No comb in supers

[terry jones]

My first year in bee keeping. Brood box looks nice and heathy lots lots of new bees and capped cells bee quantity looks good and an active queen.
My problem is they will not start building out my super, lots of activity in the super but no comb being laid on the foundation.
Someone told me to put the super underneath the brood box with the excluder on top to encourage them into the super.
ant suggestions

 

[milkermel]

You arent the only one, Mine did this last year, it was so frustrating, however this year they have shot up without any problem? some people suggested mybe my wax foundation was old, others suggested the source of the foundation, Not sure if it was either, but maybe my girls were just not ready to go up top!!!

Not much help I know but just thought I would let you know you are not alone!! Might help if you have someone you could scrounge a super frame from, but maybe your girls still have enough room and dont need to go up. All the best!

 

[Poly Hive]

Information is a bit sparse here. No location hive type amount of brood or much of anything. Is there even a flow?

For help some help is needed.

PH

 

[Polyanwood]

Spraying super foundation with sugar syrup and temporarily removing the QE do encourage bees to draw foundation, but as Poly says, if there is no flow on they won't draw the foundation.

Other consideration is that if you are sure you are not after a honey crop this year and your bees are not at risk of robbers or wasps, you could feed. Bees use a lot of energy drawing foundation.

 

[Queens59]

I had this in a new nuc. this year - and tried everything mentioned above, but nothing worked until my mentor eventually suggested feeding to encourage them to draw out and it worked...but would you build a cupboard if you didn't need to store anything??

 

[Midland Beek]

The season is over in most parts and I would guess that only Himalayan balsam (lots of) or a heather moor would get them working in the super.

What are you expecting? Have a look around you ... everything's flowered.

 

[milkermel]

The season is over in most parts and I would guess that only Himalayan balsam (lots of) or a heather moor would get them working in the super.

What are you expecting? Have a look around you ... everything's flowered.

come off it!!! everything has flowered????? my garden is only just starting to bloom!! still have loads of honeysuckle, and sedums to flower, plus the bees seem to be loving a privet type hedgerow we have growing around here! then there is the RBWH that covers all the sides of roads. I collected a swarm last week and it is building like mad. so there must be something around

 

[Poly Hive]

There are flowers and flowers....some are of use and many are not.

I suspect bar going to the heather (not an option this year) my season is over too.

PH

 

[Midland Beek]

Nothing to fill supers in my neck of the woods, bit of RBWH, bit of HB.

 

[Queens59]

No idea what mine are finding, but working till 9.30-10 each night, landing heavy and full pockets. Set my spacing badly at the start and had to hack a frame apart and damaged foundation badly - gave it to them on Sunday to empty...they have, but also repaired it and starting filling with honey...on it's side ...in the roof!!

 

[fincaazul]

My first year in bee keeping. Brood box looks nice and heathy lots lots of new bees and capped cells bee quantity looks good and an active queen.
My problem is they will not start building out my super, lots of activity in the super but no comb being laid on the foundation.
Someone told me to put the super underneath the brood box with the excluder on top to encourage them into the super.
ant suggestions

Can't remember who, but back in the 1980's there was a bee farmer who sold loads of ' drawn foundation '. This would be about about 30% of comb on a sheet of foundation. After much enquiry discovered that he achieved this by by putting boxes of waxed frames, brood and super, on a very full brood box, and continually feeding with thin sugar syrup. The bees wanted to store this bounty and drew out foundation accordingly. The partially drawn frames were what he sold. Feel sorry for the bees.

 

[kazmcc]

We are on brood and a half, our bees still have plenty of room in the brood box 2 or 3 frames haven't begun to be drawn, but they are still drawing the super. Last inspection they had drawn one both sides, one side of one frame and the side of the other on the other side, so in all equals two frames. The have started storing in them at the bottom of the super frames, as of last inspection, but from the looks of them, there are lots more bees ( there was lots of capped brood ) and they are coming and going like mad. Loads bringing pollen too, from different sources. I hope the wasps haven't slowed their progress down as they were described as very industrious by the bee inspector when we got them. We inspect again on tuesday, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the wasps were just a slight inconvenience to them, and not as much of a drain as they were on me

 

[fincaazul]

Spraying super foundation with sugar syrup and temporarily removing the QE do encourage bees to draw foundation, but as Poly says, if there is no flow on they won't draw the foundation.

Other consideration is that if you are sure you are not after a honey crop this year and your bees are not at risk of robbers or wasps, you could feed. Bees use a lot of energy drawing foundation.

hived several swarms this year, natural and AS, before putting on supers whether drawn comb or foundation, fed heavily so sugar syrup was used to draw out brood foundation rather than collected nectar which becomes honey. Hoping for a reasonable crop of honey