Winter Stores

[reigate]

I have a National hive with 2 Supers on which are all capped and ready for extraction. Can i remove both Supers for extraction or should I leave one for Winter stores? If i have to leave one Super on should this be placed below the
brood box. If this is the case can I still use Apiguard for Varroa control.

Thankyou.

 

[Erichalfbee]

Make sure there are stores in the brood box
Take both supers off leaving an empty drawn one on for the bees to move down into. If you don’t have one extract one super put it back on wet then take the other. There’s plenty of time left for the bees to organise stores for winter. What you must not do is leave them nothing now, hence checking the brood.
Whether they need a super for winter depends on what bees you have

 

[enrico]

Honey is worth far more than sugar. Extract the honey and feed sugar syrup if they need it in the autumn. There is still time for them to bring in loads. If you want to leave them honey then leave it above the brood box without a qe. If you put it below they will just move it up which is a waste of effort. If you have part filled supers they can go below. However in the spring there is likely to be brood in the super!
E

 

[user 18806]

Honey is worth far more than sugar. Extract the honey and feed sugar syrup if they need it in the autumn. There is still time for them to bring in loads. If you want to leave them honey then leave it above the brood box without a qe. If you put it below they will just move it up which is a waste of effort. If you have part filled supers they can go below. However in the spring there is likely to be brood in the super!
E

Why should the qe be removed? Was planning to leave a super on mine to help them through our first winter together.

 

[Walrus]

Why should the qe be removed? Was planning to leave a super on mine to help them through our first winter together.

If you leave the QX on over Winter, as the bees move up to get at the stored honey the queen won't be able to get up there.

 

[Swarm]

I have a National hive with 2 Supers on which are all capped and ready for extraction. Can i remove both Supers for extraction or should I leave one for Winter stores? If i have to leave one Super on should this be placed below the
brood box. If this is the case can I still use Apiguard for Varroa control.

Thankyou.

Before you remove the honey, examine the brood nest to assess both the colony size, how many frames of brood and stores, again how many frames. They should have a fair amount in there by now, colony size is diminishing and using apiguard is temperature dependent and with supers off.
I would take them one at a time and start treatment when the second one is off and without returning the empty one, it will be moving into September by end of treatment and a good time to offer invert/syrup with a dash of thymol emulsion (see sticky thread) for the little darlings to mix with the Ivy.
Saw the first little 'clubs' of blossom forming on a patch of Ivy last night, the season is winding down.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Why should the qe be removed? Was planning to leave a super on mine to help them through our first winter together.

What can happen and I know of one case where it has (very experienced beekeeper but thought passing on the warning was more important than pride) when a QX was left on overwinter in error. is that the bees will not abandon the queen (without her, the colony is doomed anyway) and sat just under the queen excluder within inches of plentiful stores and starved to death

 

[Walrus]

What can happen and I know of one case where it has (very experienced beekeeper but thought passing on the warning was more important than pride) when a QX was left on overwinter in error. is that the bees will not abandon the queen (without her, the colony is doomed anyway) and sat just under the queen excluder within inches of plentiful stores and starved to death

That’s interesting & probably makes more sense than leaving her - if the queen dies they are screwed anyway. Only just got up and I’ve learned something about bees already!

 

[bingevader]

Can i remove both Supers for extraction or should I leave one for Winter stores?

If in doubt (and you only have a few hives), take one now and check again at the end of the summer.

 

[Levitt53]

There is plenty of ivy around me and the autumns have been good weather for the last few years so I find they still have plenty of time to collect their winter stores into September and even October.