# La Gargantua large cell gets CCD'ed



## Kieck (Dec 2, 2005)

I've thought about doing much the same just as a curiosity, a strange experiment. My thought was to see if such a deep brood nest would take the place of two deeps for overwintering (it should, undoubtedly) and maybe provide better winter success because of the continuous comb in the brood next.

I'd be curious to see what would happen if you cut the comb out and go foundationless in Gargantua. Maybe I'll get a couple set up that way here and we can compare how they design their own comb in such deep frames.


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

I'm on an unreliable 3g connection, so I can't easily look at the whole album.

Why not put this on top of another colony, let the bees expand into it, and then split?

If you've decided that you don't want LC, cut the comb out of the frames with the least honey and put them in the center. Place it above (or below) a SC colony. When you have fresh comb and young brood in there, do a walk away queenless split. You can cut out and rotate the other LC combs as you can. Crush and strain, leave the combs out for robbing, or wait unitl a dearth and start removing the LC comb as you can.

Not a perfect solution, but not a perfect set of parameters you have laid out either 

deknow


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## KeyBeeper (Jun 7, 2009)

Bigger is not better, especially for overwintering. Even when not winter, it's hard for the bees to keep the brood from getting chilled in a huge box.


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## Kieck (Dec 2, 2005)

Maybe, although I've been experimenting with overwintering bees in less than two deeps (or the equivalent of that), and it seems to take some extra pains to make such methods successful. I would argue that bigger is better for overwintering to a point. But this gargantuan hive is the same size as two deeps. I typically overwinter my bees in two deeps. The volume is the same, the difference would be no gaps between frames.

Bees that have excessive brood and have trouble covering it will have trouble in two standard deeps or in one gargantuan hive like this.


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