Langstroth: harmony frame rotation method

[jenkinsbrynmair]

and there are two in Orkney called Tw@tt - lower and upper

 

[Bram]

When you guys are about ready to communicate in a civilised way, bee glad to hear your story. Bullying a newcomer and expecting me to respond to your stupidity is not what I do guys. This is not forum format. I'm out! Marley.

laters Bob

 

[Margaret Elisabeth]

I came right into the last page of this and wondering what all the buzz and sting was about, trawled through until I found the link, read the comment which outlines the method and also states that it is the original method used by Langstroth. Perhaps it was easier for me to read than for most people on here as I am dyslexic and have had to make great efforts at both reading and writing to get through my education: or maybe you lot come to the computer too tired to take in what seems to me to be very simple, although written in terms that may seem rather odd.
The brood is not sacrificed but moved to an upper box the fresh comb is placed in the lower box and this means the wax producers are kept fully occupied and the queen provided with laying space. I can see that with a long laying season this would work well my only reservation would be the question of drone brood that is laid around the edge of the nest being trapped in the upper chamber. Perhaps with two weekly inspections they have a chance to escape at inspection if they are not in the back of the nest and therefore in the lower box. I am unclear if it is just the sealed brood that is moved up. I can see I have some more reading to do.
Night Night Kiddiwinks.

 

[joctcl]

There are a number of people on this forum who are arrogant, rude, dismissive ego-maniacs. Unfortunately you have encountered most of them already. Please don't be disheartened. We all reach a point when we have to say '---- it' and leave, as I am doing now.

So its not just the bees that have funny temperament this time of year then!
Come on Vramin don't be an @rse you are absolutely right "there are a number of people on this forum who are arrogant, rude, dismissive ego-maniacs" but these guys are like the guard bees and are here for our protection keeping the complete bull.hi.ters out and certainly defending Marleys wishy washy was not worth leaving the forum for!

 

[Finman]

also states that it is the original method used by Langstroth. :

It was Georg Demaree who wrote about swarming preventive method 1884 in American Bee Journal.

The idea was to separate brood and queen.

 

[Margaret Elisabeth]

,Finman, 2014-158 =1856 so Demaree was a little later at 1884. I did check this. Demaree was sold to me as a way of coping with lack of space.
However different strokes for different folks. The world is a big place with lots of different climatic conditions,(Arabs wake early and sleep in the middle of the day when the sun is hottest then work again later, Mad dogs and English men go out in the mid day sun) what works in some places may not work so well in others, as you have said.
In Britain we tend to use a smaller box for the bees, some people use double brood boxes, they may have better, more favourable honey producing weather in their area and this might be worth a try in a National as long as it is a stable weather period and not too cold. I seem to remember that we all need to keep an eye on what the bees are doing. Beekeeping is not an exact science as yet, though we are making great strides. We are all on a learning curve unless we have a totally closed mind. Why not keep an open mind fellow forumers and if the occupation is important to you, surely most of you will have the intelligence to cope with a little variation in local dialect. Get enough sleep and your patience might benefit: get enough variety in your life and you may learn not to be afraid of something different when it appears on the horizon but to observe it and see if it has anything of benefit to bring.
Bees behave differently in different situations and circumstances. My occasional guests from the African continent tell me they fly at night, and produce honey all year round except in the very dry periods, but then the temperature is very different to our usual night time temperatures, even so this summer I have seen my bees flying after 9.30.
I may try double brood next year on at least one hive and this method of swarm control. Who knows if we have a good summer this may work really well and I might be able to have a holiday the following year.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Okay then, I'll change my statement - he's re-discovered the wheel rather than reinvented it.
Same stands as to the absolute drivel he was posting - hark nack to the start of this thread:

appears that there's some chap called "Marley" who posts long and rambling messages on someone else's blog about "harmony frame rotation". He says it is brilliant and solves all known beekeeping problems. But nobody else has ever heard of "harmony frame rotation", and Marley is so incoherent that it's impossible to work out what he's talking about.

I'd say ignore "Marley" and look elsewhere for advice.

Where to begin?

The basic tone of the site seems to be more to do with the writer's (and some contibutors) belief structure than with what is best for the bees. It is a complex mix of good stuff, anthropomorphic stuff (which sucks in novices) and nonsense.Comb rotation is a good idea. It does not need 'feelgood' names like a 'harmony frame' for what appears to be a drone frame. But you need to know what you are doing with this. Just as an example, it seems the author isin a varroa free area (I think western Australia) so a drone frame is not the potential varroa factory it is here when it is allowed to hatch rather than as a varroa trap.)

Bear in mind the author is not living in a UK environment. Our climate and flow patterns are not conducive to this constant meddling and insertion of empty frames into the nest. You can do it during nectar flows and the spring expansion phase, but at other times, especially if you have near native black bees, the new frames can act as a barrier, and we have seen swarming CAUSED by insertion of the frames, not alleviated by it, if the timing and circumstances are wrong, or if some of our staff have been let loose a tad early and inserted two empties together in error.

Rotating out old combs to be melted out? Fine. We date stamp all our frames since the 2009 EFB outbreak, but do this as a plan to reduce the risk of disease build up. The reducing cell size and consequent reduction in bee size is one of the oft repeated myths of the craft/trade and has been said so many time that it became accepted as fact and stidies were produced to show it. Yet its still drivel. Bees love old comb, they clean it out every spring (brown papery dust outside the entrance tells you what they are up to) and HAD some combs identified as at least 50 and in the case of one pattern Dave Cushman identified for us, 70 years old. Brood combs of such age, bred in most years, yet the bees from them were indistinguishable from any others and the cell walls were not thick. Should have been producing bees the size of fruit flies by then. These old combs are now all gone from our units but they were always the ones laid in first, and were swarm magnets if they were ever used for that purpose.

There is also nothing new about the concept of removing lots of brood from the nest to eliminate congestion, a common swarm trigger. Its the basic priniple behind the Demaree system and simplified Demaree system, which is over 100 years, works fine, and requires less faffing about. Lots of ways to do it, and lots of reasons for doing it.

You have good windows for new comb insertions in this country, but you have to be able to read the colonys state, the weather, and other factors, and if things are not favourable (no nectar flow, nest not expanding, queen slow in laying which is common in dearths) then instead of expanding the nest you are dividing it up, and foundation sheets in those circumstaces can act more like a dummy board than a potential new brood comb. For example we NEVER insert new combs in the June gap, though we will split or demaree using drawn comb if needed. (June gap unlikely to be an issue (for US) in 2013 as it is going to be a very compressed season)

No need to restrict yourself to two new frames per season either. If the bees are in the mood let them have as many as they will take, but successionally, not more than two at a time, and never more than one for every four bars of brood, so two is only for strong colonies, and never together, always at least one bar of brood between them. ( I can enlarge on that if asked)

Its a superficially simple subject but lots of nuances to it that mean you can do it right one week and exactly the same manoever a couple of weeks later can be wrong. Consult an experienced local mentor if in doubt.

I think I'd rather heed ITTLD.
I know someone else who (at the moment) waxes lyrical about his 'dump box' system and how he gets no swarming - he even teaches it to all the beginners he mentors.
It seems to be a year of taking old ideas fielded/perfected years ago and re-inventing them as your own.

Didn't see any bullying actually - just honest opinions as to a cuckoo system on a thread done to death years previously and resurrected for the one purpose by the 'inventor' to try and gull the newbie to adopt a system ill thought out and not particularly good for the bees

 

[Margaret Elisabeth]

As far as I could see Jenkins There was no attempt to sell anything just a little strange language and a lack of punctuation. As a matter of fact I often have to go back and punctuate as well as correct spellings(dyslexia). I can remember being Rotweilered when I joined the forum.Seems to me that some people never grow beyond the stage of the head down the toilet induction to school. I have read ITLD and he just uses different language basically giving the queen enough room to lay and the workers enough room to store is what it is about. My lot tried to swarm the week following the inspector moving the queen excluder down off the super above the brood box. Yes I had missed a QC and was a bit tardy in my inspection too. Maybe with a second brood box they will be happier and I might re align the hive too for some reason since I moved them to a different area of the garden the queen is laying in the back of the box and the workers are leaving the two front frames undrawn. Very odd as this area gets more sun and should be warmer for longer in the day.

 

[Tremyfro]

As far as I could see Jenkins There was no attempt to sell anything just a little strange language and a lack of punctuation. As a matter of fact I often have to go back and punctuate as well as correct spellings(dyslexia). I can remember being Rotweilered when I joined the forum.Seems to me that some people never grow beyond the stage of the head down the toilet induction to school. I have read ITLD and he just uses different language basically giving the queen enough room to lay and the workers enough room to store is what it is about. My lot tried to swarm the week following the inspector moving the queen excluder down off the super above the brood box. Yes I had missed a QC and was a bit tardy in my inspection too. Maybe with a second brood box they will be happier and I might re align the hive too for some reason since I moved them to a different area of the garden the queen is laying in the back of the box and the workers are leaving the two front frames undrawn. Very odd as this area gets more sun and should be warmer for longer in the day.

Guess you must have missed the ley line then! Must be running through the back of the hive......how mysterious....is it repeatable......your physics is lawless......what a hoot!
BTW your writing is great...dyslexia not withstanding.....stop worrying...no need to explain.