Hive positioning Poll

[user 6228]

Prevailing wind direction will also have an impact with respect to the nature of any subsequent wasp challenge that the apiary may experience. Stick a weaker colony at the downwind end of a longitudinally arranged apiary and it will take the full brunt for the whole apiary.

Wouldnt the reverse be better, stick a strong defensive colony on the downwind end. They would kill/deter any invasion? or is there something else?

 

[Erichalfbee]

I think what Karol is saying is that if you put a weak colony at the downwind end it will be annihilated if wasps are attacking the apiary
My apiary is arranged longitudinally and I have two wasp bane traps placed at the entrances of the two at the end.

 

[Karol]

Wouldnt the reverse be better, stick a strong defensive colony on the downwind end. They would kill/deter any invasion? or is there something else?

Absolutely which is why I raised the issue but it takes an informed conscious decision to do so and will require monitoring and manipulation as the strength of hives naturally waxes and wanes.

 

[Hivemaker.]

Stick a weaker colony at the downwind end of a longitudinally arranged apiary and it will take the full brunt for the whole apiary.

Have never found this to happen.

 

[Karol]

Have never found this to happen.

Wasps will follow a scent trail. Each hive will emit scent from whatever openings there are. If the hives are aligned so that all the scent trails from each hive overlay the scent trail from the last hive then the last hive will be in the flight path of wasps flying up the scent trail and they will preferentially attack that hive.

If you have a transverse arrangement where none of the scent trails from the individual hives overlays then each hive will attract wasps and any attack will be shared more evenly between the hives.