Time to give them more room

[Fishing-Nut]

I have a hive from a cutout I did a few weeks ago that had recovered very well. They are in an 8 frame deep box and it will be time to give them some more space within a week or so. How would you guys do it this time of year? Would you pull some frames from below and add them to the top box while replacing the bottom frames with foundation? I'd like to add another deep 8 frame to them and possibly get a little bit of honey off of them when the fall flow comes on. But the honey is definitely not mandatory. 

[van from Arkansas]

Fish, I would leave brood frames alone and yes I would some lower frames and place them up top.  Where up top: middle, or towards outer edge and which frames are moved?  That depends on how many bees, how many food frames are in the lower section and wether the queens needs more brood space.

The brood, queen, has preference to me.  If the queen needs more room for laying then provide more empty waxed out frames for the queen..  Note this: queens do not like to cross honey lines for laying brood.  I have seen queens split brood leaving a honey frame in the middle but this is very unusual.  I just want enough frames up top to encourage the bees.  In Spring during a flow, I would move brood but not in late August unless circumstances dictate.

During a dearth, I am much more careful about disturbing the bees and moving frames.  During a flow, bee keeping is easy.  Be careful with the honey frames, not to puncture, not to waive in the wind.  I am just reminding you Fish, I realize your experience is obvious by cut outs you accomplish.

Cheers
Van

BTW, Fish, when are you going to update that pic of that lil ol black bass and replace with pic of a real rod bending striped bass.  Ok, I will stop the humor, that is a nice bass.  Did you mount or release?

[Fishing-Nut]

Thanks van! I have been keeping bees for the past 5 or so years....I had a very helpful older fella teach me most of what I know and I've learned an absolute ton from this site. I do know a little bit but I very much value the opinions of others. Especially folks that have been doing it longer than me. I forgot to mention in the first post that I am feeding the bees hard right now. There's lots of pollen coming in but hardly any nectar. I feel like we are on the verge of a flow but it just isnt quite there yet. The bees are taking a ton of sugar water lately.

[Fishing-Nut]

HA...van I released that bass. I will definitely post up some pictures of some striped bass. We do a good amount of kayak fishing in some large lakes and when they make their "spawning" run I can usually get into them pretty good. Its mostly hybrid bass which is a white/striper cross....but occasionally I'll hook up with a nice line side!

[cao]

I pretty much agree with van.  Add what space/box that you need but, try to leave the brood nest intact.  This time of year my bees are getting things set up for winter and the last thing that I want to do is go rearranging what they have done.  Some of my hives are going to need boxes added.  Some of them I will be adding the empty box to the bottom just in case they don't get it filled before winter.  I'd rather have the empty space on the bottom of the hive.

[Fishing-Nut]

Thanks cao....where are you from? For those of you kind enough to offer some input I'd also like to hear where you are from with your bees....I know different climates create different actions when it comes to the bees. We are still wearing shorts at Thanksgiving most of the time.