# Honey in the brood chamber



## D's_Bees (Apr 29, 2009)

I inspected my bees the other day and I think I've made it through the worst of winter. I got down in the brood chamber and started cleaning the frames of propolis so they're easier to pull and inspect later. Anyway, I noticed a lot of honey in the chamber. More than I would have thought. I left 1 super on top this year and I'd say they ate probably 1/2 or a little more but there were still lots of open cells full of the stuff down below. Is this normal? Where will they lay the brood? Will they move the left over honey to the super at some point?


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## honeydreams (Aug 10, 2009)

do you use two deeps? and a few frames of honey on the out side is ok. but if you only use one deep as a brood chamber then you might want to ask some one who runs with just one.


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## D's_Bees (Apr 29, 2009)

I run one brood chamber. I've toyed with the idea of running two but most beekeepers around me just run 1.


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## wcubed (Aug 24, 2008)

You have no brood?? It's well past time for substantial brood. When the colony is filling the brood nest with nectar It's a pretty good indication of hopelessly queenless. I regret the bad news.
Walt


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## D's_Bees (Apr 29, 2009)

awesome 

I'm going back in today so I'll check again. I hope I missed something.


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## StevenG (Mar 27, 2009)

D's_Bees said:


> I run one brood chamber. I've toyed with the idea of running two but most beekeepers around me just run 1.


interesting... Even 60+ years ago when some were still keeping bees in skeps, it was understood that managed bees needed at least two deeps for brood nest. I wonder what kind of a) swarming problems they have, and b) what kind of honey production they have. I have an old edition of Walter Kelley's book, _How to Keep Bees and Sell Honey_ and if I remember correctly, inside the front cover is a full page picture of an apiary in KY where the beek runs two story brood nests "in an area where most beekeepers use one deep for the brood nest..." and this beek has bumper crops compared to the neighbors. I'll have to dig that up later, and get the exact information. 
Regards,
Steven


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## Fuzzy (Aug 4, 2005)

"Where will they lay the brood?"

Why are you asking ? You already know the answer ! There is no place to lay brood if the box is full of honey.

If you are going to run only 1 deep for brood then you must be diligent about keeping the box open for brood. Pull the honey out and replace with drawn frames.


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## kiwiBee (Jul 23, 2009)

We have in the past 3 seasons moved from a double deep brood to a single but only in the honey flow, we still use double deeps for pollination.
We dont get the type of flows that you guys can get but we have doubled our kilos per hive since switching to singles best thing we ever did.
Cheers
Kiwi


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## wcubed (Aug 24, 2008)

Re single vs double deeps:
Elected last night to not further branch this thread on this subject, but have strong opinions on the subject. Having started with one deep and a shallow, moved to double deeps, added a shallow above the double deeps, and reverted eventially to the single deep and shallows, I think my opinions are well founded. Check out the article at the end of the list in POV. There are a couple of items of persuasion not included there, that could be added here if there is any interest. Note that a deep and shallow is adequate for wintering in most areas of the southeast.
Walt


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## Liam (Feb 3, 2010)

What technique do you use for reducing to a single box?

With a double brood box coming into the flow, there will be too many frames to fit into a single box and I was wondering if you experienced any queen cell raising in the second now queen free box?

Its also a time of large bee numbers and queens can be harder to locate.


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## StevenG (Mar 27, 2009)

Ok, found the information I referred to in my post above. 

The back cover of the 1971 edition of Walter T. Kelley's _How To Keep Bees and Sell Honey_ has a very nice photograph of a small frame house on a gentle downhill slope, with about 12 bee hives visible in the photograph. The caption reads: "This apiary, which contained 30 colonies, produced over 7,000 pounds of surplus honey during the spring flow of 1948 in southern Kentucky, a territory where ordinarily bees are kept in one-story brood nests and only one shallow super is supplied. This shows the desirability of large brood nests and plenty of super space." 

Now admittedly providing only one shallow super would restrict a honey harvest, and 1948 must have been a bumper year, but... even half of a 234 pound average crop is still 117 pounds per colony average. If I was serious about running one deep brood box vs two in your locale, I'd be tempted to test it - run one hive with one deep, another of the same race of bees with 2 deeps, and compare the harvest at season's end. 

If you do that, report back at season's end. I imagine more folks than just me would be curious as to your results. The reason i asked, I tried one deep last year on two hives (ran out of equipment) and got next to nothing off those two colonies.
Regards,
Steven


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

I've been running almost exclusively single deeps for more than 4 years. My standard configuration is: deep, QE, upper entrance (key to success), as many supers as needed. I get 2-3 supers on the spring flow and even more with the cotton flow. This result is nearly exactly what I used to get running double deeps. I run between 15-20 colonies with this configuration.


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## brac (Sep 30, 2009)

So are you saying that your queens are trapped? I.E only entrance is on the other side on a QE? Does this help with swarming?


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

No, I didn't say that I have only one entrance above the QE. At minimum you need some type of drone exit/entrance, but I typically keep a small bottom entrance open at all times.


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## kiwiBee (Jul 23, 2009)

In reply to Liam what do we do with the top brood box when reducing to singles.
We double queen our 2 deep hives with either queens or queen cells then split them off with their own bottom board and lid.
After 40 odd years of always doing honey in double deeps most of them run as 2 queeners we decided to give it a go and we were totally unprepared for how well they did.
We found that our single deeps were completely full of brood all 10 frames and the only place the bees had to put the honey was upstairs in the honey super, we use 3/4 boxs here.
We would easily get a box of honey more on a single than a double times that by 2 because we make 2 hives from 1 and thats a heck of a lot of honey.
We take the honey off and winter them as singles hard down in one box no super on top.
We find that once the honey comes off they pack the brood nest out with honey which shuts down the queen from laying so much so they go into winter with a nice tight brood nest with their winter stores close by and with the smaller amount of bees wintering over the stores last into spring.
Early spring we go round and unite the singles back into doubles killing the old queen from last season and leaving the younger queen that was last seasons split.
We will never go back to doubles thats for sure.
But then what suits our operation wont suit others the best thing is to keep an open mind about things and experiment.
Cheers Kiwi


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## Liam (Feb 3, 2010)

Thanks KiwiBee

That sounds like a v productive strategy that would transpose to here v easily.
It also sounds like it negates autumn feeding.

When do you time your split? If the split is done too easrly, would the queen right colony potentially become swarmy? And if done too late, would the queenless split not generate a queen in time for the flow?


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## kiwiBee (Jul 23, 2009)

Hi Liam I forgot to add that when we 2 queen we more often than not will have a 3/4 honey super on top of the single deep at the bottom. Directly on top of the honey super is the split board with the entrance facing back if it's a queen cell intro or to the front if it's a caged queen intro.
We do this around mid october if using a Queen intro or earlier if using a cell. Our main flow is in late December thru to mid Feb.
In winter we have frost but no snow and usually a fair amount of sunny days ( sunny but not that warm! )
Cheers
kiwi


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## kiwiBee (Jul 23, 2009)

Just something else I forgot to add, another advantage in having a single deep as your working hive is that if a double deep isn't very strong the bees tend to fill the top deep with honey and not move up into the honey box whereas with a single even a weak hive will give you a box of honey.


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## Liam (Feb 3, 2010)

Thanks Kiwibee

I have extracted some of the honey in the second deep box by taking out the outer capped frames. This approach would be time consuming for several hives though and your method would make this unnecessary.

I would worry about my bees going swarmy if they were split 2 months before the flow and confined to a single brood box.

Last year, I made up a nuke on a spring flow that filled all available space whilst they were waiting for the queen cell to mature then get mated.

I was thinking was that your thinking was by splitting the double boxes just before the flow, the second queenless hive would generate more foraging bees as all of the emerged brood won't have new brood to care for and there would be more foragers.

Is my thinking flawed?

I'm thinking I may have to compare your 2 queen system to the double broox box split method.


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## johng (Nov 24, 2009)

I don't understand why you recombine the splits in the spring just to re split them later? 

I have just started bee keeping and was told by locals that all I need is a single deep box. I have one hive that is swarmy, I have split it twice and I may have to do it again. I have a med super on top and need to add anther one soon. They still keep trying to swarm. I was wondering if I added another deep box if they would stop trying to swarm.


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## devdog108 (May 7, 2009)

John, If they are "trying" to swarm, they are going to. They are already convinced that they need to. You could do a split and make them think that they already have swarmed. I overwintered in deep and a medium, with spares, but like you, mine were very strong, so I just split them.....


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## kiwiBee (Jul 23, 2009)

Hi Liam,
By the time we split the hives there is a mated Queen in both boxs the new queen has had approx 2 brood cycles under her belt so they go into the honey reasonably strong. 
When we do our splits using a queen cell we make them very strong with alot of emerging brood and young bees going into it.
The brood thats put into the splits are generally going to be the foragers at the start of the honey flow so we need to make sure there's plenty of them it's not a problem if using a mated queen because you dont get such a break in the brood cycle.
John the reason we rejoin our splits is it helps to control swarming and we do our pollination in 2 deep hives because in early spring a single isn't as strong.
Cheers
Kiwi


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## D's_Bees (Apr 29, 2009)

Wow, this thread really took off. I've been busy and haven't been able to get back till now. Upon re-entry into the hive I found brood. There was a small pocket that I missed. I feel much better knowing that they are there. 



StevenG said:


> interesting... Even 60+ years ago when some were still keeping bees in skeps, it was understood that managed bees needed at least two deeps for brood nest. I wonder what kind of a) swarming problems they have, and b) what kind of honey production they have. I have an old edition of Walter Kelley's book, _How to Keep Bees and Sell Honey_ and if I remember correctly, inside the front cover is a full page picture of an apiary in KY where the beek runs two story brood nests "in an area where most beekeepers use one deep for the brood nest..." and this beek has bumper crops compared to the neighbors. I'll have to dig that up later, and get the exact information.
> Regards,
> Steven


At our last local meeting a man came who had been raising bees his whole life and talked to us about splits and building up brood for the spring. He recommended a single deep and a shallow on top. I don't know if I've ever heard the reason why :s



Fuzzy said:


> "Where will they lay the brood?"
> 
> Why are you asking ? You already know the answer ! There is no place to lay brood if the box is full of honey.
> 
> If you are going to run only 1 deep for brood then you must be diligent about keeping the box open for brood. Pull the honey out and replace with drawn frames.


This is my only hive and it's only 1 year old. I don't have any other frames that have been drawn out. 



AstroBee said:


> I've been running almost exclusively single deeps for more than 4 years. My standard configuration is: deep, QE, upper entrance (key to success), as many supers as needed. I get 2-3 supers on the spring flow and even more with the cotton flow. This result is nearly exactly what I used to get running double deeps. I run between 15-20 colonies with this configuration.


I also ran an excluder on top of the brooder last year. It worked but once again, the local man said that I should allow the queen to move up into the first super. As the season goes on, she will go back down to the brooder and allow the ladies to fill the super with honey for the winter. I'm going to try that this year and see what happens. I'll put my QE on top of the first super and report back. As for the double brooder, if I can perform a successful split I'll try it and report back as well.


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## D's_Bees (Apr 29, 2009)

http://catawba.ces.ncsu.edu/content/BeekeepingCalendar-March&source=catawba

_"If there is honey and brood in the brood chamber and the queen is there, the excluder can be put on. If the queen is in the supers, she should be put in the brood chamber and the excluder put on at least three weeks before the start of the poplar honey flow so the brood in the supers will all be hatched. Do not put the queen in the brood chamber if there is no honey there. Put a quart of sugar water in the brood combs, then put the queen there."_

I just found this on my NC ag extension website. I guess with that, it confirms that there should be honey in there.


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