3rd-year newbee here. I have a bit of an odd situation. In the past when we scraped honey frames for crush-and-strain we'd put the frames outside the hives and the bees would go nuts over it. We'd do the same with honey frames that had had uncapped cells - we'd toss them in an extra super and let the bees clear out those cells, then take the rest inside for processing.
This year, they haven't touched the leftover frame from crush-and-strain, nor have they touch the frames I left out for robbing (they were completely unmanageable in size due to me originally going foundationless and it seemed like they were nowhere near getting capped - I have taken a frame out to accomodate how thick it was, and I suspect they had cells built on cells aare that point. So I decided to set them out, assuming they'd go for it like in past years. Nope. Not a sincgle bee to be seen on it, and they're about 20 feet from the hives.
What's changed for this year from last year? If they don't go for it and I decide to pop it back onto the hive in another super, will it matter that it's sat outside overnight and most of today?
And lastly, am I an idiot for doing it this way? Does anyone else have any suggestions for how to deal with ridiculously-sized hone frames?
This year, they haven't touched the leftover frame from crush-and-strain, nor have they touch the frames I left out for robbing (they were completely unmanageable in size due to me originally going foundationless and it seemed like they were nowhere near getting capped - I have taken a frame out to accomodate how thick it was, and I suspect they had cells built on cells aare that point. So I decided to set them out, assuming they'd go for it like in past years. Nope. Not a sincgle bee to be seen on it, and they're about 20 feet from the hives.
What's changed for this year from last year? If they don't go for it and I decide to pop it back onto the hive in another super, will it matter that it's sat outside overnight and most of today?
And lastly, am I an idiot for doing it this way? Does anyone else have any suggestions for how to deal with ridiculously-sized hone frames?