Winter Hive Set Up

[Erichalfbee]

Do not add space in autumn.
So when you have brood in the autumn and it has all emerged and the bees move up into the stores what is left in the bottom box?

 

[user 6228]

when it cools down and they begin to cluster they'll just walk on in

Thats sounds a good reason for highly insulated hives where they are unlikely to cluster much at all. In the wild clustering must be a last resort as there will no body guarding entrance to the treasure

 

[Matt77]

Hi Derek, at what point would you expect a colony to go into a cluster in a poly hive? Mine for example are in paynes poly with 100mm of kingspan above, the mesh floors are open.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Thats sounds a good reason for highly insulated hives where they are unlikely to cluster much at all. In the wild clustering must be a last resort as there will no body guarding entrance to the treasure

or just making your entrances mouse proof

 

[user 6228]

Hi Derek, at what point would you expect a colony to go into a cluster in a poly hive? Mine for example are in paynes poly with 100mm of kingspan above, the mesh floors are open.

the detail of the added insulation counts for a lot i.e. how well it is sealed to the rest. I have only information for the 2012 style of paynes poly which had a conductance of 1.2. They changed the roof in 2013.

if you had an 2012 paynes national it would take 1.2Kg of bees to get the temperature forced clustering down to below 0C if you only had 0.6kg bees it would below 10C

 

[Matt77]

the detail of the added insulation counts for a lot i.e. how well it is sealed to the rest. I have only information for the 2012 style of paynes poly which had a conductance of 1.2. They changed the roof in 2013.

if you had an 2012 paynes national it would take 1.2Kg of bees to get the temperature forced clustering down to below 0C if you only had 0.6kg bees it would below 10C

Thanks very much Derek, that's very interesting.

 

[Finman]

Do not add space in autumn.
So when you have brood in the autumn and it has all emerged and the bees move up into the stores what is left in the bottom box?

IT depends what is the situation in the brood box.

But when our professionals, who have 1000 hives, they start to feed hives before Winter bees have emerged and box is full of brood, they just keep that one box and feed the hive full.

No one here add extra box under wintering box. At least I have not heard.

That is odd habit in Britain and it us getting worse.

.and we have cold winters. In the midde of beekeeping area -30C is not rare. I am near sea coast and mistly -20C is enough here.

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