Storing brood frames with pollen

[RogerJ]

Having united a Q- with a Q+ colony I've got frames left over that have quite a bit of pollen in them. How best to store these over winter?

On a similar vane some of the extracted super frames have quiet a bit of pollen. Is it OK just to store these along with the rest of the super(s) and let the bees clean them up next spring?

Thanks.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Having united a Q- with a Q+ colony I've got frames left over that have quite a bit of pollen in them. How best to store these over winter?

keep them in the freezer if you want the pollen to be of any use in the spring, otherwise just store them with your other wet frames - the bees will clean out anything that's unusable

On a similar vane some of the extracted super frames have quiet a bit of pollen. Is it OK just to store these along with the rest of the super(s) and let the bees clean them up next spring?

Yes

 

[Swarm]

Yes, not a problem storing supers that contain some pollen.

 

[Erichalfbee]

I sometimes find pollen in stored supers has been taken care of by pollen mites. A quick shake the following season and it's gone

 

[beeno]

After my experience last winter I am nadiring all my pollen frames i.e. keeping double brood configuaration as they were empty come spring and had been well looked after by the bees. Acually I am not doing it this year the bees are!

 

[REDWOOD]

I don't get much pollen in super frames on 14x12 boxes

 

[beeno]

I hardly get any either, in my post above I was talking brood frames.

 

[Plenty of honey]

I sometimes find pollen in stored supers has been taken care of by pollen mites. A quick shake the following season and it's gone

Yup, every spring when i dust off my supers, i mean dust off, as the pollen mites of beetles have been in and turned all the stored hard pollen in my frames in to powder, a bit messy but a few taps and your trousers are ruined!! but the frames are lovely and clean!!
I do treat a fair few of my supers with Bacillus thurgiensis. keeps the wax moth at bay, but dosent stop the mites on the pollen!!

 

[tonyofarr]

We store our supers wet and taped into bin bags, if we don't we find super frames with mouldy pollen in the spring. We get a lot of rain and everything gets damp.

 

[MerryBee]

You get a lot less pollen stored in the super frames if you use drone foundation.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

and chaos if the queen gets through the excluder!

 

[tonyofarr]

:

and chaos if the queen gets through the excluder!

 

[Tony M]

and chaos if the queen gets through the excluder!

Is the chaos worse than if it was worker foundation? If so, why, please?

(Lot to learn here - not everything is found in books!)

Thanks,

Tony

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Is the chaos worse than if it was worker foundation? If so, why, please?

(Lot to learn here - not everything is found in books!)

Thanks,

Tony

If you have worker foundation in the supers and the queen gets up there, not really a big deal, you have worker brood in the comb, if there isn't an issue with the QX, get the queen back down in the brood box, workers will emerge and bees will clean out the comb and backfill with honey.
If there's drone foundation up there, you end up with a hive full of drones (and what use is that?) and unless you put in an additional entrance above the QX they won't get out.

 

[Tony M]

Many thanks, JBM - I understand now!

Tony