demarree for the second time of the season?

[Erichalfbee]

Wow a fantastic thread here with so much ew information to learn thanks fellow community.

How would I avoid the bees not filling the top BB with honey, but instead filling it in the super?

You can’t. Just use it as another honey super.
By the time I have taken down my Demarees I have honey in two supers over the bottom brood box and honey in the top brood. In a good year there’s honey in supers on top of the top brood.

 

[elainemary]

Ah. I keep thinking it’s a Demaree which it isn’t. But that’s splitting hairs.
I have always found that foundation is drawn pretty quickly in my Demarees but then I leave only one frame of brood in with the queen at the bottom.
Curly asked opinions on his manipulation and it seems so far nobody else here has done it.
Me? I’m as confused as ever in Curly’s threads.
Perhaps @elainemary can shed some light as she recommended the book.

Hi can’t comment on the methods of clover to heather as I’m not familiar with it.

I shared the book as it’s an anthology ie several authors who were / are heather experts, for anyone wanting to learn about heather honey colony management.

Will be interested in @Curly green finger's experiences this season.

My own plans are to make extraction quicker and easier and to that end with a bit of persuasion, my association has agreed to buy a Spiegel Hydropress this season, hoorah! My thanks to @pete darbyshire for his help, photos, videos and advice, he shared with me, which made the case to buy one possible

Postscript: after reading more of this thread now realise it’s about Demaree - the book question threw me off track- hopefully not taken the thread too much off course!

 

[Curly green finger's]

Hi can’t comment on the methods of clover to heather as I’m not familiar with it.

I shared the book as it’s an anthology ie several authors who were / are heather experts, for anyone wanting to learn about heather honey colony management.

Will be interested in @Curly green finger's experiences this season.

My own plans are to make extraction quicker and easier and to that end with a bit of persuasion, my association has agreed to buy a Spiegel Hydropress this season, hoorah! My thanks to @pete darbyshire for his help, photos, videos and advice, he shared with me, which made the case to buy one possible

Postscript: after reading more of this thread now realise it’s about Demaree - the book question threw me off track- hopefully not taken the thread too much off course!

It’s a cracking book to worth a read if you want to move/set up colony’s for heather.
I used the method last season with good results , also easier to move single brood colony’s to heather .
One thing also I did was to strengthen the colony’s more by adding loads of nurse bees three weeks prior and add/leave summer honey stores in the brood box by doing this you end up needing three supers of comb above the brood for them to store and process heather they put it all in the supers.
I think you have done something similar?

 

[elainemary]

It’s a cracking book to worth a read if you want to move/set up colony’s for heather.
I used the method last season with good results , also easier to move single brood colony’s to heather .
One thing also I did was to strengthen the colony’s more by adding loads of nurse bees three weeks prior and add/leave summer honey stores in the brood box by doing this you end up needing three supers of comb above the brood for them to store and process heather they put it all in the supers.
I think you have done something similar?

Standard practise to unite a Nuc of bees before the flow (could be from earlier swarm control) and make sure you have a queen that is still laying well. Rearrange the brood nest too so eggs on outside and sealed brood in middle so queen lays in middle when sealed brood emerges and stops brood box from being filled with honey. I aim for 2 really good supers of honey and all capped.

 

[Curly green finger's]

Standard practise to unite a Nuc of bees before the flow (could be from earlier swarm control) and make sure you have a queen that is still laying well. Rearrange the brood nest too so eggs on outside and sealed brood in middle so queen lays in middle when sealed brood emerges and stops brood box from being filled with honey. I aim for 2 really good supers of honey and all capped.

Thanks I thought you were doing something similar I’ve copied that method for future reference.

 

[Rory Fields]

The page of the book that @Curly green finger's has photographed says that you leave the queen in the bottom box with four frames of brood and six frames of foundation, which the author expresses some doubts that the bees will draw with any urgency.. I assume that will restrict the laying space and give the "rest"

Mine still chose to swarm from the bottom box with only 3 drawn frames of brood and 9 of foundation - wish the bees would read the books!

 

[Curly green finger's]

Mine still chose to swarm from the bottom box with only 3 drawn frames of brood and 9 of foundation - wish the bees would read the books!

Place a book in font of the hive on the said given pages ?
I’ve had two like that this season but a few more frames had been drawn out.
I wish I had given them some more comb in the bottom might be the answer?

 

[Erichalfbee]

That’s because foundation isn’t laying space. You need to get as much drawn comb in a Demaree as you can.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

You need to get as much drawn comb in a Demaree as you can.

and as little brood in there as possible to start

 

[Erichalfbee]

and as little brood in there as possible to start

Yes I put the frame the queen is on

 

[Rory Fields]

That’s because foundation isn’t laying space. You need to get as much drawn comb in a Demaree as you can.

Thanks, didn't realise that at all - had thought by giving only 3 drawn comb and the rest foundation, that it'd mean the swarm impulse was blunted by their need to draw comb and they'd effectively think they'd swarmed by splitting the existing brood from the queen - was a preemptive demaree rather than a reactive panic, so hadn't anticipated the small swarm with original marked and clipped queen leaving and getting about 4ft from the hive as I inspected others in the apiary. Is the v small swarm size a result of the demaree, albeit one with insufficient drawn comb? Would've expected a prime swarm I guess

 

[Erichalfbee]

Would've expected a prime swarm I guess

If it was the first swarm leaving the colony it is a prime. Was it the original mated queen?
Sometimes the bees swarm anyway...whatever you do.