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Subject: Orange County, NC Beekeepers

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  • From: Todd Walker <mtwalker AT imageray.net>
  • To: John Rintoul <beecd AT icloud.com>, Orange County Beekeepers Association <ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [ocba] Question about feeder arrangement
  • Date: Fri, 31 Jul 2015 16:39:50 -0400

John,

Working the hives during the dearth can be a painful experience. There isn't much to eat, robbing pressure is high, and the last thing they want is you digging around in the hives. I tried to work mine about 3 weeks ago and it was brutal. Now that things are starting to bloom, the mood should improve.

Bees aren't in the comb building mode this time of year so it is doubtful that they with build comb in the upper super (or anywhere for that matter). They also don't really have any reason to move the honey out of those frames you gave them. They may actually fill them with the syrup from the feeder. Some options would be to:
1) Give them 7 more drawn frames to fill up.
2) Move those frames down into a one of the boxes below, replacing 3 empty frames (if one of the boxes below is a medium).
3) Pull the frames out and let the bees rob them. Then they will move the nectar/syrup into the hive.
4) Brush off the bees and put the frames back in the freezer for another day.

~Todd

On 7/30/15 4:34 PM, "ocba on behalf of John Rintoul" <ocba-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org on behalf of beecd AT icloud.com> wrote:

2 weeks ago the bees in one of my hives were unusually defensive. I was stung multiple times before I had even removed the telescoping cover. But since I had just extracted honey from the adjoining hive, I assumed that bees were simply agitated by the smell of honey in the air. Rather than punch my luck, I closed up the hive without inspecting.

I returned to the hive one week later to finish the aborted inspection. Again the bees were angry, overly defensive, bouncing off of me, stinging through my gloves and jeans. But on balance I was better protected so I persisted. The bottom brood box had no brood, no honey, no nectar and no pollen. The upper brood box had only small amounts of everything. So I dropped the upper box to the bottom position and added a honey super with 3 partly filled frames of capped honey and nectar that I had frozen earlier + an in-hive feeder filled with light syrup. See picture below.


Today, I refilled the feeder. Thankfully, the bees were back to their usual agreeable selves.

My question for all of you experienced beekeepers - what problems, if any, am I creating with the feeder box of honey frames coupled with the tank feeder? Everything is sitting above the inner cover. Will the bees try to fill the void in the feeder box with free form comb? My hope is that they will move the honey out of the feeder box frames into their bellies or into comb in the brood boxes. Is that likely? 4 days in, it doesn't look like they are headed in that direction.

I appreciate all thoughts, comments, and advice.

-John Rintoul

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