[jamneff]

I know there have been lots of posts on here regarding moving from deeps to med. supers. I caught a swarm last year and the only thing I had available was med. supers, they wintered well. I want to move them to deep boxes, can anyone tell me the best way to do this?

 

[jmgi]

I just did the same thing, I have a few hives still in mediums and I am switching over to deeps for brood, so I put a deep box of frames on top of those hives just the other day, and will let the queen move up into them, once the brood hatches out of the mediums I will remove them from the hives. My deeps that I put on already had drawn brood comb in them, but if you only have foundation that would be fine too, may just take a little longer for them to move into them well enough to pull the mediums.

 

[jamneff]

Did you put the deep on top of the 3 medium supers and then move the boxes out from under the deep?

 

[jmgi]

I only had two mediums for brood, but yes, I removed the mediums as they were vacated of brood. Usually the bottom medium, if you run three, will not have any brood in it at all at this time of year, so you could remove that one right away, but check it first for brood. A deep added on top of the stack will occupy the queen for quite some time with her laying, enough time for all the brood in the lower boxes to hatch out and for you to remove them. But you will have to monitor them closely so she doesn't go back down and start laying in them again. Even if you find only eggs in the mediums when you go to remove them, its no big deal, eggs aren't expensive.

 

[mathesonequip]

this time of year the bottom one is likely empty. if there is any brood at all put it on top over a queen excluder. put the deep on too bellow the excluder. as the bees move up repeat as required. keep the queen bellow the excluder. you do not need to find the queen just be sure there are no eggs and little larve above the excluder, look after a few days. this will go easier before a heavy honey flow, the time to do it is now as I see you are in pa. localy I have snow on the ground and had a snow squall yesterday so it would be a bit early for me... try and time it so you do not mess with the brood when it is to cold.

 

[jamneff]

Thank you guys, I did an inspection yesterday. I am hoping to start this process on wed or thur this week. I will post any questions I have. Thanks again.

 

[Vance G]

If you are not in a hurry, remove the outer frames which I bet are all honey from two boxes and slide the remaining medium frames two high to the outside from the center and put deep frames in the middle. As any brood in the outside two frames on each side emerges, remove those frames and replace them from the middle again with deep frames. It makes the manipulation easier if you have an empty deep box to set the top medium on so the deep frame can hang down. When all medium frames in the two boxes have been replaced, transfer the deep frames to a deep box. Turn all those medium brood frames full of honey upside down on a bottom board under a queen excluder and set the deep brood box and a second empty one on top. The bees will move the honey up into your upper brood box or to a super you want to extract. At least that is the way I would do it.