Welcome, Tim.
My advice to you is:
Go through the large hives one box at a time. Remove all frames which are fully capped honey. "store them if you don't want to extract them" Get the hive down to where there is only brood and open cells of honey. Then we can guide you through the rest of the steps. Right now I don't think you really know how strong or weak your hives are. You may have only 1 or 2 boxes of bes with 6 or 8 empty boxes under them. That is why you don't understand the local beeks and their advice. You must first get a hive that is compact and well known from top to bottom, then we can help you.
My advice to you is:
Go through the large hives one box at a time. Remove all frames which are fully capped honey. "store them if you don't want to extract them" Get the hive down to where there is only brood and open cells of honey. Then we can guide you through the rest of the steps. Right now I don't think you really know how strong or weak your hives are. You may have only 1 or 2 boxes of bes with 6 or 8 empty boxes under them. That is why you don't understand the local beeks and their advice. You must first get a hive that is compact and well known from top to bottom, then we can help you.
