Drone foundation

[mmurphoh]

I am trying drone foundation for varroa control this year.  Was wondering if at some point I should remove it and replace it with drawn comb for the winter months?

[tbonekel]

Well, if you have not been welcomed yet, then welcome! Glad you are here! As far as your question goes, if they draw the foundation right and drones appear, I would move the comb to the outside of the hive once they emerge. That way, hopefully, they will back fill with honey. I'm still learning so don't take that to the bank.

[Riverrat]

YOu can do as Tbonekel suggested and move to the outside to back fill.  You may have to extract the frame next year to use as drone comb again.  It may be easier to pull and save for next year.

[kebee]

 Welcome mmurphoh to the froum, I think you will like it here.

Ken

[LazyBkpr]

That is more or less what I do.. My bees will back fill their drone frames with honey about mid summer. I make sure those frames are in the center before winterizing, and the bees will generally have them well cleaned up by the time they want to raise more drones.
   I usually only use the drone cells as an indication of mite numbers..  Pop open a bunch of those cells and count the mites..   I found a couple hives this year that averaged 5 mites per drone cell..  That usually means a crash is imminent..   Three treatments of OA Vapor and they are now BOOMING hives.

[rodmaker]

   He's using the drone comb for varroa control so he will need to freeze with larva still sealed. If this is your intension then just replace the comb after freezing and the bees will clean it out.  The only way this works for varroa control is to kill the drone brood.

[Slowmodem]

I'm thinking that you need to replace it more often that every 21 days or you'll have a mite explosion.  Once the mite population goes down for the year, you could replace it with a regular frame.

[pistolpete]

I use Drone baiting for Varroa as part of my system.   It works ok, but it takes the hive a large amount of resources to raise a full deep frame of drones.  For that reason I only do it once or twice a year, usually at the beginning of August when they have all the foragers they need for bringing in the crop and mite levels are on the up swing.

     the method is pretty simple, pop in a frame of drone sized foundation in the middle of the brood nest.  It takes them a few days to draw it out, then the eggs are laid, sealed 8 days later.   So the frame is ready for removal after about 14 days.   Pop in the freezer for a day.   Then I scratch the cappings and hive the frame a gentle bang so that most of the pupae pop out.   Put it back in the hive and again remove after two weeks.   After the second round I let them clean up the frame and after two days I take it out and store till next year. 

I suppose a really strong hive can handle continuous drone baiting, but it takes two frames of honey to raise one frame of bees, so it is a bit wasteful of their resources.   Also if you forget to remove the frame in time, you've given the mites a population boost.