turning BB to 'cold' way - when?

[acabee]

I want to turn my BB so that the frames are 'cold' way (ie ends of frames at 90 degrees to entrance) as I think this will improve ventilation during the warm dry summer we must surely deserve after last year.
Is there a particularly good time to do this - first inspection in April?

acabee

 

[oliver90owner]

Not on OMF? Timing to turn - unimportant except for local conditions, I would think.

 

[itma]

1/ warm/cold way. Just names - no real difference in ventilation, etc for the bees. Especially, as o90o indicates, if you have a mesh floor.

2/ the difference between warm and cold ways is where you stand while inspecting - at the side or the back of the hive.

3/ if you want to change, the "first inspection" would be as good a time as any. That's the time for spring cleaning - some would even swap the frames into a different brood box at that point and sanitise the one used for the previous year. It is usually prudent to make quick checks inside the hive well before then (weather permitting) but the "first inspection" (often mid/late March) is the first truly thorough unhurried, deal-with-everything-you-spot occasion for getting set for the start of the season.
It is usual to at least take the brood box off the floor and clean, if not swap, the floor at "first inspection".


// So, "cold way" isn't cooler, and "first inspection" isn't the very first time you .... oh!

 

[Finman]

.
Too cold or too warm?

If the hive is too cold, it does not occupye the top box.

If hive is too hot, I see it from number of ventilators.


Cold way or warm way is mere humbug

.

 

[richardbees]

ditto above also:

in my experience, for what it's worth, the brood tends to be on frames towards the entrance end on the 'cold way' layout and on frames at the most South facing end on 'warm way' - so suggest you arrange them that way when you switch over.

 

[o.stjohn]

I believe cold way is best - arriving bees can quickly get to their frames without having to clamber over other frames and guard bees can better reach and guard the entrance.

 

[psafloyd]

I have used warm as I prefer to inspect from behind the boxes and find it all laid out better. I dare say I cold cope with cold, but I've never had a deputation or angry letter from the bees. Maybe they've suffered in silence.

 

[Peterxix]

I have used warm as I prefer to inspect from behind the boxes and find it all laid out better. I dare say I cold cope with cold, but I've never had a deputation or angry letter from the bees. Maybe they've suffered in silence.

As a New bee , I will mainly be Inspecting on my own so I will be using the warm way, from behind, But at the last local BK meeting two of the members work together, and use the cold way, so they face each other, when Inspecting the Frames, one inspects one side and one the other, they say it is a lot quicker and no need to turn the frame round. Makes sense to me, as long as there is always two of you.

 

[Easy Beesy]

Both can't possibly see into cells to check larvae for disease this way, can they? Do they measure them to see if they're the same height and therefore compatible frame checking partners?

 

[drstitson]

do it when you do the routine spring floor clean/change.

 

[MuswellMetro]

do it when you do the routine spring floor clean/change.

or when you do your AS

it only in the national/commercial format you can do warm way, the rest of the world on langstroth have no idea what we are talking about and likewise those north of the Wall on Smith Hives dont have the warm way option