Can I give a nearly full super to another hive?

[sheena]

Hi,

I have one hive doing really well. It has a brood and a half and on top of that 2 nearly full supers. only one completed frame whicdh i rwemoved but all the others well on the way.

I gave this have another super but now its pretty tall.

Can i just shift one of the supers onto one of my weaker hives to finish off? If I do should I brush the bees off first?

Thanks

 

[oliver90owner]

Can i just shift one of the supers onto one of my weaker hives to finish off?

You could, but there is no guarantee they will finish it off. Don't transfer (m)any bees or they will scrap.

RAB

 

[enrico]

If you really want to do it then shove a bee escape on to clear the bees before you move it but be careful it may start a robbing spree!! You are micxing two different hive scents and that is not always a good thing!!
I honestly wouldn't bother unless your second hive was starving
E

 

[Mandeville]

If you really want to do it then shove a bee escape on to clear the bees before you move it but be careful it may start a robbing spree!! You are micxing two different hive scents and that is not always a good thing!!
I honestly wouldn't bother unless your second hive was starving
E

Would it work if the super was taken off and not put on to the other hive for a few days?

 

[enrico]

I think you are adding the supers too soon. Can I make a suggestion. don't add the next super until at least some of the frames are capped in the one before it. Alternatively put a crown board with a feeding hole between the started super and the new super. the bees will not go through the hole until they need find the space. Then remove the crown board when they are beginning to fill the new super. the trouble with adding all these supers is that the bees will tend to funnel up the middle and not fill the side frames. This is a waste of your time, wax and money. So let them do the job properly on one super before adding the next! At this point I might be tempted to go through the two supers that are on there and try and make one super of capped frames which I would put on the top. The one next to the brood would be the started frames and when they were beginning to cap that I would take off the capped ones and put on a new one!! Hope you followed all that
E

 

[Swarm]

 

[sheena]

Enrico - that makes sense, thanks, I shall follow that next time!

I had already moved the super over when I read that as I had had to act quickly as we were due to leave for a couple of days. I was a bit worried that things may have gone amiss but everything seems to be ok. I had used quite a bit of smoke when persuading the ladies to let go of that super so it must have masked the scent ok. I'll do a bit of rejigging now with the full ones in the lower super and then the crown board with hole and then the leaner super.

Thanks