So my question is 1. why did I reverse them.
reversing is of course meant to 2-brood hive, becaus eyou cannot reverse one box.
The start is that you have in combs winter food, pollen and brood, and perhaps few used cells in lower parts of combs.
The lover box is usually empty in spring.
Then the colony expand and it occupyes half of lower box.
It is time to reverse boxes and reasons are:
1 prevent swarming
2 to use evenly frame cells by brood --- black --- out of use
3 to get into consumption winter food from upper parts of frames and brood there.
When my hives expand in spring, steps are in one box hive
- second box under the brood box (early summer)
- when lower box is full of bees, the third box over + reversing 2 brood boxes (near dandelion blooming)
- when the third box goes over the hive, it is usually time to give some foundations. It hinders swarming too.
2. shall I turn them back now. 3. what points are important when I move tham back.
?????
4. One of my queens is new and not marked - Ill never be able to find her, how will I know if shes in the right place.
When you open the inner cover, you see a dencer patch of bees in couple og gaps of frames. The queen is laying there.
Don't use smoke so much that bees start to run away. The queen will run too.
Don't draw the frame from dense patch because the queen will easily squezed. Take the first frame off from near side. Them loose other frames and then lift the two frames from dense point.
The queen is sually on the frame, where you see young just emerged bees and eggs.
Try to look a bug which has long legs and a big abdomen. Walking style often revieles the queen.
I am suffering from information overload - please help me, but in a clear concise way. (please use short words). Thank you all very much. all advice appreciated. J
Forums are full of disinformation and all kind of tricks what you never need.
I recommend that don't use in spring the excluder. Use two brood boxes.
When you have about 4 box in the hive and honey is coming in, you may start to use excluder.
- You lift all honey frames over the excluder
- all brood and pollen frames under the excluder and the rest foundations.
- If you have old dark combs, put them first in the middle of the brood area. Bees clean all pollen and winter food away from it. Then it will be full of brood. Then lifth the comb over excluder. Bees emerge and the comb will be full of honey. After extracted take it off from usage.
- Take care that the bees have allways enough room and they are not tight-
- When they get honey, one capped super needs two more super boxes where bees put the nectar dry.
- Extract the capped honey and put empty combs between nectar boxes and brood.
- If you see queen cells, make a false swarm quickly.
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