Hey, I want to ask you guys something about condensing the hive that's confusing me a little bit. FYI, I'm in all 8 frame mediums. So I've got essentially one box worth of bees, and the phrase I usually hear is that for winter you should have the hive been the same size as the bees can fill, so they can keep warm more efficiently. My question is, this hive has more stores than bees, they have 4 frames of brood, about 5 frames of pollen, and almost a full honey super. How do I condense them without taking their stores from them?
Recommendation: This may be too descriptive, my nature so there it is.
Your goal is to basically completely tear the hive apart and push the reset button placing the colony into one box as follows:
1. Find the queen, the old good one that you are keeping, cage her, and put her in your pocket for safety while you do everything else.
2. Kill the other queen uncerimoniously and toss her in the grass.
3. Take the hive apart, setting boxes aside. Select a box that is empty of bees and take all of the frames out of it. Scrape it clean of bur comb and propolis.
4. Clean off the bottom board thoroughly.
5. Put that emptied box onto the bottom board. Reduce the entrance to between 4 to 5 bees wide at the most.
Hereon: Frame positions left to right starting at left edge: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8. As you are selecting and placing frames in next steps, get your hive tool out and scrap all the bars of the frames of bur comb and such. Really clean things up. As you are selecting frames for next steps, pretty much disregard the brood. You have no choice but to be sacrificing some, and btw you do not want it anyway as it is likely infested. Do not keep any scrapings, toss all in the trash.
6. Select the 5 heaviest fullest honey frames from all of the boxes. Place those into the new cleaned empty box on the bottom board in positions 1 2 3 7 8.
7. Select the 2 frames that have the most pollen and also as much honey on them as possible. These are the next fullest frames you can find. These may also have small patch of brood on them but you are first and foremost want them full of resources. Have complete disregard for any brood in this step. Do not be tempted to select a brood frame over the pollen/honey frames. Place those two frames in position 5 and 6
8. Take the ONE frame that has the most HEALTHY brood on it. This may not be the frame that has the most brood, you are looking for the one that is the most healthy and well organized. It may be the frame that has the smallest brood patch on it. It may be mostly empty with only eggs or it may also have some pollen/honey stores on it. This is your -new nest- frame. Place that frame in position 4.
9. Now shake all the bees and scramblers into the centre of the fine new home you just built for them. Target the top bar of the brood frame in position 4. Shake all bees in from the rest of the frames of all the other boxes into the new hive body. Once they've settled down a bit, make a note of how many frames of bees there are in the box, colony size. You will use this as a gauge later as to if things getting better or getting worse.
10. Place an ApiVar strip between frames 3 and 4. Place another one between frames 5 and 6.
11. Take the queen in cage out of your pocket. Isn't she pretty, having been safely kept warm and cozy away from all the ruckus you just made. Quietly release her into the gap between top bars of frames 4 and 5. Watch her sniff around a bit then she walks down, big wide waddling, all-in safe and sound.
12. Put the lid on, clean up the area, haul away the equipment. Walk away.
13. Bag and freeze overnight all the frames that were removed. If freezer is small, just do a few frames at a time, no biggie. As you take them out, scrape the bars clean. Scrape clean the boxes. Do not keep any of the scrapings. Toss in the trash. Put the equipment into storage ready for spring.
14. Go drink some hot chocolate or binge on a bag of chips.
15. Do not open the hive again for at least 1 week. After 1 week check in for bee health and active queen and not queen cells. Are they all still in there? Are they looking good, bunch of happy, buzzy, fuzzy bees? Or, are they totally done for now.
16. You have accomplished a healthy hive that is treated and has enough resources to make the winter. Wrap them up, or whatever your wintering configuration is. Done. Go eat some more chips.
17. Remove the ApiVar strips at 6+ weeks.