[BroncoVol74]

Does/has anyone moved supers from a hive really productive hive to another hive to allow them to finish capping? I have a hive that is booming and the supers are getting too high to manage.
If you have moved supers, how did you decide which hive(s) to put the supers on for capping?

 

[Gray Goose]

Andy,

So a bit slim on data here. How many hives do you have? I presume the supers you have use the same frames.

Say if you have 4 hives, sure you can put a super from the big hive on hive 1, then in a week put another on hive 2, then in another on hive 3
the field bees will go back so you would need to add one when you take one.

Could also swap the big hive with a smallish one with a good Queen, I would split the supers then due to the field force again going back to the old location.

I have taken frames also, just when you super Hive 2,3,4 put 3 mostly full frames in the center of the new super for the smaller hive and add an empty frames to the big one.
then when you next super do the same, even take 2 supers of frames and scatter them across 3 or 4 other hives. Put the foundation in the big one as they have the force to draw. Use combs in the smaller ones to assist.

Can also dig down 2 or 3 supers and move full frames to other hives to keep the stack smaller, and travel shorter from brood nest to storage.

GG

 

[BroncoVol74]

GG,
I have 15+ hives. The particular hive I am talking about is 2 deep brood with 5 supers (mediums) on it. That's about one too many for me to want to lift a full honey super off of.

I have been pulling frames from the supers to put into supers of other hives but that is not slowing them down enough.

About half of my hives are in 10f deeps and the other half are in 4f (Palmer) resource boxes, so I have plenty of places to relocate supers. I really haven't considered swapping the booming hive with a weaker one but that is an option.

What I was really only wondering is there any "rules" as far as what is necessary for taking full, uncapped supers off of one hive and putting it on another to allow it to finish capping to avoid one hive getting too many boxes stacked up or can I just put it on a hive that has enough bees to do the job?

And I do bottom super, mainly why I don't want anymore supers on this hive.

 

[Gray Goose]

rules?

if the big hive is diseased you may be spreading it. ?? workaholic maybe
other than that , "equalizing" is often done , bees, brood and honey. 1 or 2 or all.

keep moving the frames.

Do not rule out a 2 queen senario, maybe had a supersedure and 2 sisters did not fight to death and you have a 2 queen thing going.

sure you can move frames , I do that often, whole supers can be done.
Tipping over would not be good, so sure take some frames away.

Add a few frames to any of your other hives.

when does your flow end? As the end nears, they should start capping some/most of it.
The hive swap would mitigate the "swarm" issue as some of the field bees would be on a different hive.

if the hive makes the winter, be a good candidate for splits.
Be advised the bigger they are the more likely they get Mites. So end of july pull all the supers and treat if you do, can shuffle the supers around treat 1/2 with the supers on then other 1/2 then switch.

GG