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On-going silly questions from a New Beek, so please don't hold back, let me know your thoughts Ok. Getting ready to harvest two first year hive and am learning that every action, has an equal and opposite reaction. Had a great year (so far-fingers crossed) with two hives that started as 5 frame nucs on March 30th. One hive has 4 supers above 2 full broods, the other has 5 supers. Aside that it's on a shared platform which raises it another foot-I'm about neck deep in supers. As far as I can tell, we've had a flow of some type or another all summer and now it looks like were starting knapweed and maybe two weeks until a strong goldenrod and aster. After reading about Colony Collapse Disorder, the girls are coming first-I'd rather have the hives make it over the winter than have some extra honey.
The harvest plan is to first, open the hives pull all the supers off, get into the brood boxes and do alcohol washes, restack the supers reversed as the top on both hives are only around 60% capped but the rest are 80% or better.
Plan A, if the mite counts are acceptable, I plan on putting a third deep on each hive, the put the current +/-60% on top of the third deep and see what happens on the fall flow. (D-D-QE-D-M). I would also (on top of the top medium), return the wet extracted frames on, one at a time, for cleaning. Those would then get stored for next Spring. Once the fall flow finishes up, figuring early October, I would pull any remaining super(s) and the third (top deep above the QE), do another alcohol wash and see if I need to do an OAV now, or wait until early winter, early December here can still be in the 60's, closing up the hives with a "one and done" with Apivar starting when the weather warrant's opening the hives in late winter/early spring.
Plan B, if the mite counts are high, pull all the supers and harvest what's there, start a 21 or 27 day AOV treatment cycle. I would still put an empty deep with blank frames above the QE (as it will be eventually used as a brood box next season) to leaves some room for the colonies. i don't see how colonies that are now 2 deep and 4 or 5 supers would fit without that room.
Now my questions:
Question would be A, should I put the wet supers back on between treatments for clean up and then remove for storage before the next one so they're not exposed to the AOV?
Question B (the most important) would be what would be an "acceptable level" of mites in the wash count? I'd hate to miss the fall flow but I'd rather have the hives have the best shot of getting through the winter. If I was to get honey on the third deep frames, I'd stow it for next spring or any winter emergencies.
Question C, if the mite counts are above 0 and below x (being the upper limit of acceptable mite count), should I try something like Hopguard and stay with the fall flow. What is the upper limit of acceptable counts.
Question D On having multiple supers full of capped honey-do I use the fume board for a one at a time removal or just go for broke and grab all of them or something in between?
The harvest plan is to first, open the hives pull all the supers off, get into the brood boxes and do alcohol washes, restack the supers reversed as the top on both hives are only around 60% capped but the rest are 80% or better.
Plan A, if the mite counts are acceptable, I plan on putting a third deep on each hive, the put the current +/-60% on top of the third deep and see what happens on the fall flow. (D-D-QE-D-M). I would also (on top of the top medium), return the wet extracted frames on, one at a time, for cleaning. Those would then get stored for next Spring. Once the fall flow finishes up, figuring early October, I would pull any remaining super(s) and the third (top deep above the QE), do another alcohol wash and see if I need to do an OAV now, or wait until early winter, early December here can still be in the 60's, closing up the hives with a "one and done" with Apivar starting when the weather warrant's opening the hives in late winter/early spring.
Plan B, if the mite counts are high, pull all the supers and harvest what's there, start a 21 or 27 day AOV treatment cycle. I would still put an empty deep with blank frames above the QE (as it will be eventually used as a brood box next season) to leaves some room for the colonies. i don't see how colonies that are now 2 deep and 4 or 5 supers would fit without that room.
Now my questions:
Question would be A, should I put the wet supers back on between treatments for clean up and then remove for storage before the next one so they're not exposed to the AOV?
Question B (the most important) would be what would be an "acceptable level" of mites in the wash count? I'd hate to miss the fall flow but I'd rather have the hives have the best shot of getting through the winter. If I was to get honey on the third deep frames, I'd stow it for next spring or any winter emergencies.
Question C, if the mite counts are above 0 and below x (being the upper limit of acceptable mite count), should I try something like Hopguard and stay with the fall flow. What is the upper limit of acceptable counts.
Question D On having multiple supers full of capped honey-do I use the fume board for a one at a time removal or just go for broke and grab all of them or something in between?