Double brood swarm options

[chalkie]

2 of my 4 hives are currently on double brood, although no queen cells at the moment what are my options when this happens, also read the Demaree method of swarm prevention why are the supers placed inbetween the brood boxes and not just left on top if you don't want queen cells.

thanks.

 

[Finman]

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We talk about the place of excluder. Nothing more.
ido not use excluder and I use 3 brood boxes.

But there is no such system the you may put supers between brood boxes. It is some special case then.
Prood area must always be compact for the heat what the brood needs.

Bees instinct is to store rippen honey to topmost.
Then, when you add new empty combs, they must be over the brood. So bees feel that they are empty on stores.

You should act only when you have queen larvae in the hive. Otherwise add more space when the colony grows. Keep allways space for nectar and extract capped honey away.

Give foundations to be drawn. It prevents swarming.

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[enrico]

Depends if you want more hives! If you do just split them at the very first sign of queen cells, give the split with the queen some new foundation and put her where the old hive was, put most of the brood in the other box in new position with developing queen cell and hey presto you have two hives. You can then wait until you have new queen and recombine after killing old queen if you want to reduce numbers again.
Otherwise you can reduce to one bb and use all queen cells in nuc splits.
You could demaree, loads of options. But really depends on your reasons. If it is just to prevent swarming then an as into new brood box is best leaving double bb on new site. When new queen laying shuffle brood frames getting rid of old ones and reduce to one hive again with new queen
E

 

[Finman]

Depends if you want more hives! If you do just split them at the very first sign of queen cells, give the split with the queen some new foundation and put her where the old hive was, put most of the brood in the other box in new position with developing queen cell and hey presto you have two hives. You can then wait until you have new queen and recombine after killing old queen if you want to reduce numbers again.
Otherwise you can reduce to one bb and use all queen cells in nuc splits.
You could demaree, loads of options. But really depends on your reasons. If it is just to prevent swarming then an as into new brood box is best leaving double bb on new site. When new queen laying shuffle brood frames getting rid of old ones and reduce to one hive again with new queen
E

loads of option to destroy the summer yield. And good reasons to do that. Honey burns fingers.


Why don't you learn enlarge hives normally and then catch a good honey yield.

You may take normal honey yield and you may add hives without disturbing the yield.

I do quite often that brood box or brood frames are on top. When the brood box is half full honey, I litf the frames topmost. When bees emerge, bees fill frames with honey. Then I extract combs. .

That happens mostly to the first super. It is half full capped honey and then brood in same combs. I must get off the brood. They come out by themselves. Topmost is safe place. Queen does not go to lay there any more.

Normally sidemost frames are full of honey in brood box. They crystallize slowly because places are coldest place in the hive. In good flow I move honey frames to supers that they will be capped and extracted. 2 frames have 5 kg honey.



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[scuttlefish]

I have a very strong colony in a single brood box - if I want to go double brood can I just add a box of foundation or does it need to be drawn comb?

 

[Finman]

I have a very strong colony in a single brood box - if I want to go double brood can I just add a box of foundation or does it need to be drawn comb?

Put foundation box under the brood box and you see what happens.

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