# A few beginner questions...



## Sydney (Sep 26, 2010)

I built two, top bar hives and today I installed my package bees into them. All went well and the bees are happily drinking their sugar water and settling into their new home. What Im concerned about is how I made the top bars, they are all 1" X 1". After I made them I read that they should be 1 1/4" - 1 1/3" wide so the bees can have enough space in between each 1" thick comb. Do you think the way I made them will work?

I think theres about 25 bars in the hive and I took out 6 when I put the bees in. how long should I wait before I put all the bars back in? 
The bars in my hive fit in very tightly with little room to shift. I'm wondering if I should leave out 1 or 2 to make more room between each bar or if they are supposed to fill every gap.
I'm also a little unsure about the first inspection with a top bar hive. I understand that after 10 days (10, right?) you check to see if the queen has been released, but what else do you look for. Ive been seeing a lot of information of what to inspect for in a langstroth, but very little about the top bar. Any helpful links on this or advise would be greatly appreciated


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## Merlinspop (Nov 4, 2010)

One inch is too narrow. You'll need to correct that one way or another. I'd make spacers for the bars that they're already building comb on and swap out the rest. 1 1/4 for brood, 1 1/2 for honey is what's recommended for using different sized bars for the two sections. I have all 1 3/8 (ish, I'm a lousy carpenter) with some thin strips for spacers in the honey section. 

There needs to be a solid ceiling of bars. A lot of people use a follower to restrict the area to 10-15 bars until they need more room. 25 bars is pretty small though, so maybe you won't need to use a follower. Bars should be snug. I made mine too snug over the winter and as they swelled with humidity, they got too tight. Took out a bar and added more spacers in the back. 

10 days is too long to wait to get the queen cage out. They will have made a mess of comb around the cage by then. Check on day 4, release her if she's not out, fix any goobered up comb, then button up for a few more days.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

If they are 1" wide and up against each other (meaning no spaces) you will need to space them as Merlinspop says. Do this NOW. In a few days it will be a mess.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

As to the "how long should I wait before I put all the bars back in?" question. NEVER leave ANY bars out (or if you have frames never leave any frames out). Put them back NOW.


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## Merlinspop (Nov 4, 2010)

You won't find a better resource thanthis


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## ChetPunisher (Jan 8, 2011)

^^^ Offline...


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## Sydney (Sep 26, 2010)

Thank you guys for the help  I've redone all the top bars which are now all 1 3/8" wide and put all of them back into the hive. They are already starting to expand since two days of bees being in there, so I'm going to make some spacers for an easier fit. 
I was also wondering if it's normal to have a lot of dead bees in the package when you pick it up? Mine came with plenty of live bees but also about an inch thick layer of dead bees underneath. I'm assuming this is normal, but just want to make sure


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## DeeAnna (Nov 5, 2010)

"...The bars in my hive fit in very tightly with little room to shift...."

Do follow the others' advice, but I will also throw in this thought based on what you said in your first post:

If your top bars already fit *very tightly* on your hive now, they will fit way, way too tight this summer. Although it is true the bars need to form a solid ceiling over the hive, you also need to allow for the swelling in the wood that will occur as the humidity increases in the summer. 

If you build a top bar hive in DRY weather, allow a scant to full 1/8" gap per foot of top bars to compensate for swelling due to humidity. That means, if your hive is 3 feet long, you need to allow about 1/4" to 3/8" gap total. The amount of swelling varies with the wood species and the weather, but that's a good place to start with the softer woods. 

If you build a top bar hive in the most humid time of the summer, you could aim for a nice slip fit with very little to no gap. You'll see the space between the bars open up slightly as the weather becomes drier in the fall and winter.

Hope this helps! --DeeAnna


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## Adam Foster Collins (Nov 4, 2009)

DeeAnna makes a good point. This is one way that a follower board can help, as it allows you to tighten or loosen up as the bars or number of bars fluctuates.

I made my hive with a little room to spare, as DeeAnna describes. even so - when I opened the hive this spring and tried to pry the bars up, they were cinched tight because of a winter of absorbing moisture from the hive. When I finally pried one loose, it practically exploded upward as the tension was released, and several cold combs, still full of honey suddenly collapsed.

So proper bar size and a little room to breathe is key.

Adam


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>Mine came with plenty of live bees but also about an inch thick layer of dead bees underneath. I'm assuming this is normal, but just want to make sure 

Well, it's not unusual, but it's not the best. A really well preserved package will have a few dead bees but you can still see the wood on the bottom. A really poor package will have two inches of dead bees...


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## Sydney (Sep 26, 2010)

Its been 6 days now since the bees went in and one hive is doing noticeably better than the other. After about 3 days it had cleaned out all the dead bees that fell into the bottom, while the other still has about half of the dead bees that fell in from the package.
The hive that still has the dead bees is drinking about twice as much sugar water, while the other hive is using hardly any. I left each hive with a mason jar of sugar water for 3 days and one is still almost fill, and the other is now half filled. 
The hive thats doing good, currently has built a good size comb on 5 of the bars. I would say its about 5 inches at the widest and 6 inches down. 
The other hive is starting to build some comb but not nearly as much as the good hive. Two of the bars have comb, which is tall and skinny. 
should this be a cause for concern or is one hive just doing especially good?
I have built a follower bar and put it a couple bars behind the bee cluster. I have the mason jar feeders on the other side of the follower that does not have the bee cluster. Is this okay, or should I move the feeder to the other side?


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## buddingbeever (Apr 26, 2011)

I have a similar set up and as per Michael Bush I had gone ahead and given them extra room (bars)to comb out. 5 combs were built within 6 days at the beginning of placing the package into the hive and they were already going onto the other two bars since I last checked. Nice and straight with the help of hanging an old piece of brood comb on the bar before install.


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## Skilter (Mar 23, 2011)

I got lucky... I located a nearby pest control guy who collects swarms so I didn't have to package as a newbie. It takes a little work and a few phone calls until I found one that came from a family of beekeepers. I gave him some money although he got paid for removing the swarm. Now, he knows I am a person of interest if I have a new hive I want to fill.

If I was a newbie like me... I would pick up the phone and try to get local swarms. At this time of year in N. Texas, "swarm removers" get several calls a day in the spring when the temps are right and often times just just throw them in a box that they will offer to you because they really don't want to kill them. All you got to do is be ready at a moment's notice and go get them. I am urban so that makes a difference, but it is an experience to be driving down the road wearing a bee suit with a box of bees in the back seat. You definitely get some funny looks!!!


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