Next spring

This year I had four hives that were big enough to make a spring honey crop it starts last week of April and is usually done first week of June.Only one made a decent honey crop none of these hives swarmed but the amount of bees that were present at the flow stunk.My question to the experenced beekeepers is what can I do to maxamize my bees so that they'll make a decent spring crop next spring.And can you name a good pollen substute that will be good dry fed.SHB is making me swear off of pattys.

In Alaska, where the flo is really short, beekeepers there have started doing two queen hives to have the maximum amount of foragers at the timeof their flo. I'll look for the article and post the link if I can find it. (Divided deep box's with queen on each side)
I am overwintering about 20 of these two queen hives this year and am planning on doing the same thing(Not to mention having the extra queens for early splits and replacing winter losses)

This one is different-I have not read through it yet, but seems to touch on the same thing:

http://www.alaskabees.com/files/Two_...ckage_Bees.pdf

Here is a thread I started last month with photos and info of two queen hives.

http://www.beesource.com/forums/show...-overwintering

Start feeding the bees light syrup, less than 1:1, 42 days before the flow is expected.
Put only enough patty to be consumed in a day, or put the patty outside and away from the hive. The easiest and most effective is to reduce the entrance to less than 3 inches and extra supers to a minimum before feeding patties.
It is hard to keep intruders out of a rich man's house when one whole side is open and there are rooms he will never notice intruders are in.