I'm in my third year of beekeeping, up to 8 hives now, but as I split my hives and add supers I keep running into an issue - the bees don't draw comb fast enough. When a flow is on my hives with fully built comb will fill it out very quickly, but if they don't have comb built it seems like they don't use the flow to their advantage, they will keep building comb at a leisurely pace.
It also seems like they will keep reusing 5 or 6 frames of brood rather than filling out the empty frames or moving up a box. I've tried checkerboarding and moving the brood up a box, but they seem to really like the existing comb.
Some of my queenless hives have been fantastic comb builders, also i've noticed that if you put a swarm in a new box they will build comb really fast. Wish I could get my other hives to build comb that fast, it would really help them grow faster.
It also seems like they will keep reusing 5 or 6 frames of brood rather than filling out the empty frames or moving up a box. I've tried checkerboarding and moving the brood up a box, but they seem to really like the existing comb.
Some of my queenless hives have been fantastic comb builders, also i've noticed that if you put a swarm in a new box they will build comb really fast. Wish I could get my other hives to build comb that fast, it would really help them grow faster.