[elmer_fud]

Out of Curiosity what is the biggest hive (by boxes and/or weight) that you have had in/at the end of a single season?

My big hive this year is at 360+ lbs, 1 deep and 7 medium boxes. I tied it to the fence to reduce the chance of it tipping over. It came out of winter with a deep and 3 mediums. I am not adding any more boxes because it is already to big to work and I don't want to drag a ladder out to it.

 

[clong]

260 lbs with 7 10-frame mediums (6 polystyrene) and an 8-frame deep Flow Hive. Mine was lassoed to a tomato stake. I only harvested 64 pounds. The bees wouldn't put anything in the Flow Hive.

 

[robinh]

 

[ericweller]

My largest hive was nowhere near what the pictures show but it was 2 deeps and 4 mediums. I figured this hive would produce over 10 gallons of honey. Because of the height of the hive, I did not inspect it for a couple months. When it came time for harvest, it turned out that the colony had died. The hive swarmed but did not produce a viable queen. All but one of the mediums were robbed out leaving me just 2 gallons instead of the 10 I was expecting.
This did show me that if a hive is not caring for brood, it can collect a lot of honey. Next season, I am going to keep a hive broodless to see how much honey it can collect.