Encouraging bees to take honey from supers into brood box

[pargyle]

I’m definitely thinking of switching to worker foundation for supers in future!
Although I also fancy trying without foundation having read this thread…

People will quote the old stories about it takes a load of honey to build comb and if you provide foundation they will use less of it .... load of codswallop in my experience. I've been foundation free since Day 1 of my beekeeping. They draw comb out beautifully without foundation - they need a guide to keep the drawing in line with the frames - so start with foundation free frames checkerboarded with drawn frames and you won't go far wrong. There's lots of ways you can start them off .. I pin a triangle of timber under the top bar with the point facing down - I 'paint' the strip with melted beeswax and off they go. But - you can just run a bead of wax under the top bar. put an inch of foundation in place instead of a full sheet ... you can even make your own starter strip by melting some beeswax onto a piece of polythene and cutting it into strips when it has set - they really don't need the guidance of cells imprinted on the wax.

Try it ... it costs you nothing - you will see the beautiful way they draw out the comb and the real beauty is that it's what they want to build ...

https://www.flickr.com/photos/99514363@N06/albums/72157636257703495

 

[gmonag]

For an experimental change from starter strips I gave the bees half a sheet of foundation cut on the diagonal. They had multiple choices of what to make of it. You can see what their preferences were and those included a taste for a bit of drone comb in a BS. ...

As you can see from the photo, they usually draw their own comb from a starter strip before using the foundation.

 

[ericbeaumont]

1960's ... I'm chief Grammar Policeman ...

Not quite, Philip: 1960s does not have an apostrophe.

 

[pargyle]

Not quite, Philip: 1960s does not have an apostrophe.

Ahhh ... that's because it's an ellipsis ... the implied word that is missing is after 1960's making 1960's a possessive noun not a plural .... You should see me play Scrabble ...

 

[user 20297]

Ahhh ... that's because it's an ellipsis ... the implied word that is missing is after 1960's making 1960's a possessive noun not a plural .... You should see me play Scrabble ...

I think this might be another supersedure-type of issue. "in the '60s" might be correct and "the 1960s' fashion" may be correct. In the context of this debate, the apostrophe in "1960's" has no grammatical function other than that it looks correct.

Bear in mind that I'm rubbish at Scrabble but love a squabble.

 

[Newbeeneil]

Unless your name is Roger !!!

Or Neil

 

[pargyle]

I think this might be another supersedure-type of issue. "in the '60s" might be correct and "the 1960s' fashion" may be correct. In the context of this debate, the apostrophe in "1960's" has no grammatical function other than that it looks correct.

Bear in mind that I'm rubbish at Scrabble but love a squabble.

If it it looks right it probably is right ....

But ... I think we had better stop and call it a draw as we are in danger of punctuating a useful thread with archane and largely useless punctuation .... otherwise we will have the mods after us ... wait a minute ... I am a mod ...

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

You should try Welsh grammar, not only do you have to worry about whether there's a soft or hard mutation after a word but as each word has a gender (which is not always logical or evident) then the rules on mutations are different.

 

[pargyle]

You should try Welsh grammar, not only do you have to worry about whether there's a soft or hard mutation after a word but as each word has a gender (which is not always logical or evident) then the rules on mutations are different.

Well you can see why Welsh nearly died out then !!

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Well you can see why Welsh nearly died out then !!

yes, the percentage of Welsh speakers in our area dropped to about 75% at one point

 

[ericbeaumont]

archane

Must try harder, Argyle: you mean arcane.

 

[The Poot]

You should try Welsh grammar, not only do you have to worry about whether there's a soft or hard mutation after a word but as each word has a gender (which is not always logical or evident) then the rules on mutations are different.

I guess Woke Welsh is next on the agenda - pick a gender to identify with and follow up with a complete mutation.....

 

[pargyle]

Must try harder, Argyle: you mean arcane.

Fumble fingers ... 6/10 ... that would have been a rap on the knuckles ...it's bad enough dropping your h's but adding them in is worse ....

 

[Erichalfbee]

Fumble fingers ... 6/10 ... that would have been a rap on the knuckles ...it's bad enough dropping your h's but adding them in is worse ....

Wooden board rubber launched from a distance used to be the weapon of choice

 

[pargyle]

Wooden board rubber launched from a distance used to be the weapon of choice

Or a well aimed piece of chalk from my Maths teacher ... I reckon he could have been an Olympic chalk thrower ... speed and accuracy second to none.

Late in my school career I foolishly (in the confidence of youth) goaded him into a game of tennis ... when his first serve went past me at the speed of light and the ball actually stuck in the wire fencing surrounding the court I knew I was in trouble ... a very humbling experience as he was playing with someone else's ancient racket and odd tennis shoes. Taught me that you should never judge a book by it's cover. I took a couple of games off him towards the end but only because he couldn't keep up the pace and stopped moving !

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Wooden board rubber launched from a distance used to be the weapon of choice

We had a geography teacher Mr Thonas (Crank) who taught in the lecture theatre - it had one of those rolling cnvas blackboards with a beading at intervals so you could move the board around to the next 'page'. If he caught you misbehaving, he'd call you to the front, draw a small circle on the board and make you push your nose against the board within the circle, then as he was lecturing you, he'd grap the handle and quickly 'flip' the board up to the next page, catching your nose on the way

 

[The Poot]

Wooden board rubber launched from a distance used to be the weapon of choice

Can you imagine the outcry if that occurred today? It was the same in the school I attended. The chalk dust never quite came out of the blazer material.....

 

[ericbeaumont]

If it it looks right it probably is right

No, by thunder, no! It's that sort of flabby response that results in apple's and brake pad's! You will be tested tomorrow on this homework: Writing Decades

 

[pargyle]

We had a geography teacher Mr Thonas (Crank) who taught in the lecture theatre - it had one of those rolling cnvas blackboards with a beading at intervals so you could move the board around to the next 'page'. If he caught you misbehaving, he'd call you to the front, draw a small circle on the board and make you push your nose against the board within the circle, then as he was lecturing you, he'd grap the handle and quickly 'flip' the board up to the next page, catching your nose on the way

I think that would be classed as assault with a deadly weapon these days ..... but very creative !

 

[Finman]

A or B .... C & D are non-starters and if it's set in the comb you can't extract it to Finman's idea won't work.

My ideas surely work . Nothing wrong in them. When I see that the frame is crystallized, I do not even try to extract it.

But how I can quess whose frames are liquid or hard? I did not even know that they are drone super cells. Which is a mad idea, when you do not even extract them. That much every beekeeper must understand. But those drone foundations surely limit the flexibility in hive nursing.

Pargyle is naughty. That I have learned to understand.