# 3 deep hives pros and cons



## Tibbigt (Mar 17, 2017)

Ok everyone I am starting my spring planning and am seriously considering making all my hives 3 deep bodies. Anyone got any advice or experience with this?

Looking to get a good pros vs cons list going.

If it helps lower swarm chances that?s a pretty good pro, massive bee population should translate into higher Honey production I would hope another pro.


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## Tibbigt (Mar 17, 2017)

I had a weak hive so I combined it with another very strong hive which gave me a 3 deep hive packed full of honey going into the winter with one of my 5 hives. 

So now I got another deep with fully drawn frames and a good bit of pollen to make another of my hives a 3 deep hive. 

I was thinking make 2 hives 3 deep to experiment and if I like consider adding deeps to all of them before expanding my colony to 15 hives. 

Just want some feed back from the pros and more experienced keepers then myself. 

Thanks everyone


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## Ian (Jan 16, 2003)

Oh my aching back


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## Tibbigt (Mar 17, 2017)

Ian said:


> Oh my aching back


Haha ok a con. But I?m only 31 yrs old so I feel good about that part lol.


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## Hogback Honey (Oct 29, 2013)

I'd be interested to see what the more experienced keeps say. I run 2 deep and 1 medium configuration right now.


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## Ian (Jan 16, 2003)

I’m a singles guy


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## odfrank (May 13, 2002)

Your honey crop will be in brood combs.


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## Tibbigt (Mar 17, 2017)

odfrank said:


> Your honey crop will be in brood combs.


 explain?


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## wildbranch2007 (Dec 3, 2008)

here are a couple of good threads on three deeps, they work fine once you get used to them and get queens that work fine in that environment.

http://www.beesource.com/forums/sho...ive-Points-of-Three-Deep-Hives&highlight=deep

http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?321243-Three-Deeps&highlight=deep


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## rwlaw (May 4, 2009)

I run three deeps only when I don’t have time to split and eliminate the chances of a swarm or I’ll combine a split with a double. The two disadvantages.
1 it turns the hive into a powerhouse. One to wade into a hive insp, sometimes even I get overwhelmed and tend to live and let live, especially when they’re cranky.
2 IMO, it is very hard to keep a three story from turning into a mite bomb.


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## Tibbigt (Mar 17, 2017)

rwlaw said:


> I run three deeps only when I don’t have time to split and eliminate the chances of a swarm or I’ll combine a split with a double. The two disadvantages.
> 1 it turns the hive into a powerhouse. One to wade into a hive insp, sometimes even I get overwhelmed and tend to live and let live, especially when they’re cranky.
> 2 IMO, it is very hard to keep a three story from turning into a mite bomb.


How often would u treat? I just wanna give 2 hives a try. And do I end up putting suppers on 3 deeps or don?t they mkd enough? From what I?ve read they make a good bit more honey just not sure if they ever make it out of the deeps


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## wildbranch2007 (Dec 3, 2008)

Tibbigt said:


> How often would u treat? I just wanna give 2 hives a try. And do I end up putting suppers on 3 deeps or don?t they mkd enough? From what I?ve read they make a good bit more honey just not sure if they ever make it out of the deeps


I have all three deeps, in NY they make plenty of honey, depending on where you are located in Penn. you can make honey. In the 13 years I have been in NY, the lowest total I have gotten is 140lbs per hive, the state average is 55 lbs according to the govt.


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## Tibbigt (Mar 17, 2017)

wildbranch2007 said:


> Tibbigt said:
> 
> 
> > How often would u treat? I just wanna give 2 hives a try. And do I end up putting suppers on 3 deeps or don?t they mkd enough? From what I?ve read they make a good bit more honey just not sure if they ever make it out of the deeps
> ...


Does it make it to supers or is that all in the deeps? How many hives u got?


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## JRG13 (May 11, 2012)

Honestly, it all depends on your flows. The only advantage a 3 deep has is in areas of high pollen production. I run some hives 4 and 5 deeps and honestly it doesn't do anything for swarm prevention or anything such as that. I think the 5 deep threw 2-3 after swarms after the primary. Some of it does depend on the bees though, but I find if I add more boxes, the bees just move the nest higher up as we don't have the flows to keep them pushed down.


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## wildbranch2007 (Dec 3, 2008)

Tibbigt said:


> Does it make it to supers or is that all in the deeps? How many hives u got?


If it didn't make it to the supers, I wouldn't be extracting 150lb's plus every year. I know some sections of Penn. the flow stops in June and they don't get a goldenrod flow, wouldn't have a need for 3 deeps there. I'm not familiar with the area you are in. I had 100 hives, have cut down to 50 and going to less this year.
Yes 3 deep will stop swarming, if you have a young queen in the spring, and super like heck, the advantage of the 3 deeps is you can make mistakes and still keep them from swarming, make a mistake running one deeps and they are in the trees.


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## Ian (Jan 16, 2003)

Na, having three deep has nothing to do with swarm prevention.
Swarm prevention is population control and timing. Space is included in that equation but after the two other facts.


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## dudelt (Mar 18, 2013)

I personally don't see any real upside to it unless you need a 3rd box for wintering. Being in PA, I don't think you would. Mathematically, a good queen needs about 32,000 cells for a brood area, about 1/2 of the cells in a 10 frame deep. Everything else is storage space. The 3rd deep is now 8 or 10 more frames you will need to inspect. Lifting it will be a pain. If you don't have a bad back now, eventually, you will. If the bees don't empty it in the winter, it will not have empty cells and will not help with swarm prevention. It will be more area for small hive beetles and wax moths to live. Since you will be treating for varroa, you should not ever eat or sell that honey either. You will be spending 50% more money in extra frames, foundation and boxes that will not be doing anything for you. 

I hope this helps.


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## JRG13 (May 11, 2012)

I personally feel if you restrict the brood area the bees actually utilize supers better as they're forced to move stores up into them. Of course, some colonies will just backfill and swarm but others do quite well.


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

As you can see from the pic, I was running 2 brood boxes then honey supers. But after reading Tim Ives I set some up his way in fall to see how it would compare. This is what happened in spring regardless of the 5 deeps and no excluder. There was brood from the bottom to the top.

In the end the Tim Ives hives were just too big and unweildy for my climate and flow pattern, I cut my losses and broke them down into nucs.


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## Ian (Jan 16, 2003)

Maybe I miss read, 
The queens ability to lay maxes out regarded the space provided. I’ve talked to Tim, he claims an active brood nest which just doesn’t add up to ACTUAL reality.


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## clyderoad (Jun 10, 2012)

wildbranch2007 said:


> I have all three deeps, in NY they make plenty of honey, depending on where you are located in Penn. you can make honey. In the 13 years I have been in NY, the lowest total I have gotten is 140lbs per hive, the state average is 55 lbs according to the govt.


140 per is saying something. sounds like you are bucking the trend these last 2 years from what I hear.


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## clyderoad (Jun 10, 2012)

Ian said:


> Na, having three deep has nothing to do with swarm prevention.
> Swarm prevention is population control and timing. Space is included in that equation but after the two other facts.


I agree with that.


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## Sour Kraut (Jun 17, 2012)

Tibbigt said:


> Ok everyone I am starting my spring planning and am seriously considering making all my hives 3 deep bodies. Anyone got any advice or experience with this?
> 
> Looking to get a good pros vs cons list going.
> 
> If it helps lower swarm chances that?s a pretty good pro, massive bee population should translate into higher Honey production I would hope another pro.


Last years crop was about 240 pounds off a 12 x 2....so..........

I'm going to experiment with 10 x 3's, 12 x 3's, and 15 x 2's next year.

I feel a good queen can fill up 12-14 frames with brood so why not see what the limit is ?

Yes, I know.....they are heavy.......that's what 15-year old grandsons are for........


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

Ian said:


> I’ve talked to Tim, he claims an active brood nest which just doesn’t add up to ACTUAL reality.


Came to that conclusion myself about some of the claims LOL. Such as his queens live 5 years on average 

Anyhow, in the interests of science, I'll try anything once .


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## Sour Kraut (Jun 17, 2012)

Gary L. Glaenzer said:


> Last years crop was about *240 pounds *off a 12 x 2....so..........
> 
> I'm going to experiment with 10 x 3's, 12 x 3's, and 15 x 2's next year.
> 
> ...


oops

that was* 120 pounds* off a 12 x 2.......in the middle of a city of 20,000


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

What is a 12 x 2 ?


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## Ian (Jan 16, 2003)

I’m a Beekeeper and I don’t know half the lingo guys use when talking bees! Lol


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## Sour Kraut (Jun 17, 2012)

Oldtimer said:


> What is a 12 x 2 ?
> 
> 
> > 12 frames wide x 2 deep


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

OK, thanks.


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## wildbranch2007 (Dec 3, 2008)

saving time it's hunting season




Ian said:


> Oh my aching back


not when done properly, you don't have to go down into the boxes unless you are re-queening, and that's done early in the year or fall.



rwlaw said:


> I run three deeps only when I don’t have time to split and eliminate the chances of a swarm or I’ll combine a split with a double. The two disadvantages.
> 1 it turns the hive into a powerhouse. One to wade into a hive insp, sometimes even I get overwhelmed and tend to live and let live, especially when they’re cranky.
> 2 IMO, it is very hard to keep a three story from turning into a mite bomb.


rwlaw is 100% correct, they are powerhouses, and if done correctly will get the early flows that people running smaller hives miss or are used for making brood. some of our better flows are early in the year, locust for instance.

never had mine become mite bombs, but you must treat them differently, for instance when I used mite away II's, they went below the top deep, the recommendation was to be on top. and why would you have more mites, because you had enough resources and a good queen so that they started raising brood far earlier than your neighbors hives that were not 3 deep.




JRG13 said:


> Honestly, it all depends on your flows. The only advantage a 3 deep has is in areas of high pollen production. I run some hives 4 and 5 deeps and honestly it doesn't do anything for swarm prevention or anything such as that. I think the 5 deep threw 2-3 after swarms after the primary. Some of it does depend on the bees though, but I find if I add more boxes, the bees just move the nest higher up as we don't have the flows to keep them pushed down.


JRG13 is correct in his environment. You will find out with the 3 deep, that the bees will pretty much fill the bottom deep with pollen if you are in a good area, so no restrictions for brood laying with plenty of pollen and honey. now what does that free up, the bees still put pollen in the brood area, but not as much, more room for the queen to lay.





Ian said:


> Na, having three deep has nothing to do with swarm prevention.
> Swarm prevention is population control and timing. Space is included in that equation but after the two other facts.


Ian is correct in his environment, so lets break it down, he comes out of his winter storage, going on memory of posts in April, and most hives don't have brood yet. He puts on a second brood chamber and after a while goes in moves the capped brood up into the second brood chamber, finds the queen and puts her below the brood chamber and removes some brood to other hives. in the fall he now has to feed the hives to get them up to weight and put them back into storage. so unless I miss count there is 6 manipulations he has to do, none of which are normally required with a three deep, and the three deeps in a normal winter start raising brood in Feb. I had to feed 3 hives this year, I have tried pollen patties, but my bees ignore them because they still have plenty of pollen of their own, all they do is get full of shb lava. If I kept my hives inside, I would switch to a different configuration.



Oldtimer said:


> As you can see from the pic, I was running 2 brood boxes then honey supers. But after reading Tim Ives I set some up his way in fall to see how it would compare. This is what happened in spring regardless of the 5 deeps and no excluder. There was brood from the bottom to the top.
> 
> In the end the Tim Ives hives were just too big and unweildy for my climate and flow pattern, I cut my losses and broke them down into nucs.


now look at oldtimer's picture, the multideep hive has more bees than the two deeps in the backround, take the picture, the comments above about increased mite level, and the assumption I would have is an unrestricted brood nest, in an area with intense flow's sure has a high possibility of success. as to swarm control, the only hives that swarmed this year were nucs that I couldn't get into the yards do to rain and mud to do any thing with them. I know of a couple of full sized hives that swarmed, I have one carnie hive, that I've had for years and it can't handle 3 deeps, but still produces enough honey to pay it's way.

This year I participated in a virus study done by BVS, this is the comment he made on my end of April or early May report, which I would suspect are overwintering bees. the next sample in July had the same results, higher than average but slightly lower than May.

Bee weight is high in comparison to the samples in my data base. Bee weight is subjective to many outside influences and is best used to compare to your own samples.
•

now why would my bee's weigh more than the average bee's he had seen, Um Ian spends a lot of time trying to get the proper protein into his patties, could it bee all that natural pollen(even though there are claims that global warming has lowered the protein level by 25%) and all the extra honey that I let them keep, and all those wonderful extra bees that are hanging out on the front of Oldtimes hives, just waiting to feed those winter bees. we will never know until we try it in your area


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## Ian (Jan 16, 2003)

🙂
Let me estimate... last year I >>averaged<< 65 lbs net per honey box extracted.
Doing “all” that work resulted in... I’ll provide the numbers, you do the math.
Say 1200 hives, taking those 2, $1.5 per lbs

Bit of work, bit of syrup...


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## Sour Kraut (Jun 17, 2012)

[QUOTE "*we will never know until we try it in your area*" [/QUOTE]

And that sums it up in 11 words

Every area is different; what works one place may fail in another.

Constant experimentation and testing of different strategies is needed to figure out what works best in YOUR area

Which may be vastly different from 2-3 miles away !

So I'm going to take my 12-wide to 3 stories early in the spring, and build another; plus a pair of 15-frames-wide, probably only 2 deep in 2018, but higher in 2019

If swarms are plentiful in 2019, may even try an 18-wide just for sh*ts-n-grins.


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## wildbranch2007 (Dec 3, 2008)

Ian said:


> &#55357;&#56898;
> Let me estimate... last year I >>averaged<< 65 lbs net per honey box extracted.
> Doing “all” that work resulted in... I’ll provide the numbers, you do the math.
> Say 1200 hives, taking those 2, $1.5 per lbs
> ...


ya but you have an unfair advantage, your still young:applause:


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## wildbranch2007 (Dec 3, 2008)

clyderoad said:


> 140 per is saying something. sounds like you are bucking the trend these last 2 years from what I hear.


Even though it rained all spring up here, the best flows were all early, knapp weed had no flow late, and goldenrod the first two weeks were cold and rainy. Most everyone I know had about an average year, except the commercials who came in after the good flows were over. That's why I crank my bees up early, after basswood it gets a bit crowded around here. depending on the rain and bloom time, around my house it was a record breaking year up until knapp weed, 15 miles away the bloom kept getting washed away, my average would have been probably 30-40 lbs more per hive if my other yards had done better.


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## Ian (Jan 16, 2003)

wildbranch2007 said:


> ya but you have an unfair advantage, your still young:applause:


You mean young and lazy  not wanting to crack 3 boxes ? Lol


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## JRG13 (May 11, 2012)

In Regards to Tim,

Do you think he has multiple queens? He puts out his numbers, I think he says he calculates his queens at 4000 eggs per day or something like that?


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## Ian (Jan 16, 2003)

He talks about that one hive...as he’s talking about 500, but doesn’t have that 500


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## grozzie2 (Jun 3, 2011)

JRG13 said:


> In Regards to Tim,
> 
> Do you think he has multiple queens? He puts out his numbers, I think he says he calculates his queens at 4000 eggs per day or something like that?


Do the math. There are 60x60*24 = 86400 seconds in a day. 86400 / 4000 = 21.6 seconds per egg if the queen is laying non stop for 24 hours. I think that's unrealistic, but I've been wrong about things before. At the 1500 eggs per day rate that most talk about, that's still an egg a minute for the full 24 hours. the other factor that comes into play, particulaly during the buildup phase of colony growth, how many cells can the population properly incubate, which depends on ambient temperatures outside and hive population.

If I had one of those ezloader gadgets on the truck, 3 deeps with honey supers above probably wouldn't look so intimidating, but, I dont. I have no desire to be lifting full honey boxes off of a stack that puts the honey boxes above my shoulders, that's a sure fire recipe for getting 'beekeeper back', an affliction I have no desire to get.

I think things get misleading when folks talk about 'how many boxes' for brood nest etc. In this example, ok, I'll grant a 3 deep setup _may_ produce more honey than doing single boxes, but, it's not an apples to apples comparison. To get that comparison, how much honey comes from 3 colonies in single boxes vs one colony in 3 boxes ? 3 colonies in singles will have 3 laying queens and ultimately give you more bees than a single colony in a triple stack, so on the same flow, there will be more honey. In our area flows are not the same as some places on the prairies, so what I would expect to see from a 3 high colony, a brood nest that's two frames wide and 3 frames high in the center, with honey on the edges, a real pain to sort out come honey pull time.


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## gww (Feb 14, 2015)

Grozzy


> , but, it's not an apples to apples comparison. To get that comparison, how much honey comes from 3 colonies in single boxes vs one colony in 3 boxes ? 3 colonies in singles will have 3 laying queens and ultimately give you more bees than a single colony in a triple stack, so on the same flow, there will be more honey.


Maby but that is not the theory I have read in many places on hive economy. Most say one big hive will produce more honey then two small ones. I have no experiance but reading about it though.
Cheers
gww

Ps your way makes it not as bigg of a deal if you have a hive go queenless though.


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

JRG13 said:


> In Regards to Tim,
> 
> Do you think he has multiple queens? He puts out his numbers, I think he says he calculates his queens at 4000 eggs per day or something like that?


Tim has devised a method that works for his area and flow pattern. He's also a pretty clever guy.

But he certainly is mouthy and not everything he says adds up. Despite pics showing him climbing up his hives on a ladder, when I got figures on his total honey production and divided it by claimed hive numbers, it was less honey per hive than I get using standard methods.


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## Ian (Jan 16, 2003)

No, I’d say two properly prepared colonies will produce more than one big one. Big hives tend to swarm. Bees don’t produce in the trees


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## beenoob (Jun 16, 2016)

Ian said:


> Oh my aching back


this


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## Specialkayme (Sep 4, 2005)

Oldtimer said:


> As you can see from the pic, I was running 2 brood boxes then honey supers. But after reading Tim Ives I set some up his way in fall to see how it would compare. This is what happened in spring regardless of the 5 deeps and no excluder. There was brood from the bottom to the top.
> 
> In the end the Tim Ives hives were just too big and unweildy for my climate and flow pattern, I cut my losses and broke them down into nucs.


Looks to me like the colony swarmed and was returning. I got a similar picture a few years back:


Not saying it isn't a large colony, but it isn't exactly fair to compare it to the colonies behind it based solely on that picture.


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## Specialkayme (Sep 4, 2005)

gww said:


> Most say one big hive will produce more honey then two small ones. I have no experiance but reading about it though.


One colony of 40,000 bees will produce more honey than two colonies of 20,000 bees each. Several studies have shown this. 

But I believe what others are saying is that two colonies of 20,000 bees each, have two laying queens, while the 40,000 colony has one laying queen. So in spring, two small colonies can produce more bees than one large colony, and have more ability to gather more honey.


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