Pulling honey supers before dusk for evening extraction...doable?

[mxr618]

Has anybody pulled supers a couple hours before dusk and put them in front of the hives to let the bees make it back to the hive and then collected (hopefully) bee-less supers for nighttime extraction?

It's 100 degrees here and spending time in a bee suit with a leaf blower doesn't sound like fun. Can the above method work?

Any help would be appreciated!

mxr

[Michael Pawelek]

By leaving the supers in front of the hives you may attract bees from other local hives and end up with more on the supers than you started out with from the original hive. How about starting out in the morning for the project when it is cooler.

[gmcharlie]

thats teh way I do it, take the supers off NO MORE than 2 hours before dark or you will start robbing. Later in the year, closer to dark. I shkae the majority of bees I can off each frame, set teh super on edge next to the hive. come back after dark. Bees will want to bee in the hive. Make sure they are far enough away bearing bees arnt there (cpl feet)

[Beeboy01]

I've pulled supers in the afternoon and moved the frames to empty boxes while shaking off the bees. I have also used a natural bee-go to get the bees out of the supers in the afternoon for an evening extraction. Both methods worked out well. If you set the supers out in front of the hives there is avery good chance that the bees will just stay in the boxes and more bees will show up to rob out the honey. You will need to drive the bees out of the supers somehow, just don't leave them out in front of the hives and expect the bees to go away.

[mxr618]

drat. It sounded too easy. Now to plan B...whatever that is.

[tefer2]

Leaving them out in front till dark works good when the weather is cooler in the fall. Don't know about summer time, sounds like robbing frenzy to me.

[Roland]

They do still make bee escapes.

Crazy Roland

[beedeetee]

The abandonment method has only worked for me when nights are cool (50's-low 60's). Above that and it didn't seem to work for me. Fortunately we have a lot of evenings like that.