# Questions for Those That Don't Rotate Brood Boxes



## fish_stix (May 17, 2009)

In Jan, as we pull our fall honey, we give them several drawn, empty frames in both brood boxes, 4-5 frames/box, and leave only brood and the 2 outside frames with honey as they start in Dec-Jan bringing in maple and willow pollen and nectar. Had our first swarm in mid Feb but had only a couple more by getting them set up early. We have to have strong hives by end of Feb as the citrus starts in early-mid Mar. Without the drawn frames we'd have a mass exodus of swarms by the citrus flow. So, weather permitting, my opinion is to get into them as early as possible and open up both brood boxes. Extract honey if you have to, but open them up with plenty of egg laying space. You'll be real happy a month later when you open them to find 12 frames of solid brood. Then you can start worrying if you have enough supers on hand!


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## MDS (Jan 9, 2011)

Thanks for the advice. I only added two empty frames to the top box in place of the two honey frames I took out. Maybe I need to go back in and take out more honey (it's really not honey, it was left from sugar feeding from last year). I'll be able to use the sugar made honey with my new packages.

If I'm understanding correctly it sounds like I have to open up the top box way more than just two empty frames. It still gets cold at night (sometimes in the upper 30's) in my part of Missouri and I'm worried if I take out too much honey to open it up I might get into trouble. However, our days are warmer now so guess I'd have a chance to put honey back in or feed them if I found them running on empty.

Thanks again for the advice. Simply rotating the boxes in Spring sounds to easy and I got to think that always assuming one can rotate the boxes without looking into the conditions may be a wrong move. For example, why rotate the boxes to get the queen to the lower box if she is already there and lying eggs in it. Rotating the boxes assumes the queen is in the upper box. So, I'm leaning towards moving frames rather than rotating boxes, always being sure not to break up the brood.

Any more information anyone can offer on moving frames rather than rotating boxes would be appreciated. Thanks in advance.


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## Mike Snodgrass (Mar 11, 2010)

I firmly believe this board should be based on local...things in florida arent anything like things in Missouri, let alone ohio! According to the beeks i learned from, you did everything absolutely right...They dont switch boxs either to keep from trapping some brood up, they move frames instead of reversing....


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## fish_stix (May 17, 2009)

Whether he's in FL, MO, AK or Russia the queen needs laying room before the spring flow starts. MO starts later than FL but it's the same drill. If you want strong honey producers you need lots of bees when the flow hits. Excess honey (stored syrup) in the brood chambers doesn't get you where you need to be. My calendar says it's Mar 22. I don't believe he needs a full deep of syrup to make it through the rest of the winter.


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## rrussell6870 (May 14, 2009)

It always surprised me when I would be taking deep honey frames out of the chamber and inserting drawn empties in spring that my northern students had never seen that... it works extremely well, may need to be a bit later up north, but it still works. I would take all but four frames of honey completely out, move the remaining four to the far outside edges and place any pollen frames just inside of that... then all brood frames in the middle and put my winter store medium back on top... set the honey frames up in deeps in the yard (five to a box so there is plenty of room between them)... like fish said, this gives the queen 12+ frames for solid brood, and the bees robbing the frames out will fill their guts with quality honey which will be used to feed that brood and in turn produce heavy, healthy colonies... I agree that bee keeping is 100% location dependant... this is just a management practice that has been excellent for honey producers and package/nuc producers... a few guys from Michigan told me that they do it as well, just a bit later than I used to of course.


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## MDS (Jan 9, 2011)

Thanks for being specific and the advise. I figure if I open up a hive to inspect and the queen is laying everything in the lower box and most of the bees are there it would be a bad thing to move the complete box up. I'm going to fully open up the center of each box (I run two deeps for brood) and move the honey outside and pollen inside. Our nights a cool but the days are above fifty degrees so I would think they would be able to move to honey and cluster at will with no problem. Suppose timing is important based on weather. A few more years under my belt maybe I'll get this thing down. 

I noticed one hive had only about a total of one frame of brood. I'm not feeding it because they have honey but wondered if the queen was going bad (no queen cells) or if they are waiting for a flow for some reason to start more brood. Or maybe there just is not enough bees in there for them to keep the brood warm as of yet. Will continue to watch that hive.


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## fish_stix (May 17, 2009)

Just keep an eye on them. Queens don't all crank up at the same time or beekeeping would be a lot easier! You can't evaluate a queen until she's been laying for a while and you can see numbers and patterns of eggs and larva. Sounds like you're off to a good year!


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## wcubed (Aug 24, 2008)

Learn something every day - if you pay attention. I have not ever seen any reference to this procedure, and have read a lot of literature. All the lit. talks about reversal like it is the last word for double deeps. Where were you guys when the literature was written? 

I poke my nose in here because the foundation for the success of this manipulation is the same as for checkerboarding. You are opening up the overhead capped honey reserve to continued brood nest expansion. The colony would normally stop short of building brood through the reserve and start the brood nest reduction of swarm preps (backfilling.) 

It also gets the colony storing nectar overhead early in the season - a key ingredient in swarm prevention. If you check, you will find that brood is not layed in those empty cells until they are first filled with nectar. Then, the nectar is consumed and the cells prepared for eggs. (within the arc of intended brood nest expansion)

Glad to find this approach. It takes away one of my reservations about using the double deep wintering configuration for the southeast. The timing for reversal is tricky here.

Stix:
Could you give an approximate estimate of brood volumes generated by application of this procedure? Have an article coming this month about brood volumes when CBed.

MDS:
Recommend you do not get carried away with removing frames of honey immediately above the brood nest. Every other one on an alternating basis will maintain feed above the brood. We've not had three frames fail to meet our objectives.

Walt


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## fish_stix (May 17, 2009)

wcubed; as I stated above we need bees boiling out the top by Mar for our orange flow. They start in Dec and Jan on red maple then right into Feb on willows. We have one location very close to the St. Johns River, which is a wide, swampy river bottom, 4-5 miles wide, virtually covered with willow. Some of our hives put on a super of willow honey during Feb. All of them at that location were just boiling out the top by Mar 1. At our other locations the bees had built up only on red maple and were strong but not as strong as the willow yard, so this coming year all our bees will be at that location. In Jan we pull all the fall honey out leaving only the 2 outside frames in each box, and, of course, also leaving any brood. Give them empty drawn frames and they literally explode. I like seeing 8-12 frames of brood going into the citrus bloom. BTW, we do not do any feeding for stimulation and use all 8 frame doubles. It's not a new method, folks down here have been building up this way for ages. You do have to have lots of drawn comb though. Each of our hives get at least one deep super of foundation for orange flow and then mediums over the deeps. Anytime we have a flow strong enough for drawing foundation we try to get deeps drawn.


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## wcubed (Aug 24, 2008)

Thanks, Stix
8 to 12 sounds like two full 8-framers of brood. One last ?. When you harvest the added deep of F, do you see evidence of discoloration indicating that brood grew into it before it was filled with honey?
Walt


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## MDS (Jan 9, 2011)

wcubed said:


> If you check, you will find that brood is not layed in those empty cells until they are first filled with nectar. Then, the nectar is consumed and the cells prepared for eggs. (within the arc of intended brood nest expansion)Walt


I've recently seen them putting nectar into the empty comb I gave them for the purpose of brood. My assumption is that they were honey bound. Are you sure they put nectar in then use them for brood? I'd hate to have a swarm that could have been avoided especially with a small hive.


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## wcubed (Aug 24, 2008)

When growing into overhead nectar, the cells are typically filled with nectar. When growing laterally into empty comb, it may be just a drop of nectar in the bottom of the cell. It may be that a bit of nectar helps in the cleaning/polishing of the cell in preparation for the egg (guessing here).

Don't think you need to worry yet about that small cluster swarming. They have a lot of growing to do to complete their format.

Walt


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## MDS (Jan 9, 2011)

That is exactly what happened. I put some empty drawn frames in the top box about three weeks ago thinking she would move up and lay eggs. Checked about a week or so and they were putting nectar in the empty space. I checked again today expecting to have to move honey from the center and to my surprise, the queen was in the top deep and they had moved nectar out or eat it. She was laying a great pattern in what was nectar two weeks ago. Yay!

Learned something new. I will not worry unless they cap the nectar as it appears they move it or use it freely.


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## rrussell6870 (May 14, 2009)

This is very noticeable when using stored drawn comb and when trying to reuse comb that had been in slimed hives. They use the nectar as a cleaning or conditioning agent, then move it outward as the queen progresses... we have studied this action by spraying a lite mist of 1:1 on used comb before placing them back on hives, the results were a very quick use of the cells that had been misted... the bees moved the syrup and the queen layer the cells right away... 

Part of our spring routine is to pull out all honey frames with brood cells except for the outer most frames, place them in empty boxes and stand them upright in the yard... the frames are replaced with drawn comb that had been stored and some foundation... the result is stimulation of the queens, without having to feed syrup and the brood is reared on honey instead of sugar, so the microbes stay right. This has proven to be a huge help in eliminating the concern of brood diseases as well as nosema.

Hope this helps!


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## fish_stix (May 17, 2009)

wcubed; sorry I haven't got back to you sooner, been out of town for a week or so. On our foundation frames we see very little brood, just mostly nice white capped orange blossum honey! I would guess that we get brood in only 2-3 percent of the new supers. When we move them into the groves we give them a deep of foundation and then continue with mediums, either drawn or foundation. Since we're in the building up process after being out of beekeeping for 10-12 years, we're using a lot of mediums with foundation.


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## wcubed (Aug 24, 2008)

Thanks, Stix
Had noticed here that the colony had trouble resisting the temptation to put brood in a deep of F overhead being drawn.


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## ersatzS2 (Sep 24, 2009)

Can I piggyback on this thread:
I opened all three of my hives and found basically the same thing: lots of brood built in between the top (third) box and the second, which I ripped open and exposed when I pulled the box off. The second boxes were all mixed brood and honey, the first, bottom boxes were relatively empty. 
Suggestions?


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## MDS (Jan 9, 2011)

If my bottom box was totally empty I'd be tempted to move it above the others so they can grow up into it. I just don't rotate my boxes without a very apparent need to do so. I open up the center for brood and move the honey outward. If I have extra pollen I put it next to the brood area. Works for me but like anything else I might think it is working fine when in reality there is a better way to do it and get even better results. Constant learning is one thing I like about this hobbie.

I once had a bottom box that was almost all pollen. That's a lot. Used some in other hives and replaced with empty comb. In that same hive they later moved down into it in the fall. No idea if I lost time raising brood because of the empty box during the flow. It was a first year hive. 

I'm leaning towards less and less manipulation of frames because they surprise me all the time in how they move stuff and themselves around all the time.


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## Seymore (May 1, 2009)

rrussell6870 said:


> Part of our spring routine is to pull out all honey frames with brood cells except for the outer most frames, place them in empty boxes and stand them upright in the yard... the frames are replaced with drawn comb that had been stored and some foundation... the result is stimulation of the queens, without having to feed syrup and the brood is reared on honey instead of sugar


rruss - are you saying you LEAVE the boxes of honey in the yard? And that is the honey they harvest? Does it create a frenzy among competing hives? Very interesting!


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## rrussell6870 (May 14, 2009)

No bad frenzy... the excess stores are gathered up fairly quickly, then the bees feed the brood with it during the build up... makes for one heck of a strong build up, healthy properly balanced bees, and open brood chambers for heavy laying. 

Better than 1:1 or hfcs, both for the bees and for the pocket book...


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## Seymore (May 1, 2009)

So that leaves me with empty comb?? I need empty comb. I have to crush and strain. That would be so cool! So glad you shared that!


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## MDS (Jan 9, 2011)

*Symore:*
Would be an interesting experiment if he is putting the full frames in the yard "to stimulate the queen" which I took to mean if they have to go get the nectar they think they are in a flow and causes them to build out comb for the queen to lay in? How's that for a run-on sentence!

Or is the purpose to gain a few empty frames of comb? I've got a problem with that myself right now.

*Rrussell:* Do you open up the cappings before leaving them out for the bees to cleanup? 

I've also been taught or told the honey they clean out is different than nectar for purposes of wax building ect.. I'm not experienced enough to know the difference yet.

I'm going to get off the computer right now and grap a frame, uncap it and lean it against a tree well away from the hives and see what happens. I might put it by my water source which is a blue kids pool about 50 yards from the hive. Thanks for the idea because this may open up some of my comb to use in rotating frames


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## rrussell6870 (May 14, 2009)

You don't have to uncap it.. that would just waste a little... they can open it up with ease and clean it right up....

Yes it is for stimulation to encourage laying, not so much wax building... but yes it does indeed give you open frames to cycle back through... we used stored empty frames that we let the bees rob out during the previous fall... this will take the place of the capped stores in the chambers... 

One thing that is not commonly known is that the cluster expands during spring meaning the bees move and use stores outwardly... this polishes the cells with honey/nectar before the queen uses them for laying... 

All you are doing with this method is putting clean cells amongst the cluster for the bees to store the honey in, showing the queen that its time to get to work, and giving them something clean and pure to feed brood and clean the cells with.


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## rrussell6870 (May 14, 2009)

Depending on the timing, it will not take them long at all to clean up these frames... its best to put drawn frames in there place in the hives so that the bees will use it to make the old frames "lay ready" for the queen... but if you do not have drawn empty comb, you can simply pull only one or two frames at a time, and push the others back together in the hives... a few ours later, the frames that you pulled should be near empty, so you can put them back in the hives BETWEEN brood frames... this makes the cluster spread out more and encourages the bees and queen to hurry up and build up.


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## MDS (Jan 9, 2011)

rrussell6870 said:


> One thing that is not commonly known is that the cluster expands during spring meaning the bees move and use stores outwardly... this polishes the cells with honey/nectar before the queen uses them for laying...


Guy earlier set me straight on that. I put a full frame about 30 feet from hive and no takers yet. I'm worried that if I put it up against the hive it will draw animals or start a robbing issue. Is 30 feet too close for purposes of bee dance and forager directions?


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## MDS (Jan 9, 2011)

I wanted to pass along that this is going to be a good year for me. After manipulating the brood area the queen filled the empty frames and went out horizontally from there. Double the amount of brood I saw last year. All conditions being even. Fact is the best hive has a two year old queen in it. Getting me some splits! A side point is I opened up one box in the center early spring while the queen was left laying up above (staying warm on those cold nights), a month later she has moved down and laying very well. I pulled honey out again for my packages as it's plenty warm here now.


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## MDS (Jan 9, 2011)

Early summer frame rotation question.

Took apart a two box hive. Found the lower box to have empty comb other than pollen in places. Last year I found the same in a hive and felt I had missed out on brood as the queen did not move back down until the end of the season.

Would you leave the empty lower box alone? Move frames up and maybe honey filled frames down? move brood and frames down, or rotate the box? Or what?


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## MDS (Jan 9, 2011)

Well. Spring is coming and once again I am considering the idea of again just moving a few frames rather than rotating the hive body to above as long as the bottom box is empty of brood. I have never rotated boxes and wonder if I am missing out on improving the available space for the queen to move up to empty comb in the box above after rotating boxes. In the past I just moved frames to open up the broad area. 


Any comments regarding pros and cons of not rotating, or rotating boxes would be appreciated.


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## Seymore (May 1, 2009)

Mike Snodgrass said:


> I firmly believe this board should be based on local...things in florida arent anything like things in Missouri, let alone ohio


Still re-reading thread, MDS, but I agree here, Mike, which is why I suggested to Barry to visibly add hardiness zones. Advice given can be better targeted if we know each other's zones. Not everything is zone related, of course, but bloom time which means flow time which means swarm time etc...


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## Seymore (May 1, 2009)

Still not enough experience for me to offer an opinion, MDS. But I too am trying to find my way in this area. Fish's technique is of great interest. I am trying checkerboarding for the first time. Getting a grasp on the fact that a honey barrier is a no-cross zone. Hope to report lots of expansion from that!


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## Seymore (May 1, 2009)

Ok, hope this isn't hijacking your thread, MDS. I've got a few questions for you guys with all the experience, if y'all don't mind. Im still very inexperienced, which I am sure my questions will reveal. But, since I had 3 (that I know of) swarms out of 2 hives last year, I'm really trying to get a grasp on this part of keeping - building up yet preventing swarms. 

1. Fish, post #2 - sounds like u r working with 2 frames of brood? So the setup would be something like (I'm assuming 10 frame) HEEEBBEEEH? And when you say Empty, you mean no pollen either?
Fish, post 5...you say "...Whether he's in FL, MO, AK or Russia the queen needs laying room before the spring flow starts..." I checkerboarded - added two 8fr meds CBd above 2 undisturbed hive bodies with undetermined amount of brood in both. Doesn't this CB give Q room to lay? And, even so, why might I choose your method over CB? Or are they for two different things

2. Russell, p6 - you say "I would take all but four frames of honey completely out, move the remaining four to the far outside edges and place any pollen frames just inside of that... then all brood frames in the middle and put my winter store medium back on top..." Winter store medium - you mean full of honey? Wouldn't this create a honey barrier? Or do we care since we have 12 frames for expansion?

3. Russell, p25 says - "a few hours later, the frames that you pulled should be near empty, so you can put them back in the hives BETWEEN brood frames... this makes the cluster spread out more and encourages the bees and queen to hurry up and build up." I'm thinking it must be consistently at least 50 degrees to do this cuz I'm splitting the brood up? Or just have lots of bees?

4. Now that I have already done a CB, is it needless - or too late - to open up the brood box? If not too late, is there something I might see that might keep me from doing it, all things being equal?

Hope that wasn't too many questions!


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## MDS (Jan 9, 2011)

Seymore no problem, your not hijacking the thread. Individual frame movement vrs. box rotation is an advanced topic. I'm really, really, leaning towards just making sure the brood area is open for the queen to lay eggs in drawn comb and letting the bees handle the rest of the hive. Other than maybe in new hives, moving outer foundation one spot towards the center, away from the sides of the box, to get them to draw it out.

My big deal right now (in preparation for spring) is worrying about the empty brood box below where they seem to store a bunch of pollen. In the years past I've just left the box alone and the queen moved down on her own.

Swarm prevention is a big topic all on its own. Sure rotating or moving frames can help with that but my intention regarding the pros and cons of each has more to do with building up bee numbers. Figure moving frames when proper will cause them less work and help in the process of building their numbers.

I personally don't mind watching for swarm issues, such as queen cells, because I only have 9 hives in my backyard. 

Maybe I'm wrong, but I'm thinking moving frames or boxes should be done in order to *help the bees *out in getting to the place they are working so hard to get to.


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## fish_stix (May 17, 2009)

Seymore; in post #2 I didn't mention any specific amount of brood but it's whatever is there. The concern is giving them room for the max amount of brood. We place a honey frame to the outside and pollen frames inside those. Then brood frames clustered in the center with empties surrounding the brood. If, as sometimes happens, there's no brood in the bottom box we move a frame or 2 down to get nurse bees and the queen using the bottom box as well as the top. Our goal is to have 8-12 frames of capped/emerging brood and bees boiling out the top when the citrus starts blooming. I can't help you with Checkerboarding, never used the method. But, I can tell you this; checkerboarding up in the honey supers is not going to do anything for maximizing brood down in the bottom boxes. You need open cells where the queen is trying to lay. You say "undetermined amount" of brood in the lower boxes. Why is it undetermined? If you're going to go through the trouble of checkerboarding find out if you even need to do it. You may have a completely empty box down below in which case simply moving some of the empty frames around may take care of any swarming problems. Any type of swarm control implies that you have very strong hives going into a flow; if they're weak, forget swarm control, they're not going anywhere!


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## Seymore (May 1, 2009)

Yeah, opening the brood box sounds very interesting. I've seen the term but never really saw it explained before and never did research. I'm taking this a step at a time - not always in the right direction.  There is so much based on timing, and I still feel lost there.


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

just read through the whole thread, lots of good stuff in here. thanks to all for sharing.

i am in a different location and i am using a different configuration, but i'll report what i am seeing with four of my hives here in northeast al.

all four went into winter in one ten frame deep with a full medium of honey on top. i had wanted to try checkerboarding them, as i did have some drawn medium frames from last year's honey.

but when i went into the hives toward the end of january, i found that they had already emptied some honey frames in the mediums. the bees were clustered mostly in the deeps, and brood rearing was beginning.

i decided to alternate the frames of honey with the frames of empty comb in the mediums.

it's a little over a month since then, and i looked into these hives on friday. what i found was
that the deeps were almost filled completely with brood, and they were just starting to expand the brood nest into the mediums.

it looks like there will be a lot of bees in these hives in the next couple of weeks. i'll probably be putting on another medium super soon. there is a lot of stuff in bloom here, but i don't think we have quite reached swarm season yet. 

i guess we'll see if they swarm or not.


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## Seymore (May 1, 2009)

Fish - explanation helps, thanks. I did have brood in both boxes, but I tend to leave alone as long as I see things are heading in the right direction. I get worried about temps, etc. I know that's just Lack of experience and it has probably cost me. But this hive was feeling swarmy to me, in all my vast experience. So...does that sound like I don't even need to open brood at this point, if the numbers are high? Or do I still want more and more?

I like the idea of moving some frames down when the lower box is empty - sounds like a modified reverse. And I'm getting what you mean about CB - seems like it's more for prevention but yours is for growth.


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## fish_stix (May 17, 2009)

Actually, I'm pretty sure Walt has brood expansion plus swarm prevention in mind when checkerboarding, I just don't know enough about it to comment. My manipulation of the brood boxes is primarily concerned with maximizing brood for our citrus flow in early March, probably while some of you are still butt deep in snow. Some of our bees will swarm; you can't stop all of them. However, they've been expanding since late December and when the citrus starts they really go crazy with brood expansion, so a swarm is a pretty minor bump in the road, not even noticeable in most cases. I think that if I were in your location I'd probably make sure I had plenty of open drawn comb available in each brood box when brood expansion starts and if they're in the top box I'd move some brood frames down to the bottom to draw the queen down. Leave enough honey to finish out the winter/spring and remember they need some honey/pollen for brood expansion. BTW, we are doing the same as a reversal of the boxes, just not physically moving the boxes.


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## Seymore (May 1, 2009)

Thanks, Fish. I'm much clearer now. Great question MDS!


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## MDS (Jan 9, 2011)

Seymore said:


> Thanks, Fish. I'm much clearer now. Great question MDS!


Thanks. Frame manipulation seems like a little more advanced topic and I suspect getting a handle on it might be a great way to help out the bees get to where they want to be. I just worry about moving a frame wrong and causing the bees to move everything back to where they want it. Seems like spring is the most important time to do the manipulation. Last year some of my hives had nothing in the bottom box but pollen so I moved some brood frames down into the bottom box along with the queen. Then I opened up the brood area a little in the center of the upper box and the hive took off with new brood. I wait until the night time temps are higher before doing anything other than maybe moving some honey closer to the cluster if it is cold at night.


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