The bees in my bee hive keep trying to use an entrance from the top, in spite of the fact that I have the bottom entrance all the way open. Almost none of them go through the bottom, instead, they will wait in line to go through a small entrance on top. Do I need to give them more room at the top, or can they get by without it. I usually have to put the top on crooked to let them get in through the top. Also, I am in central Wisconsin, and I just added another super to the three they had. Is this too late in the season to do this? They filled the others. I don't know if they swarmed or not this year since I am gone most of the day. I put it second down from the top one. They get so heavy that it is difficult to work with them. Is there a reason why I need to use deep supers? Wouldn't smaller supers be ok, and a lot lighter? Ok, I think I am done! Lots of questions that don't always seem to be answered in the books, though I have read several. It just isn't the same as "talking" to someone.

-- Joan (JTYTOR@pressenter.com), August 12, 2001

Answers

some will always try to get in another way,, also,, make sure they arent robber bees from another hive. If not,, then there are using the entrance they came out of,, maybe cause they are closer to the honey. I only use dep supers for brood chambers,, and mediums for the honey. The most I do is rotate the deep supers twice a year,, its not too bad right now. You can also try to put a pallet or 2 under the,,, to you dont have to lift them off the ground. It helped me. But if not,,you can use what ever supers you want, there isnt a set rule,, and everyone does things different. Just make sure they have enough room for brood

-- stan (sopal@net-port.com), August 12, 2001.

Joan- You can definitely use shallow supers instead of deeps. I only use a single deep for the brood chamber topped with shallow supers for honey. I started my first hive with a medium super but the first time I had to lift it off the hive when it was full of capped frames I knew it was a mistake, so I switched to shallows. As far as adding supers now- it all depends on whether there is a honey flow on. Also, does the new super contain foundation or drawn out comb? If it has foundation and there is a flow, no problem. If no flow the bees might chew the wax- they probably won't try to draw it out if there is not a honey flow on. I would not leave the top on crooked, unless you KNOW for sure that there is a honey flow. If the honey flow stops other bees might try to rob your hive (do you just have one?)and your bees may not be able to defend it. Your bees might be using the top entrance to avoid having to go through the queen excluder, especially if they are bringing in a lot of nectar. Hard to say exactly since I don't know what the conditions are there. Also, I do not use top entrances on my hives so I can't offer advice on that. Oh, have you done a hive inspection recently? Maybe there is some obstruction in the brood chamber that the bees are avoiding. Good luck with them.

-- Elizabeth (ekfla@aol.com), August 12, 2001.

I have 2 hives, one of which has a slatted rack and one doesn't. The one that does, the bees tend to go in at the bottom an the one that doesn't, the bees go in at the top. I'm guessing that there isn't enough room for lots of bees to come and go, and lots of bees to air condition at the same time in the hive without the slatted rack. I've purchased, but still need to assemble and install the slatted rack for that hive!

I use 2 deep supers as hivebodies and shallow supers on top of that. I've been debating some other options because hefting those deep supers in the fall (if I have to treat for mites) is back-breaking.

Here in southern Maine we usually take the honey supers in mid to late August. If the 2 remaining hive bodies are full of honey at that time, I add an empty super. Usually, I'll find that the bottom hive body is light, so I'll switch the hivebodies and leave them until both hivebodies are full, then add another super in September if needed. I let them overwinter with at least the 2 full hive bodies and the partial honey super if there is one. I usually have to start my mite treatments (if necessary) by early September to make sure the ambient temperature is high enough for the Apistan strips to work (I don't know what you do with Apistan resistant mites since I haven't had to deal with that yet).

You are hosting wild animals here, so no matter what the books say, assume your bees have not read them!!! Beekeeping is vastly different from any other type of animal husbandry since the bees are wild animals and we are just convincing them that they want to stay in our hives and allow us to harvest some of their hard work! I think they're fascinating.

-- Sheryl in Me (radams@sacoriver.net), August 13, 2001.

Joan: I agree with Elizabeth. It sounds like there may be an obstruction in the hive body: either too much burr comb or a queen excluder. Have you ever watched workers trying to squeeze through an excluder? Very difficult and they don't like it at all when they are loaded with groceries. As for deeps for extracting. Nothing but unnecessary work! I use two 9-5/8" boxes for the hive body (Elizabeth: how do your bees overwinter with only one deep?) and 6- 5/8" supers for extracting. Not only are the deeps too heavy to lift, but they are a real pain in the extractor.

The only reason to use a queen excluder is to keep her out of the honey supers. I never put one on until I see her laying brood in the honey supers. I then move her down, put on the queen excluder, put a full box of only honey over it (if I have one) and then add the honey supers with brood. I leave the excluder on until the brood have emerged and the workers start filling the empty cells with honey. Then its safe to remove the excluder. The queen will not normally cross solid honey to move up to empty comb. Another trick is to reverse the brood chambers so that the frames that are plugged up with brood and pollen are at the bottom and the empty frames are at the top of the brood section. The queen always likes to move upward in the hive as she lays. Most queens will not move down toward the bottom when they run out of room, even if the top is plugged up and the bottom is open. There is a good article in this month's Bee Culture magazine that shows how egg laying peaks in May. You can really boost your hive population by reversing the brood boxes at the end of May or beginning of June to give the queen more laying space while she is at her peak. Just in time for the honey flow.

-- Skip in Western WA (sundaycreek@gnrac.net), August 13, 2001.

Skip- I guess we have enough mild weather and winter blooming plants to keep the bees going through the winter. The first year I kept bees I did not even have a shallow super on for them- just the hive body. They did great- I still have that first hive. Now I keep one shallow super for the bees all the time.

-- Elizabeth (ekfla@aol.com), August 13, 2001.

Thanks for the info everyone! I don't have a queen excluder, so I think that they just like the top entrance! I am glad to hear this shouldn't be a problem. I will definately consider smaller bodies. I too have a very difficult time lifting the full ones.

-- Joan (JTYTOR@pressenter.com), August 15, 2001.