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Hi All,
Following a suggestion by a well respected forum member, I "expanded" the brood nest as we transistioned from Winter into Spring by inserting new foundationless frames into the middle of the brood nest. My understanding of the process is that inserting new foundationless frames would provide new space in the brood nest for the bees to build out, thereby occupying young bees with comb building, and further preventing crowding, all in an effort to forestall swarming, without the potentially detrimental affects of dividing the cluster. This made alot of sense to my simple understanding of brood nest dynamics.
Accordingly, as our weather warmed up, I started inserting new foundationless frames into the center of the brood nests of my larger and more active hives. Many of these brood nests spanned two deeps, and thus I inserted two frames, one aligned atop the other, in the center of such hives. I did this up to thee times on some of the hives, meaning in some instances a hive received and built out a total of 6 new deep foundationless frames in about 8 weeks.
I quickly discovered that almost all the new comb built on these inserted frames in all the hives I did this too was built out as drone comb. So, rather than building out worker comb and raising worker bees, as I had expected, the hives used this new space to build out drone comb and raise drones. These hives now have *huge* amounts of drones! Just an "eyeball estimate" from looking at frames covered with bees, but I would guess the hives are now made up of between 30% - 50% drones. And, the brood nests now have a significant amount of drone comb right in the middle. (I know I can move the drone comb to another place in the hive, but that is not the point of my question).
Drone production is now winding down or has stopped, and, the bees are now filling these drone cells with nectar.
Does backfilling drone cells in the center of the brood nest with nectar have any special significance? Specifically, what does backfilling drone cells indicate? Or is this a case of backfilling the center of the brood nest, which just happens to be drone cells in this case? Or, has the hive shifted into honey production mode, and the bees are simply using the space they have to store what they are bringing in and it is nothing special? Any other explanations?
TIA
--shinbone
Following a suggestion by a well respected forum member, I "expanded" the brood nest as we transistioned from Winter into Spring by inserting new foundationless frames into the middle of the brood nest. My understanding of the process is that inserting new foundationless frames would provide new space in the brood nest for the bees to build out, thereby occupying young bees with comb building, and further preventing crowding, all in an effort to forestall swarming, without the potentially detrimental affects of dividing the cluster. This made alot of sense to my simple understanding of brood nest dynamics.
Accordingly, as our weather warmed up, I started inserting new foundationless frames into the center of the brood nests of my larger and more active hives. Many of these brood nests spanned two deeps, and thus I inserted two frames, one aligned atop the other, in the center of such hives. I did this up to thee times on some of the hives, meaning in some instances a hive received and built out a total of 6 new deep foundationless frames in about 8 weeks.
I quickly discovered that almost all the new comb built on these inserted frames in all the hives I did this too was built out as drone comb. So, rather than building out worker comb and raising worker bees, as I had expected, the hives used this new space to build out drone comb and raise drones. These hives now have *huge* amounts of drones! Just an "eyeball estimate" from looking at frames covered with bees, but I would guess the hives are now made up of between 30% - 50% drones. And, the brood nests now have a significant amount of drone comb right in the middle. (I know I can move the drone comb to another place in the hive, but that is not the point of my question).
Drone production is now winding down or has stopped, and, the bees are now filling these drone cells with nectar.
Does backfilling drone cells in the center of the brood nest with nectar have any special significance? Specifically, what does backfilling drone cells indicate? Or is this a case of backfilling the center of the brood nest, which just happens to be drone cells in this case? Or, has the hive shifted into honey production mode, and the bees are simply using the space they have to store what they are bringing in and it is nothing special? Any other explanations?
TIA
--shinbone