By what name is Renson's limited broodnest method known in English?

[ugcheleuce]

Hello everyone

[In beekeeping, the exact same thing is often known by different names in different countries (often having been "invented" by different people).]

There is a beekeeping method called "Renson-broedbeperking" (Renson's limited broodnest), designed by Henri Renson of France. Do any of you know this method, and/or by what name it is known in the English-speaking world?

http://www.imkerpedia.nl/wiki/index.php/Renson_broedbeperking (in Dutch)
http://www.bijenhouden.nl/pagina/methode_broedbeperking.asp (in Dutch)

At its simplest, the system uses three shallows (more shallows can be added on top as the honey yield increases). At the start of the nectar flow, you place the queen in the middle shallow, between two queen excluders. The bees eventually fill the lower box with mostly pollen, and the upper box with mostly honey. The middle box is the "limited broodnest". The queen can't lay many eggs, which means that bees are promoted to outside duty a lot sooner, which means that they live longer and bring in more honey and pollen. In a variation of this system, two vertical queen excluders are added, so that the queen can't reach the frames at the far ends of the middle super. A drone comb frame is added to the brood nest, and as soon as it is filled, it is replaced by an empty one (and the full one is moved to the other side of the queen excluder, and the drones are able to move about the top and bottom shallows, as it pleases them).

Does this sound familiar? What is it called in English?

Thanks
Samuel

 

[Erichalfbee]

Sorry,Samuel I can't help with this one but I thought I'd stick in my two pen'orth.
I have four hives, I may have eight at some point this year. Last year was a good honey year for me but my neighbours tell me that the weather was the best they had seen in ten years so I can't expect the same for a while yet. All I want to do is look after my bees, keep them healthy and hang on to most of my colonies.

YET I do marvel at how people think these things up.

 

[SteveJ]

Came across an old beekeeper in Lincolnshire who only used shallows, but mainly due to failing health he couldn't life full brood boxes anymore.
SteveJ


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[ugcheleuce]

Came across an old beekeeper in Lincolnshire who only used shallows, but mainly due to failing health he couldn't life full brood boxes anymore.

Thanks, but the essence of this method is not to use small hive bodies but to constrict the queen to a small space, so that the brood nest remains small, although ample room is given for pollen and honey.

Last year was a good honey year for me but my neighbours tell me that the weather was the best they had seen in ten years so I can't expect the same for a while yet. ... I do marvel at how people think these things up.

Well, it is simply a practical application using known facts:

1. The bigger the brood nest, the longer the hive duty time.
2. The longer bees do hive duty, the quicker they die (though some older beekeeping books and current popular television shows still teach the old myth that bees die quicker if they have to fly and forage more).
3. The shorter the lifespan of foragers, the less honey and pollen is gathered.

Hence: Keep the brood nest small (but not too small), and new bees won't need to spend such a long time doing hive duty (before they become foragers). Because the bees do less hive duty, they live longer, and bring in honey and pollen on more days before they die. As a by-product you get whole frames with mostly pollen and no brood, plus of course whole frames of honey (which is the reason for this method: to get more honey).

 

[VEG]

What stops them from swarming if you are restricting the brood nest size?

 

[drstitson]

sounds like a recipe for swarming.

better to use the 2 queen system to increase foragers at optimal time AND get swarm control into the bargain.

 

[Erichalfbee]

What stops them from swarming if you are restricting the brood nest size?

Queen appears to be confined between various excluders so no way out

 

[VEG]

That wont stop swarm cells being made though

 

[ugcheleuce]

What stops them from swarming if you are restricting the brood nest size?

Sounds like a recipe for swarming.

Swarming is a little difficult for the bees if the old queen can't get out.

Queen appears to be confined between various excluders so no way out.

That won't stop swarm cells being made, though.

Interestingly, all of the literature on this method suggest that swarming is reduced because (a) the brood nest has a stable size and (b) the queen is locked up.

I've now read that the method is quite old, actually. It was first applied (by Renson) in 1976-77. He was a commercial beekeeper (producing 3-4 tons of honey per year), and not just a hobbyist with a clever idea that he tried on just two or three hives. Anyway, the method is not uncommon my region.

 

[masterBK]

So if you restrict the brood nest then presumably the colony will be short of bees for later flows since it takes 35 days plus from egg to forager. Might work for a single flow area but otherwise a poor idea.

 

[ugcheleuce]

So if you restrict the brood nest then presumably the colony will be short of bees for later flows...

In Renson's method, the queen is locked up for up to 10 weeks (e.g. from 20 April to 30 June), and the colony size begins to drop off about 2 weeks later. A further 2 weeks later, winter preparation begins.

...since it takes 35 days plus from egg to forager.

I'm not sure how long it takes for bees to become foragers in Renson's method, but they do become foragers somewhat sooner, and they live about one-and-a-half to twice as long.

By the way, the maximum size of the limited broodnest is about 30 000 cells, and the queen will presumably lay about 2000 eggs per day.

Might work for a single flow area but otherwise a poor idea.

I'm not sure if France and Holland are "single flow" areas in the sense that you mean it.

But let's forget about the person "Renson" for the moment. Do you know of any other beekeeping methods that involve some kind of broodnest size limiting, to increase the life span of foraging bees?

 

[alanf]

...By the way, the maximum size of the limited broodnest is about 30 000 cells, and the queen will presumably lay about 2000 eggs per day...

But let's forget about the person "Renson" for the moment. Do you know of any other beekeeping methods that involve some kind of broodnest size limiting, to increase the life span of foraging bees?

So 30,000 worker cells plus a frame of drone foundation? Just for comparison, the most common hive broodnest around me is based in a single National Deep box with around 55,000 cells in total. That's smaller than a Langstroth or Dadant-Blatt but somewhat larger than your 30,000 though. Is Dadant-Blatt what Renson used in France?

Not aware of anybody I know who uses broodnest limiting, and it's not in the beginners books I've seen most likely to be bought by UK beekeepers. Unless I've missed one. Given the way many beekeepers like to experiment I'd be surprised if no-one at all has tried it here though. I'd guess it's easy to try except for the use of drone brood foundation, which is not available everywhere here, but you can get it. What are the results like there?

 

[MuswellMetro]

never seen it used in ?UK, but others make contradict me

The only restriction i have seen is a method of putting a QE and foundation underneath a stadnard brood box and AMM bees rather than AML/AMCs or hybrids

so it would look like

Roof
Crown B
super
super
super
QE
National Brood
QE
Foundation super
Foundation Super
floor

and you move the lower super up top once the foundation is drawn and add another undrawn one, the theory being the bee wont make QCell with if they space underneath the hive~~~well that was what the beek said when i gave him his swarm BACK

 

[Norton]

A 3/4 depth Langstroth super has enough room to keep a good queen busy. The maximum laying rate is about 1500 eggs/day. If bees with a low swarming instinct are used there shouldn't be a problem. Carniolians are going to swarm anyway no matter what the size of the brood chamber.

 

[ugcheleuce]

The only restriction [method] I have seen is...

Roof
Crown board
Super
Super
Super
QE
National brood
QE
Foundation super
Foundation super
Floor

...and you move the lower super up top once the foundation is drawn and add another undrawn one.

This looks very similar to the Renson method's box sequence (I'm not saying it is a similar method, though). Renson's box sequence is:

Roof
Crown board (?)
Super
Super
Super
QE
Super (capacity: roughly 30 000 cells)
QE
Super
Floor

I'm not sure if Renson's supers have drawn or undrawn frames, but since the object of his method is to make lots of honey and bring in lots of pollen, it would make sense to use fully drawn out frames.

As for swarming, the literature on Renson all seem to assume that the beekeeper would be checking the brood nest periodically anyway (for example they mention it as an advantage that regular inspection of the brood nest is quicker because you have fewer frames to check and you know exactly in which box the queen is).

Renson literature also often suggest using a medium-sized box (usual capacity 50 000 cells, same as National "brood" box) and reducing the brood nest horizontally, using two vertical queen excluders, to 30 000 cells, which means that you can use the two outer frames for either pollen or as a place to put the filled drone frame. I'm not sure to what extend periodically swapping out a drone frame out of the brood nest would inhibit swarm urge (someone more knowledgeable can speculate on that).

 

[beeno]

A 3/4 depth Langstroth super has enough room to keep a good queen busy. The maximum laying rate is about 1500 eggs/day. If bees with a low swarming instinct are used there shouldn't be a problem. Carniolians are going to swarm anyway no matter what the size of the brood chamber.

Hi Norton,
I am quite sure Brother Adam mentioned a laying rate for his Buckfast queens of 3,000 per day in the video that Hivemaker put on the forum (cannot find it now). Is that because Buckfast queens are more prolific or have laying rates dropped or did I mishear him?

 

[FreeFall]

so it would look like

Roof
Crown B
super
super
super
QE
National Brood
QE
Foundation super
Foundation Super
floor

Hmm... what about the drones? Are they released periodically?

 

[Norton]

Hello,
I do not recall Brother Adam mentioning anything about 3,000 eggs/day. In our strain the maximum rate is about 1,500 and this has also been the number given by studies in the USA. Most beekeepers here in Cyprus use a SINGLE deep Langstroth broodchamber with an excluder. It works well, the bees arrange the broodnest in the space provided and any incoming nectar is put into the supers.
Finman has mentioned that they use several hive bodies for brood. When we do that here the bottom one ends up empty or partly filled with pollen. But then our season is much longer than the Finnish one.
Best regards
Norton.
A good discussion here:
http://www.beekeepingforum.co.uk/archive/index.php/t-14486.html

 

[drstitson]

"Finman has mentioned that they use several hive bodies for brood. When we do that here the bottom one ends up empty or partly filled with pollen. But then our season is much longer than the Finnish one."

which is probably useful in finland as it provides frames to boost spring build up ready for the short season.

 

[Norton]

If anyone has a queen bee that can lay 3,000 eggs/day we are interested in purchasing it.