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Author Topic: Adding Your First Super  (Read 11788 times)

Offline Bamboo

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #20 on: October 22, 2018, 04:44:12 pm »
Brian
Follow Maxs' advice. It is totally unnecessary to feed here in Australia. We are not in the USA where conditions are different and advice given here is mainly from US beeks who are knowledgeable about their conditions but unaware of our climate. Depends where you are ...drought or not, but you should be coming in to some flows with spring flowering. Chat to local beeks or join a club and get information about your locale and what flows happen when. Let the bees do their thing and be patient.
Good luck.

Offline Acebird

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #21 on: October 22, 2018, 06:00:42 pm »
Bamboo, you can't lump all of the US into one category.  I have never found a need to feed in my area but there are a lot of people in my area that do.
Brian Cardinal
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Offline max2

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #22 on: October 22, 2018, 06:12:14 pm »
Got ot - sent one back.

Offline TheHoneyPump

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #23 on: October 22, 2018, 06:57:47 pm »
If there is forage, there is no need to feed if you are happy with their pace and performance.  However, if your objective is population build up, drawing of a lot of comb, and rapid expansion of the hive. Feed is essential and will make the difference between a populous hive hive filling honey supers in 6 weeks versus not feeding and a hive that is still working on drawing out comb in two months.  If you want them to build fast, feed so they are never slowed due to lack of resources and gets them over the hump until there is a strong foraging force.  If you are happy with their pace, do not feed.

Beekeeping is regional in a sense of what season you are in, the forage available, climate and weather.  Beekeeping is universal in a sense of what is going on inside the hive and what the bees need at each stage of their annual cycle to achieve their maximum potential.

I think there is more than enough valuable information throughout above posts to disseminate what information you need to take away to accomplish what your goals are with respect to getting a new hive established and drawing out comb.

On your questions;
  - no, brood rearing takes priority.  They will not crowd out the queen from the feed - provided you are attentive and are adding space appropriately
  - no, you will not have syrup feed in your honey supers because logic and reason says that if honey supers are going on then they do not need feed anymore and the feed has been removed prior to adding the supers.

Have fun with it!
When the lid goes back on, the bees will spend the next 3 days undoing most of what the beekeeper just did to them.

Offline Bamboo

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #24 on: October 22, 2018, 08:27:04 pm »
Bamboo, you can't lump all of the US into one category.  I have never found a need to feed in my area but there are a lot of people in my area that do.
I wasn't lumping all together, I am fully aware that keeping bees in Florida is very different than in Minnesota. Much the same in Australia we have vast differences in temps and climate. I keep bees in a subtropical climate where winter to us is 16C with summer temps approaching 40+C. Further south they will have snow at times but not the snowed in situations that some of you experience in the Northern states so conditions vary greatly.
I used to keep bees in NZ and the only time I fed was hives that were used to pollinate Kiwifruit as there was no nectar flow.

Offline BrianP_69

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #25 on: October 23, 2018, 12:26:35 am »
Thanks everyone for all the valuable info posted.
I guess if I wanted to build up the hive faster I could feed but after speaking to several local beekeepers in my region, it seems it's unnecessary, especially at this time of the year. I have to be a bit more patient & just let them do what they will. They are going great, numbers are increasing & I can smell nectar in there every time I walk past the hive, it smells awesome. Next inspection, I'll take note of how many frames are covered in bees, I recall 6 last time & check how far out the brood is & how many frames they have stores on. I'm probably looking straight at stuff & not even realizing what I'm looking at. I noted the brood frames were excellent, capped brood top to bottom & end to end with hardly a missed cell so the Queen is doing a great job. I noted heaps of healthy larvae as well in different stages so that was very exciting too.
Thanks everyone. 

Offline blackforest beekeeper

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #26 on: October 23, 2018, 02:42:36 am »
Yeah, that is so.
There are regions where the flow stops, though , in mid-season. If honey has been pulled of, there just might be a need to feed (depending on how one managed the hives and weather-extremes). I have had this situation twice - due to unruly cold miserable weather in June/July. In one case I put on half-filled-supers again. The other case I just got by. So.... if your flows are steady, don`t worry. If you got flows that can fail in between, think about some storage of honey for the bees.
My colleagues running two brood boxes never have to worry, while I have to. Especially when moving the bees (without honey in the supers then) to the forest. But they got to transport the stuff, too and handle it. And get less honey.

Offline BrianP_69

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #27 on: October 25, 2018, 06:09:07 am »
I have completed another hive inspection today & all is looking great. The bees are pretty much covering all 10 frames when I opened the lid & all 10 frames are being worked on with building comb. There is still 1 frame that doesn't have any drawn comb on but the bees are working on it. I have noticed the last couple of nights there is quite a few bees bearding on the outside at the entrance. I know they do this to help regulate the hive temperature but they also do it if the hive is starting to feel congested. I think I'll be adding my first super this weekend.

Offline Crysalismum

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #28 on: October 29, 2018, 06:58:42 am »
Sorry rookie question- I thought you always fed sugar syrup- what do you feed if you don?t feed sugar syrup?

Offline max2

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #29 on: October 29, 2018, 07:47:34 am »
"Sorry rookie question- I thought you always fed sugar syrup- what do you feed if you don?t feed sugar syrup? "
The idea is to leave enough honey so that you never have to feed. It works in our climate but I'm sure it is a very different situation in Canada or the Balck Forest.

Offline blackforest beekeeper

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #30 on: October 29, 2018, 10:57:24 am »
"Sorry rookie question- I thought you always fed sugar syrup- what do you feed if you don?t feed sugar syrup? "
The idea is to leave enough honey so that you never have to feed. It works in our climate but I'm sure it is a very different situation in Canada or the Balck Forest.

Overall in Germany, it`s sort of impossible without feeding. Just had an email from a beekeeper in Berlin, fed 1 ton of sugar to 30 hives since beginning of July.

Offline BeeMaster2

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #31 on: October 29, 2018, 11:03:49 am »
Wow. And my wife complained because I used 20 pounds of sugar for 13 hives to boost them up a bit for winter. All newly acquired hives.
Jim
Democracy is 2 wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well armed lamb contesting the vote.
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Offline blackforest beekeeper

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #32 on: October 29, 2018, 11:40:29 am »
I like to have 20 kg of sugar at hand for every hive I expect to send into winter. Dont always need it all. But it would be horrible to have too little as I need certified Bioland-sugar, which is sort of hard to get. So I order it in late winter and have to have a rule of thumb about how many hives there will be in August.
This year i got a ton left-over, which is just fine with me. But....it was replacement by pine-honey. Extremely valuable and NOT good for the bees.

Offline BeeMaster2

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #33 on: October 29, 2018, 06:15:32 pm »
My wife came home from the store today with 70 pounds of sugar. She got it for 20 cents per pound. Usually it has been 40 cents or more here.
Jim
Democracy is 2 wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well armed lamb contesting the vote.
Ben Franklin

Offline cao

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #34 on: October 29, 2018, 10:12:42 pm »
20 kg is over 44 lbs.  For each hive.   All I can say is wow. :shocked:

My hives wouldn't need much honey if I fed them that much.  I shoot for anything over 75 lbs of honey to overwinter without any feeding required.  Some have done fine with about 50 lbs of honey.  Even my lightest hives won't get much more than ten pounds of sugar.

Offline blackforest beekeeper

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #35 on: October 30, 2018, 04:52:18 am »
20 kg is over 44 lbs.  For each hive.   All I can say is wow. :shocked:

My hives wouldn't need much honey if I fed them that much.  I shoot for anything over 75 lbs of honey to overwinter without any feeding required.  Some have done fine with about 50 lbs of honey.  Even my lightest hives won't get much more than ten pounds of sugar.

we don`t need that many stores. anything from 15 to 20 kg - depending on micro-climate - over-all-stores are all that is needed (let`s say from mid-October on). it`s the thing, there are no fall flows. the last flow in Germany is usually over by mid-July at the latest. Very very few regions might get anything later, nothing of it is suitable as winter-feed. So usually they either feed on their own honey in late summer already, are already being fed.

Don`t know about normal sugar-prices here. We pay about 1,50 or so Euro per kg on a pallet of 800 kg. But that is certified, regional, organic, Bioland sugar.

First snow-flakes just tumbling by my window here.

Offline BrianP_69

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #36 on: November 14, 2018, 06:31:17 am »
Two weeks ago I added my first super. I waited a week before inspection hoping they would have at least started drawing comb. I was a little disappointed to see all 10 frames untouched so I can only assume there was still some usable space in the brood box so they had no need to venture upstairs. The second week inspection was much different. 7 of the 10 frames are drawn out with nectar stores on both sides of those frames so the girls are onto a decent honey flow. I will be doing another inspection this weekend to see how they're progressing & to check if any of the frames are being capped.   

Offline max2

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #37 on: November 14, 2018, 08:07:50 pm »
Hi Brian,
you will find that moving a couple of old frames with mostly capped brood from the brood box into the new super will make them move quicker.
They will never abandon their babys.
The aother advantage is that the queen will have new foundation to lay in.
When all the brood has hatched in the frames you moved into the honey super the bees will fill it with honey.
If the frames have old foundation this is an opportunity to extract and  renew the foundation.

Offline BrianP_69

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #38 on: November 15, 2018, 01:09:50 am »
Hi Brian,
you will find that moving a couple of old frames with mostly capped brood from the brood box into the new super will make them move quicker.
They will never abandon their babys.
The aother advantage is that the queen will have new foundation to lay in.
When all the brood has hatched in the frames you moved into the honey super the bees will fill it with honey.
If the frames have old foundation this is an opportunity to extract and  renew the foundation.

Great tips, thank you.
A couple of questions come to mind.
1. Move the chosen brood frame to the super with the bees or shake them off. I'm not the most experienced at finding the Queen among the crowded frame.
2. Place a brand new frame with foundation where I took the frame from? This might see an empty frame between brood frames or close the brood frames in & give them the new frame on the outside?

Offline BeeMaster2

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Re: Adding Your First Super
« Reply #39 on: November 15, 2018, 06:43:06 am »
Leave the bees on the frame that you move up. If you use queen excluders, not use a queen excluder until you get the bees building in the super
If your nights are above 65, put the empty/foundation less frame in a he middle of the brood. If the hive is overflowing with bees, you could do it with lower temperatures.
Jim
Democracy is 2 wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well armed lamb contesting the vote.
Ben Franklin