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Two queen hive

12K views 57 replies 14 participants last post by  Patrick Scannell 
#1 ·
hi everyone:
I was wondering if anyone heard of two queen hives. I know I was surprised to hear of such an arrangement.
I'm hoping if anyone has tried it or have any info on how this thing works would share that info with us.
 
#52 ·
Michael, in an earlier post, you shot down the idea of a nuc highrise,( 4 nucs stacked with screen between each), because of the condensation. Have you tried banking nucs in your long hive?
Something like 2 frames w/queen - excluder- single frame - excluder- 2 frames w/queen - excluder-single frame - excluder- 2 frames w/queen....ect.
I am aiming at banking queens through the winter with out putting them in little boxes.
The premiss I am going with is that if you can make a 2 queen hive, then 3,4, or 5 should be posable. I was told that keeping them in queen cages all winter stresses them, therefore weakens them. Do you think the clusters would abondon a queen for a prettier smelling one?

I understand that if this did work, the springtime buildup would be explosive.

What happens when you leave a 2 queen hive as a 2 queen hive all winter?
 
#53 ·
>Have you tried banking nucs in your long hive?
Something like 2 frames w/queen - excluder- single frame - excluder- 2 frames w/queen - excluder-single frame - excluder- 2 frames w/queen....ect.

No but I've made the mistake of leaving an excluder on and the cluster left the queen behind. Im quite certain the bees will all cluster around one of those queens and most of the queens will be left to die.

>I am aiming at banking queens through the winter with out putting them in little boxes.

I'm banking some this winter in a five frame nuc with a terrarium heater under it and in the middle of my row of nucs with the heater. So far they are doing well, but we'll see what winter brings.

>The premiss I am going with is that if you can make a 2 queen hive, then 3,4, or 5 should be posable.

But I don't see how it would help other than wintering queens, and to do that, my theory was to cram enough bees into the nuc to keep the cluster big enough to cover the queens, feed them so they don't starve, and keep them warm enough that the cluster won't shrink too much and leave them too cold.

>I was told that keeping them in queen cages all winter stresses them, therefore weakens them.

I don't see that it matters. The queen won't lay all winter anyway.

>Do you think the clusters would abondon a queen for a prettier smelling one?

No, but they will abandon her for a warm spot in the main cluster in a heartbeat.

>I understand that if this did work, the springtime buildup would be explosive.

It won't.

>What happens when you leave a 2 queen hive as a 2 queen hive all winter?

The bees all move to cluster in one spot and they may even leave BOTH queens behind. In the winter the bees aren't looking for the queen, they are looking for a warm spot in the cluster and the cluster isn't looking for the queen, the cluster is looking for a warm spot with food.
 
#55 ·
When I've done something similar, I just did one deep for each queen and tried to keep it from getting to congetsted
That's what I'thinking to do. Did you find less/equal/more honey near the brood in this configuration than in conventional SQ? And how about the pollen ditribution?

I put two bound excluders between
That's exatly what I thought to be necessary, but some authors report they use only one excluder. In the other hand, they previously keep the hives piled for a week or more with a double, bee-proof screen. Maybe this helps the queens to get used with the pheromones of each other and decreases the mutual agressive tendency.

Either a hole in the box, or a notch in the bound excluder etc.
I was thinking of an entrance in the excluders, but I think they'd have to be large enough to support the heavy traffic in the season (would a small landing board help/encourage the bees to use this entrance?). But then maybe the rims would have to be a little higher, for providing a useful entrance, and that could slightly violate the bee space. Anyway, maybe excluders should come normally with a closable entrance, don't you think so?

João
 
#56 ·
>Did you find less/equal/more honey near the brood in this configuration than in conventional SQ? And how about the pollen ditribution?

I think it's typical of a regular hive. There is the bee's tendancy to start backfilling the brood nest to prepare to swarm and then you have to open it up. But up until then they will be expanding it. Pollen, of course, is always near the brood. Some colonies will store lots of it and others just some. I never figured out why but it must be just a genetic variation.


>That's exatly what I thought to be necessary, but some authors report they use only one excluder.

Maybe one would work. I never tried it, to be honest, but I think they might fight otherwise.

>In the other hand, they previously keep the hives piled for a week or more with a double, bee-proof screen. Maybe this helps the queens to get used with the pheromones of each other and decreases the mutual agressive tendency.

Maybe.

>I was thinking of an entrance in the excluders, but I think they'd have to be large enough to support the heavy traffic in the season (would a small landing board help/encourage the bees to use this entrance?).

I don't see any difference with landing boards. I think they are to make beekeepers feel better.
I guess my point was that drones can get out. You can have other entrances that are larger.

>But then maybe the rims would have to be a little higher, for providing a useful entrance

1/4" high will do. Anything over 3/8" is just more ventilation and probably won't speed up traffic any.

> and that could slightly violate the bee space.

Slightly larger than bee space at the entrance is easier to get away with since the bees don't tend to burr up a high traffic area.

>Anyway, maybe excluders should come normally with a closable entrance, don't you think so?

Seems like a good idea.
I don't really use them so I don't think about it much.
 
#57 ·
Joao
Take look at this 2 queen board we use in New Zealand commercial hives.If you want a complete breakdown on the simplicity on how these two queen hives are created,ease of making increases, reason for placement of queen excluder section and placement of queens for pheomones just contact me off line if you wish.

http://tinyurl.com/btze5

[ December 16, 2005, 12:52 PM: Message edited by: Bob Russell ]
 
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