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I really want to give the bees foundationless frames in a super (I do box hives now) just for the very purpose of letting bees do what they want - draw comb.

But that raised an interesting...

Sounds like the space between the top level and bottom level is less than bee space - so less than 3/8". Bees propolize gaps like that.

The bees will keep propolizing the frames together......

In my area, I found that when my hives started the spring with a high mite population, they did not build up in population enough to cover a double deep, and of course did not make honey. 50% died. ...

To the OP: I have had mite drops of 500 in a 5 day period, multiple times this fall. Up to a week after an OAV treatment. I know my hives are broodless at the beginning of Nov, so those mites were...

Thanks Robert Holcombe for sharing your mite management experiences with recording mite drops post treatment, and tracking through the years.

This is my second winter using the _prior_...

i have 16 colonies that are sisters and half sisters, all with midsummer brood breaks and new queens by july. Full sized hives. i started oav oct 10th or so - first drop ranged from 50 to 2000. Now...

I would say the best bees are local bees, from a beekeeping buddy or from your bee club. By June, someone there will have too many bees, I promise. One day, you'll have that problem too. ...

The boxes typically don't kill bees. ;) still there does seem like a lot to worry about!

I would recommend sanding the tops/bottoms of the boxes. When they sit edge-to-edge, the dry/cured paint...

So... the bees who fly right now, and through the early spring, are oriented to the hive location. And there are enough to be a problem for any penned in critters, or people, so try to picture a...

Another take on the situation here.... Up the road from me, a buddy had mite counts at 0/300 in July. He decided to do MAQS anyways in Sept, then again in mid Oct. Before the Oct treatment, his...

I use 2 mediums glued together as the brood chamber. The frames are 12 3/4" side bars. They fit in the two mediums with the same clearance as a deep frame would fit into a Langstroth deep - so about...

I'm not really that militant; but I do want to confess that I use Dadant deep hive bodies, 10 frames. The frames are 12.5 inches deep, but otherwise identical in dimension to a Langstroth deep...

Using a Langstroth hive is different from using a 2-hive body, 10-deep configuration. Really, we ought to call them "tower hives", as you can make towers with the boxes.

You can use Langstroth......

I can only tell you about my experience; in 2018, I had 8 queens, all sisters. All born in June or so. 6 of them swarmed (or tried to) in fall 2018. Come spring 2019, 1 of the fall swarmers was a...

Wouldn't it be nice if we could glean all of the info we need about a hive from watching the entrance? Here is a book about that: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bx7DrOGMiXtlV2MyNTJpN2NqeVk/view
...

If there were queen cells, there was a queen replacement. I have found that if the bees put up queen cells, then it is very difficult to change their mind. It could have been a swarm - if the queen...

Some winter bees are oriented to their current location. I have moved bees in the winter, about 20 feet move. A tale of 2 hives....

The first hive was facing north (it had a tremendous...

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Long story short, I'm feeding hive A, and Hive B. Both are about 10lbs underweight. Using 1/2 gallon feeders, one right after another, without more than a couple of hours between refills. ...

I think of the bees' thinking as more like rule-followers; and it's my job to figure out the rules. As well as the exceptions.

So robbing isn't "naughty" or anything value-laden, just a...

https://bip2.beeinformed.org/survey/

go here - you can select the state of interest, years of interest, method of mite treatment of interest...or lack of treatment. Listed as "used any management...

Hmmm... I can say that I don't see good comb construction unless outside temps are lows in the 50s at the lowest. We in OH have moved out of those temps for some days, not for others... so I would...

The Steppler method (run the bees in 1 deep brood chamber until mid spring, add a deep with drawn comb, once the bees hatch out, remove second deep) has a lot in common with the Oh Henry method (see...

If the bees are building up enough population to cover 2 deeps and honey supers, then they are strong and healthy

My third year, after starting beekeeping with a swarm the June prior, I split, and...

And then there is Ian Steppler's method.

https://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?305364-How-to-control-swarming-in-a-large-scale-operation

also his website: ...

Hmmm, some thoughts come to mind - but a few questions.
What month did you see the 4 become queenless?

How strong were the hives in June and July? were they at least 2 deeps full of bees, and 2...