Frame spacing in half brood.

[Haywards]

This is my first spring with bees and my 2 colonies, in National hives, wintered well and are strong. I left a super of honey on each for the winter and decided I will work on brood and half in national hives. I now realise I have made the mistake of leaving the 10 castellation spacing in the half brood. Both these half boxes are full of brood on every frame. I have done 3 inspections and have drone brood bridging the gap between bottom and top frames, though this was much reduced on yesterday's inspection.
My questions are:
1) Can I leave the castellation spacing and move to Hoffman spacing in autumn?

2) Should I try to move the frames to a box with runners using Hoffman spacers. I have plenty of spare kit but the poor weather does not favour messing the bees about?

3) I read in a post that running frames in opposite directions makes lifting and checking easier. Does this matter?

 

[itma]

OK, you are entering religious territory here, so expect heartfelt opinions - but I'll let you judge the sense of them!

IMHO, brood frames ought to be at brood-spacing, which is what hoffmans are for.
Again, and I think this ought not to be controversial (but somehow can be), rails and a proper dummy board make for easier brood frame inspections.
Castellations are fine for a super, where you don't (shouldn't) need to inspect much if at all.
But, even at brood-spacing, they are an unusual choice for a brood box, as it is harder (and slower) to inspect than when frames are on rails.

The fact that the bees have "worked around" the "wrong" spacing indicates that this is not disastrous, just sub-optimal.
Its hard to change at this point in the season.


Comb building between boxes is often a sign that the beespace is wrong.
Otherwise it may be an indication that the bees are short of "space" - which really means comb - and that they should have had a (crop) super added last week!
My suggestion would be to clean off the wild comb completely from top and bottom bars, give them a super and see what they have done next week.


My understanding is that crossing the frames doesn't stop them building comb in a wrong-size beespace, just that it means that you don't lift frames in the lower box while you are trying to inspect the top one!
You are also bound to create a problem of propolising the lugs of the frames in the lower box, as they will have lost the benefit of the 'undercut' beespace in the top box - which is there (on the lug sides of the box) specifically to provide beespace over the lugs.

 

[Haywards]

OK, you are entering religious territory here, so expect heartfelt opinions - but I'll let you judge the sense of them!

I realise this! I decided to try to take a consistent approach this year rather than chop and change according to various approaches. I decided to follow Wally Shaw's advice - brood and half, swarm control and so on. I did not realise the significance of brood spacing and storage spacing.

IMHO, brood frames ought to be at brood-spacing, which is what hoffmans are for.

Yes got these in large brood box.

The fact that the bees have "worked around" the "wrong" spacing indicates that this is not disastrous, just sub-optimal.

Will the larger space make the bees move down the brood into normal spacing and use the half box for stores? Or is this just a case of wait and see what they do?

Comb building between boxes is often a sign that the beespace is wrong.
Otherwise it may be an indication that the bees are short of "space" - which really means comb - and that they should have had a (crop) super added last week!

I did add a super last week and they have started to draw this. The bee space is OK and the comb between boxes seemed to be drone comb coming from the bottom of the top box in a bulbous mess of comb. When I lifted to inspect this caused cells to break leaving big fat drone grubs exposed. The bees have dealt with these and I left some for the birds but I was uncomfortable not knowing how the colony would react to "slaughtering their drones". I want to prevent this if I can and not upset the bees. Though I'm also upset!

My suggestion would be to clean off the wild comb completely from top and bottom bars, give them a super and see what they have done next week.

This would mean destroying more drone cells and grubs. Carry on?

My understanding is that crossing the frames doesn't stop them building comb in a wrong-size beespace, just that it means that you don't lift frames in the lower box while you are trying to inspect the top one!

My understanding too! Did not explain it very well.

So, is there an ideal way to set up brood and half? It might be too late for this season but nice to know for next year - if I continue with this set up.

Thanks for your time and advice.

 

[itma]

IMHO, all brood frames ought to be at brood-spacing, which is what hoffmans are for.

Hope that small addition clarifies the point.
However tall the box might be.



Brood and a half is a bit of a nuisance.
I like 14x12 (extra deep national), some like 16x10 ('commercial') -- both provide brood and a half space in a single box on a National footprint.
I can see the point of double brood (though I think its a bit big for ordinary bees) but brood and a half gives you multibrood hassle without the benefit of flexibility.

 

[Haywards]

Hope that small addition clarifies the point.
However tall the box might be.



Brood and a half is a bit of a nuisance.
I like 14x12 (extra deep national), some like 16x10 ('commercial') -- both provide brood and a half space in a single box on a National footprint.
I can see the point of double brood (though I think its a bit big for ordinary bees) but brood and a half gives you multibrood hassle without the benefit of flexibility.

Thanks for your help. Not as concerned now and will leave the bees to cope with my mess. I'll see how I get on with brood and half and decide "what next" at the end of the season.

 

[dexter's shed]

I made this mistake last year, the bees started building extra comb between the castelations, so in effect I had two layers of comb per frame, no good for inspections as you couldn't see in between the two combs, I got a friend to give me a hand, we cut out the second comb and fixed them into empty frames and then swapped boxes, it's a shame to let them build all that extra comb that gets removed by us

 

[drstitson]

"they are an unusual choice for a brood box"

not in europe they aren't.

i find them fine to use and a convenient step on which to rest frame after levering and before gripping properly to remove.

remember jumbo LS/dadant frames are heavy.

 

[Honeybeeco]

Opposite directions of boxes and frames don't make that much difference if your bees are prone to making burr comb - either way frames can be burred and lower ones lifted.

Heres another idea :- If you want to sort this mess out sooner rather than later and get back to single brood box, you could always find the queen and put her in the brood box below, slap on a queen excluder and let the brood up top all come to life and then eventually the half brood will be empty of brood. The only problem you will have with this is drones can't get out either so you have a dead drones up top. I am assuming you don't have a eke or shim with a separate entrance as you can put that above the excluder and all drones will hopefully go out that way.

You can use the above to go double brood if you want by inserting a brood box between bottom brood and queen excluder.

I have to agree with others that Brood and half are rather a pain and not easy when it comes to manipulations. We run mostly double broods here but I went to brood and half last year at my father home hives, just to see if I was correct in remembering how bad it was, and it was pretty painfull.

Dont forget there is no wrong or right here, so which ever way you decide to go, sometimes if your going to be into bee keeping for the long term, you do sort of learn more by trying and experimenting yourself.

Let us know how you get on and which way you go.