# # nucs made ?



## orthoman (Feb 23, 2013)

Not sure about your question. 

When would you be making up the NUC?


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## beefarmer (May 2, 2010)

Would be making nucs up in early spring, before a flow and temps are ok, I guess a better way to ask is how many frames of capped brood could one take from a overwintered hive [ which should be large population at this time ] and still having the hive be able to make a good honey crop ?


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

If you can figure out how to steal brood/bees from a hive and not impact honey production, I'm sure there are people who want to know.

Minimal impact would be stealing for nucs after main flow I'd think. If you can keep them in the box until then. I made most of mine up in July. Made one up in August and that queen started laying first week of September. Was a good year for that kind of goofing around. Last year they would have been a loss if I'd tried it.


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## Harley Craig (Sep 18, 2012)

this is just a WAG, because your avg. could be different than my avg. But if I had drawn comb to replace the ones I've taken, I could PROBABLY make 1 2 frame split a week right through the flow without much loss of production. If it was a yr like this yr. I busted an overwintered colony up this yr late march into 3 strong nucs for queens to mate in early april and all 3 had filled honey supers by august. That would not be normal in a regular yr. our flow doesn't usually last that long. 


Edit; I will say that my carni mutts literally explode in the spring so that is why I feel I could get away with it, I'm often times robbing brood just to prevent swarming later on.


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## clyderoad (Jun 10, 2012)

I can't do this on a regular basis in my location- either the parent hive suffers or the nucs do, sometimes both.
If the nucs suffer they are never ready to catch our early flow and are in build up mode throughout it.
Delivery to customers was always later than they wanted and early queens can be iffy.
In the odd year everything works out. Weather being unsettled/cold is the big issue.
Sometimes I split into all nucs to capture the $$ in nucs and forego the $$ from honey production
and free up equipment.
Splitting strong hives in spring works better for me re honey production.

Overwintered nucs is the way I have been doing it.


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

like all things beekeeping i think 'it depends'.

in my area our main spring flow is over by the 4th of july after which the splitting out of bees doesn't lessen the honey yield and may even improve it due the the brood break and reducing of population eating up stores through the summer dearth. 

northern locations may have a more continuous flow throughout the season so it would work differently there than it would here.

without effective swarm prevention and if a colony swarms once or more there may not be much if any honey yield at all. if splitting out a couple frames here and there keeps them from swarming you will likely get more honey than if you didn't split at all and they end up swarming.

one of my most productive hives this year that responded favorably to late winter checkerboarding and did not swarm drew out 2 new supers of foundation and is set to yield 100+ lbs. of honey, (no feeding). after the main flow, there was about a 3 lb. beard of bees hanging out at the entrance so i split out the queen with 4 frames of bees and got a new colony off of it as well.


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## J.Walters (Sep 24, 2015)

If your using the OTS (on the spot) method of making splits / nucs, Mel suggests only taking away the Queen right before the honey flow. This would automatically give you 1 nuc with old queen, then to notch 1 frame of brood (12hr eggs) for the old hive to raise a new Queen. From the time you take the Queen away, the new Queen emerges, & starts to lay eggs will be roughly 4 weeks that the entire hive will be bringing in nector without having to feed any brood. 

I did this with 3 hives this Spring and each hive did great, at least 120# of honey and a box of cut comb above a Queen excluder from each hive. A few other overwinter hives I broke down into 3 and 4 nucs each, depends on the resources / number of bees.


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## mgolden (Oct 26, 2011)

In my area, you can pull two 4 frame NUCs off the main hive and not affect production. Pulling two NUCs is a must to control the population in the main hive so they don't get over crowded and swarm. If one insulates and wraps the hive and feeds sugar blocks and an early pollen patty, you need to pull one NUC out before the flow begins. And then a second one out halfway through the flow. To me it is about assessing and managing the population to be highly productive but also managed so that it does not swarm. For the second NUC, just start by taking a couple of frames of brood and bees and replace with blank foundation. You can pull a couple frames of capped brood again in a couple of weeks to add to a small NUC.

I wouldn't pull the queen from the main hive. I have done it on two occasions for swarm prep stopping but it seems to really demoralize the colony. They seem to lack purpose and bee traffic at the entrance slows. They can't and don't swarm but further honey production slows considerably. 

Re queening the main colony makes a lot more sense to me and move the old queen to the NUC. Get the NUC to 5-6 frames and going strong and pull the queen, notch some frames, and take a couple of frames and start another NUC. Pull a couple of frames of brood later and beef up the two frame NUC.


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## Michael B (Feb 6, 2010)

simple answer is zero. Anytime you cut down a hive it has an effect. Good nucs are made up with young nurse bees and capped brood.


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## D Coates (Jan 6, 2006)

Michael B said:


> simple answer is zero. Anytime you cut down a hive it has an effect. Good nucs are made up with young nurse bees and capped brood.


Agreed. The nucs I make are from swarms I catch. I steal from the nucs I always have going. I really avoid stealing anything from production hives unless they're about to swarm. If that's the case I'll split it up possibly adding a thriving nuc (newspaper combine) to the portion of the split hive that was without a queen. This would allow the split to get rid of it's swarming impulses and be requeened with a strong queen and still hopefully allow for the hive to still produce honey.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

If you have more than one hive wouldn't it be better to use one for splits and use the others for honey? Every time you pull brood, bees, and honey for a split you have to take off the honey if it is producing.


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## mgolden (Oct 26, 2011)

You have to have the population to get the production and it's a fine line between maximizing production and a swarm. I know it is possible to manage to max population by periodically pulling a couple of frames. Also can then insert a couple of blank frames to keep the wax makers busy. I was on the watch for swarm cells but never had any. 

I have one production hive and made up two NUCs pulling two frames at a time and split one of the NUCs. And I am more than pleased with production of 406 lbs of honey.


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

Acebird said:


> If you have more than one hive wouldn't it be better to use one for splits and use the others for honey? Every time you pull brood, bees, and honey for a split you have to take off the honey if it is producing.


that's how i've started doing it, inspired by mike palmer's 'sustainable apiary' video.

candidates for splits are the lesser producing and swarmy hives. i had one this year that was found queenless just after our main flow due to a failed supercedure and it got busted up into nucs to receive some of this year's grafted queens.

removing three or four mediums full of honey off to get at those brood frames in the bottom boxes for splits would be a lot of extra grunt work for sure.


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

If stealing brood keeps the hive from swarming - or makes it swarm later - then you might make *more* honey. Anyway, nucs have value just like honey does so to some extent it probably washes.

I make nucs for sale and increase, rear queens and make honey with the same hives so apparently I believe that the benefits outweigh the costs.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

squarepeg said:


> that's how i've started doing it, inspired by mike palmer's 'sustainable apiary' video.


[edit] I don't make nucs, but if I did I wouldn't come up with a system that required pulling honey boxes off to pull frames and shake bees. Mike Palmer is a successful guy in the north country who makes a lot of nucs, queens and honey so if I had any interest in making nucs I think I would try to do what he does. [edit]


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## beestudent (Jun 10, 2015)

Why couldnt you take frames from a 2 deep (speculating here, could easily be done with 3 mediums...) make 2 (was thinking of 5 frame ones at this moment) walkaway splits( leaving the origional queen at home) and just as fast as the nucs make queens, put them over top of the mother hive, queen excluder and paper. (The bees there will mostly still smell alike, so not alot of killing )sooo, what have you got? Some bees(if you go at MP advice, 2 brood combs and nurse bees) that have gone ahead and made queens, and a mother colony that has got most of the bees back after 3 weeks. Then, if you take capped brood frames, (or the nucs themselves) and have new, seperate nucs, then all it really would be like for the production hive would be adding a new box of comb, and at some point, removing the top box and having a fully functual production hive... I dont know, just a few ideas...

And to jwcarlson and acebird, if you want to call eachother names and fight on EVERY SINGLE POST IN THE BEE FORUM, then i would kindly ask you to take it somewhere else... i sure bet everyone else is totally sick of it too...


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## biggraham610 (Jun 26, 2013)

Acebird said:


> If you have more than one hive wouldn't it be better to use one for splits and use the others for honey? Every time you pull brood, bees, and honey for a split you have to take off the honey if it is producing.


That's how I make increase. Dedicate production hives and Increase hives. Pulling a few frames from production hives as necessary to attempt and avoid the swarm. G


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

beefarmer said:


> Would be making nucs up in early spring, before a flow and temps are ok, I guess a better way to ask is how many frames of capped brood could one take from a overwintered hive [ which should be large population at this time ] and still having the hive be able to make a good honey crop ?


Depends on how many frames of brood and how many frames of honey one finds in one's hives. I usually take two frames of brood, one capped and one open, and one frame of honey from each hive to make a nuc in SC in late March and April. Some I take less from. Some hives I don't take anything from. 

If you have strong hives that you can rob bees from to cover the brood from other hives maybe you can make many more.

I have a friend who makes nucs to Winter. He takes two story 5 frame nucs that over Wintered and makes three or four nucs from them in March and April. As soon as it is possible to produce well mated queens.

It depends on management and location, mostly. I believe.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

Michael B said:


> simple answer is zero. Anytime you cut down a hive it has an effect. Good nucs are made up with young nurse bees and capped brood.


But, Michael, if you don't artificially swarm the hive you can still loose production to an actual swarm. Nucing a hive can control swarming and still have that hive produce a crop of honey, a good one.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

Acebird said:


> [edit] I don't make nucs, but if I did I wouldn't come up with a system that required pulling honey boxes off to pull frames and shake bees. Mike Palmer is a successful guy in the north country who makes a lot of nucs, queens and honey so if I had any interest in making nucs I think I would try to do what he does. [edit]


If you notice beefarmer was asking about an overWintered hive. Not a hive with boxes full of honey. An overwintered hive has its bees and brood up close to the top of the hive. So no boxes of honey need pulling. And most of us don't have the back problem constraints that you do. So taking off boxes of honey is not the same problem for most of us that it is for you.

You could nuc your overwintered hive come Spring and not have to lift much at all. Less than what you would if you rotate boxes as part of your swarm control management. If you do that.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

sqkcrk said:


> If you notice beefarmer was asking about an overWintered hive. Not a hive with boxes full of honey.


I thought he was asking for a maximum number of nucs with out affecting honey production. That to me meant he would be doing it a little at a time over the season. How can you pull any nucs from an overwintered hive that has no honey in reserves? If the honey is coming from somewhere else isn't that affecting production?


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

You can't pull honey from a hive if that honey doesn't exist, obviously. But the hives I manage have frames of brood and frames of honey in them come Spring. As do most people's hives. Unless your colony is next to starving, of course.

There are all sorts of things that one can do to a hive or hives and still make a good crop of honey. And probably as much honey as any one hive could have made had one not taken anything from it.

Now don't start splitting hairs. Just take the answer.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

sqkcrk said:


> Now don't start splitting hairs. Just take the answer.


OK.


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## beestudent (Jun 10, 2015)

This thread has got me thinking about some ideas i had recently, why wouldnt a system of throwing 2 nucs ontop of a production colony ( with queen excluder inbetween) each with its own queen, work??? You could take frames of brood at will, and not damage the colony, (if you consider it as a normal hive with one queen ) and, you also have queens in reserve being put to use.

Im sorry, is there something im missing about using nucs/multiple queens? Is the idea of puting nucs on top of a hive not ok? I understand no one would want to do this with, say, a 3 deep 4 super hive, that would be rediculous... but what about a small one? A single deep, 2 medium, anything of small brood space capable of supporting one extra box? 

You could even have a long lang, and put a bunch of nucs on top of that! Wouldnt that be an idea! Dont rob a hive that could possibly make surplus honey, or an already weak hive, HAVE HIVES THAT DON'T NEED THE BROOD!!


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

That's what nucs are for that's what Palmer does with his 3 story ones. Brood factories. They don't need another queenright colony below them. Why would you put them on top of queenright colonies? They standalone just fine. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised next spring when you have a few colonies overwintered and you get to see what a second year colony can do. It's like a Ferrari vs. a Civic. You seem a little hanged up on getting two or three or now 5 or 6 queens together in the same set of boxes. Why so?


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## beestudent (Jun 10, 2015)

The point would be, if they have a full capped/emerging frameof brood, you dont have to worry about hurting the nuc by taking it...


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

This is no worry if they are strong enough. You'll have a better feel for strength by the time youvd be to thst point next year. There is no need for queen tricks to have big strong colonies that are capable of donating brood for bee work.


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## biggraham610 (Jun 26, 2013)

jwcarlson said:


> That's what nucs are for that's what Palmer does with his 3 story ones. Brood factories. They standalone just fine.


Yes this. In the spring you better plan on regularly taking frames of brood from your nucs, or they will be in the trees. No need to overthink it BS. Its been tried and done. Keep nucs for making increase and boosting hives, and making queens. Keep production colonies Production colonies. G


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

Overwintered nucs ARE production hives - or can be anyway if you play your cards right. For that matter I sold 8 frame medium hives that I started on April 3 with purchased queens and some of those produced a super or more of excess honey - without being given any comb.


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## Mike Gillmore (Feb 25, 2006)

Lots of great ideas here. I guess to narrow it down, beefarmer, it would be very helpful to understand better what your goals are and what your current situation is. Right now everything is hypothetical without all the background and facts surrounding your status.

How many hives are you overwintering now? What are your intentions with the nucs, colony increase or to sell them? What are your long term goals?

With a little more information the suggestions could be more focused and relevant to your unique situation.


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## Riverderwent (May 23, 2013)

"What would anybody say the average would be of how many nucs could be made from an overwintered hive, and not affect honey production on the overwinter hive, assuming making 2 frame nucs ?"

I have not been able to both eat my cake and have it. However, depending on the timing of your flows and the length of your production season, you can checkerboard production hives before swarm season and make nucs from some after their population grows. Whether you want to do this depends on a number of things including your goals and the relative value to you of honey and nucs.


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## biggraham610 (Jun 26, 2013)

David LaFerney said:


> Overwintered nucs ARE production hives - or can be anyway if you play your cards right. For that matter I sold 8 frame medium hives that I started on April 3 with purchased queens and some of those produced a super or more of excess honey - without being given any comb.


Well said David, and I do plan to make increase in Production Hives out of overwintered Nucs this spring. My main point was, nucs are good for what ails you. In my opinion, nucs are gold. This year, I will plan on turning my nucs, to get to my production threshold. Once that is reached, I will still be keeping nucs in the yard, for all the other benefits, and overwintered, is a bonus. G


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## beestudent (Jun 10, 2015)

Ok, i understand that overwintered hives go nuts, but couldnt having nucs like that work? At the very least, it would help struggling nucs to get big..


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## Kamon A. Reynolds (Apr 15, 2012)

I have thought and pondered about this subject for a long time. Like everything it varies by location. 

Now we all know more foragers=more honey but what I have wondered and have experimented with, is finding the balance between the two.

If you make a 2-3 frame split pre flow you will reduce your honey crop likely. BUT if you are charging 135-150 bucks a nuc that covers a bit of honey. The big question is how much honey are you sacrificing and are you? Does the nuc make more than you are sacrificing? This takes experimentation in each location.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

Tennessee's Bees LLC said:


> Like everything it varies by location.


Yes, it also varies by available time. I don't see nucs as gold. I see them as an anchor that ties you to the bee yard watching over them. I would much rather bring full size hives through the winter, do one manipulation in spring or pre-spring and then pile on boxes. There is timing involved but nothing like raising nucs. The disadvantage of only having full size hives is it takes more equipment to have the same number of hives.


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## dsegrest (May 15, 2014)

beefarmer said:


> What would anybody say the average would be of how many nucs could be made from an overwintered hive, and not affect honey production on the overwinter hive, assuming making 2 frame nucs ?


I don't think of a 2 frame colony as a nuc. I use 3 frames in my queen castles. I pulled 6 frames from 1 colony last year. Each had 1 or 2 capped queen cells. The colony did not swarm so I think I may have made more honey. We had a really bad year so it is hard to compare.


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## dsegrest (May 15, 2014)

Acebird said:


> Yes, it also varies by available time. I don't see nucs as gold. I see them as an anchor that ties you to the bee yard watching over them. I would much rather bring full size hives through the winter, do one manipulation in spring or pre-spring and then pile on boxes. There is timing involved but nothing like raising nucs. The disadvantage of only having full size hives is it takes more equipment to have the same number of hives.


Brian, you need to spend more time in the apiary and less time on Beesource. Look who's talking.


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

Acebird said:


> Yes, it also varies by available time. I don't see nucs as gold. I see them as an anchor that ties you to the bee yard watching over them. I would much rather bring full size hives through the winter, do one manipulation in spring or pre-spring and then pile on boxes. There is timing involved but nothing like raising nucs. The disadvantage of only having full size hives is it takes more equipment to have the same number of hives.


How many nucs have you made up since 2011, Ace? Making nucs is pretty darn easy. In July put two frames of capped brood into a box. One frame of food, two empties and give them a caged queen or queen under push-in cage. If caged come back around a week later, check if she's laying and add another 5 frames on top. If under push in go in 3-4 days later, cut out any emergency cells and pull the cage. It's not rocket science, all of the information is out there. Nucs are easy to manipulate for the feeble among us as well.

[edit]


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

Tennessee's Bees LLC said:


> If you make a 2-3 frame split pre flow you will reduce your honey crop likely. BUT if you are charging 135-150 bucks a nuc that covers a bit of honey. The big question is how much honey are you sacrificing and are you? Does the nuc make more than you are sacrificing? This takes experimentation in each location.


Nucing a hive or simply moving brood from a strong colony to a weaker colony is and can be simply part of one's management style in attempts to keep some colonies from swarming and other colonies from the problems weakness can bring.


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

Tennessee's Bees LLC said:


> I have thought and pondered about this subject for a long time. Like everything it varies by location.
> 
> Now we all know more foragers=more honey but what I have wondered and have experimented with, is finding the balance between the two.
> 
> If you make a 2-3 frame split pre flow you will reduce your honey crop likely. BUT if you are charging 135-150 bucks a nuc that covers a bit of honey. The big question is how much honey are you sacrificing and are you? Does the nuc make more than you are sacrificing? This takes experimentation in each location.


You know I've been doing this for a couple of years now, and I've thought about the same issue - would you be dollars ahead to keep the bees and make more honey? And I'm pretty sure that if the only factor you consider is bottom line annual profit you should just concentrate on making honey. But nucs give you a nice payday months before honey, and also spread the work load - moving work from the heat of summer (honey harvest/processing) to April. Selling nucs also keeps you from accumulating and having to deal with ancient brood comb and helps in swarm management. For me there seems to be more profit per hard work in nucs than in honey so I'm going to keep doing both.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

Acebird said:


> Yes, it also varies by available time. I don't see nucs as gold. I see them as an anchor that ties you to the bee yard watching over them. I would much rather bring full size hives through the winter, do one manipulation in spring or pre-spring and then pile on boxes. There is timing involved but nothing like raising nucs. The disadvantage of only having full size hives is it takes more equipment to have the same number of hives.


I'm not surprised that you would see nucs as an anchor instead of gold. But hopefully more people than not can see the glass as half full, not half empty.

As far as the availability of time, it's not what you spend, it's what you gain. What you gain is flexibility, more options. What you may loose by not nucing a hive or hives is swarms and the crop potential.


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## BeeCurious (Aug 7, 2007)

In this entire thread, was it ever mentioned where the queens were going to come from for the OP's nucs?


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

_"As far as the availability of time, it's not what you spend, it's what you gain. What you gain is flexibility, more options. What you may loose by not nucing a hive or hives is swarms and the crop potential."_

So true.

Also I've seen this over and over - people (especially new beekeepers) who make their own increase as opposed to buying bees or remaining static just have more success. They just do.

And whatever happened to "Split like Crazy?"


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

sqkcrk said:


> What you may loose by not nucing a hive or hives is swarms and the crop potential.


I don't seem to be having problems with either, I split hives. Now is a split hive a nuc, maybe but I think the OP was talking about two frame nucs. I don't do two frame nucs and see no advantage for me to do so.


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

I do 2 frame splits every year - mating nucs - if I do it right and get a little lucky after I finish rearing queens they often build up into strong medium doubles by September - which is twice as big as they need to be to successfully overwinter around here. If you do it wrong or get unlucky they can fail miserably at any point. 

I'm not exactly recomending it, but it can work.

So to answer the OP - You could make 2 frame splits out of every frame of brood you can find and furnish with bees and a queen cell. You will sacrifice all honey production in that case - or you can make no splits and if they don't swarm you could make max honey. Everything else is in between. 

It's all a judgement call and subject to weather, your skill level and many other factors.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

BeeCurious said:


> In this entire thread, was it ever mentioned where the queens were going to come from for the OP's nucs?


Not part of the original Posts' question. Assuming purchased queens, does it make a difference as to how many nucs can be made and not effect crop production?


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

Acebird said:


> I don't do two frame nucs and see no advantage for me to do so.


Then maybe you should consider that before thinking about contributing to this Thread. If you don't have any experience or learned knowledge about the topic being discussed what's the point of your contributions?


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

beefarmer said:


> What would anybody say the average would be of how many nucs could be made from an overwintered hive, and not affect honey production on the overwinter hive, assuming making 2 frame nucs ?


Maybe two nucs. At first in the Spring, if the colony and resources are adequate.


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## biggraham610 (Jun 26, 2013)

sqkcrk said:


> Maybe two nucs. At first in the Spring, if the colony and resources are adequate.


I agree. I regularly have had to make at least one to prevent swarming. When the queen is in full build mode in early spring, I like Mark, believe you could probably get away with 2. G


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## JohnBruceLeonard (Jul 7, 2015)

J.Walters said:


> If your using the OTS (on the spot) method of making splits / nucs, Mel suggests only taking away the Queen right before the honey flow. This would automatically give you 1 nuc with old queen, then to notch 1 frame of brood (12hr eggs) for the old hive to raise a new Queen. From the time you take the Queen away, the new Queen emerges, & starts to lay eggs will be roughly 4 weeks that the entire hive will be bringing in nector without having to feed any brood.
> 
> I did this with 3 hives this Spring and each hive did great, at least 120# of honey and a box of cut comb above a Queen excluder from each hive. A few other overwinter hives I broke down into 3 and 4 nucs each, depends on the resources / number of bees.


J. Walters, this is very interesting. How did the hives you tried this with compare to other of your hives, or other hives in the area, in terms of honey production? And - no doubt an ignorant question - who is Mel?

John


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## Kamon A. Reynolds (Apr 15, 2012)

Acebird said:


> Yes, it also varies by available time. I don't see nucs as gold. I see them as an anchor that ties you to the bee yard watching over them. I would much rather bring full size hives through the winter, do one manipulation in spring or pre-spring and then pile on boxes. There is timing involved but nothing like raising nucs. The disadvantage of only having full size hives is it takes more equipment to have the same number of hives.


Shoot during spring raising nucs is a breeze. Our nucs are made up in 10 frame boxes. There is to much money and sustainability to not be raising nucs.


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## biggraham610 (Jun 26, 2013)

JohnBruceLeonard said:


> J. Walters, this is very interesting. How did the hives you tried this with compare to other of your hives, or other hives in the area, in terms of honey production? And - no doubt an ignorant question - who is Mel?
> 
> John


http://www.mdasplitter.com/docs/PREVIEW-CONTENTS.pdf


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

biggraham610 said:


> , I like Mark, G


Oh, gee Graham, I like you too.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

David LaFerney said:


> And whatever happened to "Split like Crazy?"


If you take "split like Crazy" to its maximum you are doing 2 frame nucs. Are you not? Or can you actually get a one frame nuc survive without adding resource frames?


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

Acebird said:


> If you take "split like Crazy" to its maximum you are doing 2 frame nucs. Are you not? Or can you actually get a one frame nuc survive without adding resource frames?


This is what he's talking about, Ace...
http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?291085-Split-like-crazy


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## biggraham610 (Jun 26, 2013)

sqkcrk said:


> Oh, gee Graham, I like you too.


:no: You Huckster........... G


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## marshmasterpat (Jun 26, 2013)

David LaFerney said:


> I do 2 frame splits every year - mating nucs - if I do it right and get a little lucky after I finish rearing queens they often build up into strong medium doubles by September - which is twice as big as they need to be to successfully overwinter around here. If you do it wrong or get unlucky they can fail miserably at any point.
> 
> I'm not exactly recomending it, but it can work. It's all a judgement call and subject to weather, your skill level and many other factors.


Glad you shared that, I was thinking of 3 frames medium nucs for starts and wondering if they could grow that large. I have been curious because the difference in amount of brood between 2 frame medium and 2 frame deeps is significant. So I have been concerned about the lag time for increasing numbers. 

Yea it is gamble, but I don't mind the gamble. Thank for sharing


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

A key thing is for them to be established by the START of the main spring flow, and don't pull queens until they have laid a lot of eggs. Which also results in better queens IMO.


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## biggraham610 (Jun 26, 2013)

I also do 2 framers. Deep, but am transitioning to mediums, so will be starting mediums in the spring. I think the extra shake of nurses goes a long ways. Frees up room for more rapid increase. G


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

You certainly have to get enough adult bees to stay in there to adequately cover all the brood - no matter how large or small the split is. But that's really the trick isn't it?


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## biggraham610 (Jun 26, 2013)

I do believe it is. G


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

biggraham610 said:


> :no: You Huckster........... G


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## Harley Craig (Sep 18, 2012)

David LaFerney said:


> You certainly have to get enough adult bees to stay in there to adequately cover all the brood - no matter how large or small the split is. But that's really the trick isn't it?


I when I make a small nuc once the queen has hatched and starts going a little I like to drop in a frame of emerging brood. They will take right off!


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

That's the way to do it, Harley. And is what I do too. No use having too many nurse bees with no brood to care for then forcing them back to nursing duties a couple weeks later.


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## JohnBruceLeonard (Jul 7, 2015)

biggraham610 said:


> http://www.mdasplitter.com/docs/PREVIEW-CONTENTS.pdf


Belatedly - thanks for the link, biggraham...


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## beefarmer (May 2, 2010)

Thanks to everyone for the opinions, was thinking to take away a little brood, start a nuc, stop swarm intentions, but still have enough bees that would hatch in time for an ? almost normal amount of honey brought in. Sounds like more than a couple frames of brood removed before the flow starts to impact total honey yield, which is what I was asking for.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

beefarmer said:


> Sounds like more than a couple frames of brood removed before the flow starts to impact total honey yield, which is what I was asking for.


I am not saying this will work for you but I let my overwintered hive expand into 4 medium boxes and then split the hive in half and walked away. That yielded 4 medium boxes from the parent and two from the split. I don't think the yield was hurt one I ohta.


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## BeeCurious (Aug 7, 2007)

Acebird said:


> I am not saying this will work for you but I let my overwintered hive expand into 4 medium boxes and then split the hive in half and walked away. That yielded 4 medium boxes from the parent and two from the split. I don't think the yield was hurt one I ohta.


That's interesting. You split a 4 box colony in half, and you end up with 4 and 2.

This is intriguing...


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## lharder (Mar 21, 2015)

jwcarlson said:


> That's the way to do it, Harley. And is what I do too. No use having too many nurse bees with no brood to care for then forcing them back to nursing duties a couple weeks later.


I do this as well. Throw resources at success, in this case a queen that begins laying.


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## lharder (Mar 21, 2015)

Isn't there some danger in splitting too soon? I waited this year until drones were flying and populations on a definite upswing. Then started pulling frames for nucs. They still kept momentum up. From overwintered nucs I ended up with 28 nucs with queens, the original 6 in big boxes and about 4.5 5 gallon buckets of honey. The average around here is 100 lbs in the city.


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## Kamon A. Reynolds (Apr 15, 2012)

lharder said:


> Isn't there some danger in splitting too soon? I waited this year until drones were flying and populations on a definite upswing. Then started pulling frames for nucs. They still kept momentum up. From overwintered nucs I ended up with 28 nucs with queens, the original 6 in big boxes and about 4.5 5 gallon buckets of honey. The average around here is 100 lbs in the city.


For sure. Check your big hives. If you have drones in the purple eyed stage your good. Now if you are raising hundreds of queens, then it would be important to have drone colones. As far as colony strength for splitting...I like a double deep so packed you can't get the lid back on. That's when I split.

Who doesn't? haha


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## Colobee (May 15, 2014)

To the OP: one or two *4-5 frame medium* nucs ( bees & stores), for me, here. EVERY year is a bit different. I've been doing it for almost 40 years.

MO queens become available in mid April. Peak swarm is early May, here. When the queens arrive in mid to late April, pull one of the 3 mediums, from a decent overwintered colony. Make up 1-2 nucs - 4-5 frames of bees & stores, and place them over double screen boards, above the parent colony. The parent colony almost always loses the urge to swarm. The nucs prosper with the extra warmth from below. Brood injections to the nucs at 2 weeks, & with each additional (medium) box. Set the nucs off, & supers on, at the start of the main flow. Or combine/re-queen the nuc with the parent colony, back into a "boomer". 

Best yield from a parent nuc combo: ~525 lbs ( 1st year). The average is more like 1/3 to 1/2 of that.


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## beestudent (Jun 10, 2015)

Colobee said:


> To the OP: one or two *4-5 frame medium* nucs ( bees & stores), for me, here. EVERY year is a bit different. I've been doing it for almost 40 years.
> 
> MO queens become available in mid April. Peak swarm is early May, here. When the queens arrive in mid to late April, pull one of the 3 mediums, from a decent overwintered colony. Make up 1-2 nucs - 4-5 frames of bees & stores, and place them over double screen boards, above the parent colony. The parent colony almost always loses the urge to swarm. The nucs prosper with the extra warmth from below. Brood injections to the nucs at 2 weeks, & with each additional (medium) box. Set the nucs off, & supers on, at the start of the main flow. Or combine/re-queen the nuc with the parent colony, back into a "boomer".
> 
> Best yield from a parent nuc combo: ~525 lbs ( 1st year). The average is more like 1/3 to 1/2 of that.


Isnt that pretty close to what i said? I mean, you could put the nucs over the double screen, then when the queens are loose, replace the screen with a queen excluder, and add supers straight on top of both, or have a queen excluder over the nucs! What is so difficult? Jwcarlson, no matter how awesome a 2nd year colony can be, there is still a limit to how much brood a queen can produce... wouldnt it be better to have multiple queens???


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

beestudent said:


> Jwcarlson, no matter how awesome a 2nd year colony can be, there is still a limit to how much brood a queen can produce... wouldnt it be better to have multiple queens???


If it were so much better to have several queens in a colony they would be doing it in nature more often and with greater utilization. I can't comment on specifics because I have not done it, but for one... I cannot imagine trying to keep a the different colonies within a colony from wanting to swarm. As a temporary thing maybe not an issue. It just adds a lot of variable that may make it that much harder to keep bees. 

It's so much easier to manage them as their own separate units instead of one big mondo-colony. Certainly doesn't mean it can't be done... But if it was that great wouldn't someone much better at beekeeping than you already be doing it? 

There are way way way more factors around brooding than how many eggs the queen lays. Frankly, I'm not sure most colonies are ever allowed to or managed to allow a single queen to reach her potential. It is not as easy as "more eggs". If you took a five frame nuc and added 5 more frames of eggs it doesn't mean that's necessarily good for the colony if that makes sense.

Number one issue for you in year two, Beestudent, will likely be mites. Followed closely by learning how to keep them in boxes in late May-June. Does throwing queeen right two nucs on top of a queen right colony make either of those problems easier to deal with? I don't think it probably does.

The short version to all that... I think your assertion that the queen is the limit is misplaced. Think about that. Space, available food, amount of nurse bees etc etc. A million possibilities.

Edited to add: keeping the main colony from backfilling the nucs might be a challenge.


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## biggraham610 (Jun 26, 2013)

I may be wrong, but I take the gist of Colobees post as a way to make strong early nucs into 1st yr production hives with purchased mated queens while at the same time, thwarting the swarm impulse. I am sure he will let me know if I have misconstrued his intent, but, I am pretty sure, he is not talking about the same approach as you are describing. That being said, beekeeping is about learning, and the best way to learn is to put your efforts in the hive. If you choose to try what you suggest, more power to you, nothing ventured nothing gained.. Good Luck. G

Read this Beestudent.
http://www.beesource.com/point-of-view/walt-wright/how-many-eggs-can-a-queen-lay/


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## Colobee (May 15, 2014)

Close, G... 

In response to the OP ( original post), I was sharing that I have been pulling a nuc or two, out of a decent overwintered colony (or several), and not only having them develop into decent producers, but also have the parent colony produce a "regular" crop. The net effect is an increase in honey production (AND hive numbers) from the same starter colony.

What I was trying to say is that pulling one or two nucs, from a healthy spring colony just before the swarm season, can yield as much ( if not more) honey than similar hive left untouched - especially when considering the effect of swarming on honey production.

Another point :_I'm not speculating - I've been practicing this for quite some time_.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

The number that keeps coming up is one or two.


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