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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Oct 2008
    Location
    Sydney, NSW, Australia
    Posts
    14

    Question Honey super size, could I use a deep brood frame ?

    Hi
    I am a new beekeeper, living in Sydney, Australia.
    I have started two hives very recently, one a swarm capture and the other a feral hive cutout.
    They both seem to be thriving, and have almost filled two brood boxes (it is midsummer here now).
    I made my hive boxes (from scrounged construction site scraps), to standard metric langstroth dimensions.
    The brood frames are 230mm deep (9.1 inches).
    Just wondering, could I use this same size, for the honey supers ?
    (to keep things simple and uniform)
    And just harvest one or two frames, at a time ?
    Or would this cause problems ?
    I only intend to have 2 or 3 hives, in my city backyard, and eat the honey myself.

    Jeff

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Feb 2008
    Location
    berkley county, WV
    Posts
    429

    Default super size

    the problem with your idea, as i see it, is that you won't want to keep handeling a 70+ lb. super of honey to check your bees. And if you keep taking out a frame or 2 of honey to extract you will always have open cells preventing you from taking off the whole thing. I don't think it will hurt you to use a deep super to make honey, but I think you will get tired of handeling it all the time. I thought abput the same idea, but gave it up when I realized how much heavier a deep half full of honey was compared to a deep full of bees..

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Feb 2008
    Location
    JAMESTOWN, INDIANA
    Posts
    53

    Default

    That Is All I Use Because To Me When Harvest Time I Do Not Have To Deal With Little Frames And I Sure Get Alot More Honey Out Of Deeps And If I Need To Start Another Hive I Have Foundation Draw Out And It Jumps Start My Bees, Yes They Are Heavey But I Lift Them Juust Fine?

  4. #4
    Join Date
    May 2002
    Location
    San Mateo, CA
    Posts
    3,951

    Default

    You get the best drawn combs for future hives by drawing them out as a honey frame.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Aug 2002
    Location
    Greenwood, Nebraska USA
    Posts
    39,915

    Default

    A ten frame deep full of honey weighs 90 pounds. That's the only downside.
    Michael Bush bushfarms.com/bees.htm "Everything works if you let it."
    My book: ThePracticalBeekeeper.com

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Oct 2008
    Location
    Sydney, NSW, Australia
    Posts
    14

    Default

    Thanks everyone for the advice, about the weight importance.
    I am not really that strong.
    I could live with two different frame sizes.
    And maybe convert to all mediums, as advocated on the Bushfarms.com website.
    (One of my very favorite sources of information - thanks Michael)

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Jan 2005
    Location
    missouri
    Posts
    147

    Default

    while they are heavy if you did pull the whole box, but I usually just pull each frame out and place in a nuc box so I only have to carry 4-5 at a time and seeing how I pull each frame anyway to brush off bees its not much difference to me whether its a meduim or a deep but kinda preffer deeps as you have less frames to extract.

  8. #8
    Join Date
    Oct 2008
    Location
    Sydney, NSW, Australia
    Posts
    14

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by bejay View Post
    while they are heavy if you did pull the whole box, but I usually just pull each frame out and place in a nuc box so I only have to carry 4-5 at a time
    That is an excellent idea.
    Since I have a spare brood box and frames, but not a shallow super box, I will try a deep super, and see how I go.

    Quote Originally Posted by JOHN HINCHMAN View Post
    And If I Need To Start Another Hive I Have Foundation Drawn Out And It Jumps Start My Bees
    Another good idea.

    Quote Originally Posted by odfrank View Post
    You get the best drawn combs for future hives by drawing them out as a honey frame.
    Just wondering, do you mean that shallow honey frames are better than deep honey frames ? Are they better because the comb is more robust (in the extractor for example), and so can be recycled more times in future hives ?

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