Using newspaper to unite with empty box

[ugcheleuce]

Hello everyone

I'm aware of the "newspaper method" of merging colonies, whereby a newspaper is placed between two colonies that you want to merge.

However, a beekeeper recently mentioned a method of adding supers when you're not sure if the bees need a super, that involves a newspaper... and I've never heard of this method before.

Basically how it works is that if you suspect that the bees need more room, but you don't want to give them more room if they don't really want more room, then you add a super to your hive and put a newspaper under the super (above the colony). The idea is that if the bees want the room, they'll remove the newspaper. If they don't want the room, then they don't need to keep the extra box warm.

Have you encountered this methodology before? If not (or if so), do you think that it makes sense?

Thanks
Samuel

Added: The beekeeper also puts a queen excluder under the super, to prevent the queen from wandering into the empty box. The beekeeper lives in an area where the June night temperature drops to 5 degrees Celsius.

 

[ijcooper]

Yes, Ron Brown's Seasonal Guide mentions this. He says recommends it for out-apiaries, and says you can put 3 supers on at a time like this, with newspaper in between each one.

He says he had thought he'd invented the system, but later found out that some beekeepers did the same during the war, when petrol was severely rationed!

 

[oliver90owner]

Paper is not the best of insulators but is better than nothing if the beekeeper is away for a protracted period for one reason or another.

It is not a legitimate reason to be a lazy beekeeper!

 

[Finman]

.
Many uses that paper, but it is better to put exrta box under the brood.