....... i have even pulled queens out of double deeps and let them make bunches of cells and then make up nucs with those. My intentions were not to keep revolving the mini nuc boxes and build over and over again, but to just get 1 start from the 1 frame of brood in a 2 frame box, and build them up into a 5 frame and eventually a 10 frame to overwinter
Pretty much how I operate.
Making honey from this particular unit is not a goal - so slice and dice it as see fit.
Made my first batch of 2-frame units this year already and that was a success in Q mating (already expanded each 2-framer to 4-5 frames).
There will be another batch of the same soon here.
I do:
- make a strong, desired unit queen-less and have it set the QCs
- once the QCs have been capped - make
as many 2-frame nucs
as possible using those QCs - not just ONE (purely for mating needs, only doing one 2-framer is risky - consider that mating success is << 100%)
- any successful 2-framers (contingent upon successful Q-mating) - will go on and grow into the full-size colonies for wintering
- any failed 2-framer - will get recombined (not much resource wasted)