One for two

[TAWoods]

Well, since my apiary is very young I haven't had to deal with many swarms.
Actually, in the past four years I have had two swarms. The first I caught and the one yesterday I watched disappear into the tree to the north of my hives. What a sad sight! The hive was new this april with a two pound package of russians. Their growth has been good, but I didn't anticapate their departure. This past tuesday (jun 10th) the second hive body was added to all six hive of russians. Hive one and two received the new hive body on top and hives 3 - 6 received the new hive body on the bottom (below the brood box). This technique was share with me from an old timer 40 plus years keeping bees. He said they would accept the new hive body better and quicker. Well anyways, hive one swarmed and moved on... Hive two had new swarm cell almost completed. I removed the cells and reversed the supers, putting the new super underneath the existing super. Hives 3-6 are crawling through the new supers and drawing out the comb, where 1 and 2 hadn't done much to the new super.

Has anyone else heard about putting the new hive body under the existing brood super?

Oh, the reason to the 1-2 receiving the super on top verses 3-6, it started to rain hard, so I just finished up quickly. I hadn't much of a chance to look in on them til the swarm happen yesterday afternoon.

Well, I guess that will teach me not to rush.

[Clayton]

Has anyone else heard about putting the new hive body under the existing brood super?

reply:

Yes. It is best done with drawn combs however. You now have seen first hand the problems that can occur with foundation. I much prefer to bait up as it manipulates the bees up. Baiting down can be down but it is a little trickier.


Clay

[Michael Bush]

As I've watched the bees in my observation hive they seem to like to start at the top and work their way down. I've tried both adding to the bottom and adding to the top. Both work most of the time.

[mark williams]

Michael: you stated they like to start at the top & go down,I've added drawn comb on alot of my hive's & they are filling the top super's up first.But as far as the queen laying does she not like to start at the bottom & go up?>>>>>>Mark

[Michael Bush]

I'm saying in the my observation hive, everytime I've populated it the queen has started laying at the top and worked her way down.

In hives, I've often seen them work their way down or up depending on where the space was.

If you think about it, most natural hives are only one comb in height and they start building it at the top and work down. When they build comb in a tree they start at the top of the available space where they can attach a comb and keep building on to the bottom of the comb. They do not start at the bottom of the tree and fill it as they move up.