full of brood, again turn around. The cells will be consumed evenly for brood. Winter food and old stores go to circulation.

 

[Finman]

.
Unevenly consumed brood frame

Lower centre part too old, most part non used.
When you change the order of brood boxes, combs will be used evenly.

 

[Finman]

.
Swarm preventing in douple brood #2

This is the most popular in Australia and popular in USA too.

The queen likes to lay in upper box. You may prevent swarming by moving all honey frames over the excluder and all capped brood frames.

Then the queen gets almost empty box of frames to be layed. You put some foundations there too and it keeps laying and brood rearing busy.
.

 

[Pete Nicholson]

Thanks for all the information Finman - I see where you are coming from but I am reluctant to go for double BB as I have difficulty finding the queen even in one! I went through last year with only a standard BB on each of my national hives and as a newbee found this quick and easy for inspections. I would like to keep the original configuration for ease but I recognise that I may need to expand the brood area to prevent swarming and as the original question poses - what is the right way to do it? ie. super on top or super on bottom of BB.
Cheers for all your advice.
P.

 

[Hivemaker.]

Pete
if you wish to run on brood and a half, then place the super on top of the brood box when first inspections start,then queen excluder and further supers as needed. You will of course still have two boxes in which the queen may be if you go with this method,personally i find brood and a half a messy system.

 

[Pete Nicholson]

Thanks HM (Sage and mentor)
Looking forward to requeening from you in May.
Cheers
Pete.

 

[Black Comb]

What I do on my nats with this is to remove super at 1st or 2nd inspection, after ensuring there are enough stores in brood box. Then as the queen expands laying and starts to fill the lower box with brood I put a 2nd brood box in top i.e. double brood. This way, by removing the super fairly early in the season you will probably get no brood in the super.

Of course if you really want to run brood and a half then do as Hivemaker says.

 

[oliver90owner]

The reason why the shallow has historically been put above the deep? Simple. Weight.

Old beekeepers were not stupid. They knew how many times they would be lugging that heavy brood box off for any inspections throughout the summer months.

 

[itma]

if you wish to run on brood and a half, then ... You will of course still have two boxes in which the queen may be if you go with this method,personally i find brood and a half a messy system.

Using multiple brood boxes doesn't appeal to me, but lately I've been hearing about quick (swarming awareness) queen cell inspections by "tipping" - raising one side of the upper box to allow viewing of the bottom of its frames. I've been assured that the bottom of the top box's frames is "invariably" (yes, really! - or anyway so they say) where all the queen cups or cells are to be found.
I can see the attraction where lots of colonies are involved, but it doesn't sound like much of an inspection!

If the bees need more space then a bigger bb (like 14x12) seems like a better answer than mucking about with plural bbs.

 

[Hivemaker.]

If the bees need more space then a bigger bb (like 14x12) seems like a better answer than mucking about with plural bbs.

If thats what you prefer,then go 14x12 but even that may be too small for some bees at times,so then you need to do something about that,some like to demaree,easier with standard brood boxes,plus advantages of all frames the same size in multiple boxes....but everyone has there own favourite, and effective methods of colony management.

 

[Finman]

.
My advise is that use same size boxes as brood boxes. It has nothing to do with "finding queen".

 

[Norton Caff]

Out of interest, with double brood boxes which box do you look in first for the queen? What's the "best practice" method for this. You can tell I'm a newbie!

 

[Poly Hive]

I have one word for that idea. Rubbish. Bees never do anything invariably and to say they do is plain misleading.

Double broods I have had when producing cells had them neatly on the frame and not visible tween the boxes. So there you are...

PH

 

[Monsieur Abeille]

Out of interest, with double brood boxes which box do you look in first for the queen? What's the "best practice" method for this. You can tell I'm a newbie!

Normally top one if no other indicators such as eggs. Otherwise if you put the top one to one side while you search the bottom one then putting it back on for ease of inspection she may escape back down.

 

[drstitson]

brood and a half is messy; double brood or 14x12 much better idea. as finman says DB allows easy manipulation of the brood for ASing or similar.

why are you needing to check through whole hive and find queen at every inspection?

one could argue that it is only really necessary (or at least preferable) to find queen ONCE per year - when ASing. if you mark +/- clip then the new queen needs finding.

the depending upon preferences you may need to find one again later before uniting. another possible time would be early spring to mark/clip any new supercedure queens that take you by surprise.

otherwise happy colonies + BIAS = queen present.

do you think the pros spend half an hour per hive looking for HM?????

 

[Finman]

Out of interest, with double brood boxes which box do you look in first for the queen? What's the "best practice" method for this. You can tell I'm a newbie!

I use 3 brood boxes.

There is no difficulty to find a queen. It is normally 80-90% in cases in the uppermost box where is most of brood. I do not use excluder either.

When I take honey boxes off, I see a concentration of bees in some area of frames. The queen is inside that cluster.

If you give smoke to the bees, queen often escapes.

When you notice a concentration, you should open thaé frames fom another place. So queen does not will be squeezed between frames.

Then you loose apart frames and you get a safe touch the frames of concentration. Yhe queen is there mostly. If not, then you find a frame area which has most eggs.

If you do not find her easily, let it be and take a look some other time.

Normally I do not look to second lower box. It disturbes hive life too much.

It is enough to me that I see young larvae in the hive. I need not find the queen.

 

[Finman]

why are you needing to check through whole hive and find queen at every inspection?
?

That is a good question. There is allways a danger that fat mom will be squeezed between frames.

I need to find the queen only when I change it or I make a false swarm to cut the swarming. To see larvae is enough to me.

To find a virgin queen is too big job. There are tricks to do that but it is better leave it in peace. A virgin in mating age is often near lower entrance and difficult to find. It walks quickly and hidden herself often.

 

[oliver90owner]

necessary (or at least preferable) to find queen ONCE per year - when ASing.

Of course, you don't actually need to find the queen, even for an A/S. Oviously preferable in a distant out-apiary, but there are easy options for those with them local who, as PH puts it, fiddle with their colonies every day....

RAB

 

[drstitson]

rab - that's specifically why i included "preferable".

the big difference is of course between those who are keeping bees as a hobby and those for whom beekeeping is a hobby.

Big difference.