Honey Production Hives

[tedh]

Hi Everyone,
I hear the term "production hives" from time to time.  I think the term is self explanatory, that it refers to a hive used to produce honey.  After all, momma didn't raise any fools, except maybe for brother Tommy.  Anyway, my understanding of a production hive is that you want to build it up for maximum honey production, however you need to take certain steps to avoid swarming.  I thought we did this.  We rotated the boxes, we removed 4 frames to open up the brood chamber, then we sat back and watched them go to town.  Just so you know, both of our hives survived the winter!  Also for clarity sake let me add that instead of referring to the hives as "my hive" or "Josh's hive", the two of us are in this together after all, we started numbering hives and now refer to them by number.  Back to the question.  After the precautions we took, number 2 hive swarmed and number 1 hive was in swarm mode.  So, how does one keep the hive population large enough to make extra honey and yet low enough to not feel the need to swarm?  My guess is that you would periodically remove frames of brood and either destroy the brood in that/those frames or donate them to weaker hives.  Which leads to another question.  What would be the indicators that a frame or frames need to be removed?  Is there a "rule of thumb" a person can go by?  Thanks, Ted

[efmesch]

Swarming is a natural process for bee hives to multiply.  When we try to prevent swarming, we're attempting to restrict a natural instinct that has been with bees for millions of years. 
That having been said, we beekeepers can do many things in  management to limit the expression of this instinct.  Any "complete" discusssion of this topic would fill encyclopedias so I'll just touch briefly on a few items and leave plenty to be said by those who continue this thread.
1. Room in the hive.  If the bees feel crowded, they'll move into swarming gear---add new supers in plenty of time, don't wait  till the last minute to put them on.
2. Age of the queen.  Younger queens tend to head colonies that swarm less.  To prevent swarming we often have to face the unwanted decision of whether or not to replace good queens.
3. Activity---give the girls work to do---meaning  frames to build.
4. Temperature in the hive---make sure there is enough circulation of air to cool things off---open entrances, shift upper supers back to make added air enter and cool the hive. 

I'm sure there's more coming,,

[tedh]

Hmmm.  Interesting.  Thanks ef.  We added the honey super (undrawn foundation) at the beginning of May.  My observation was that until they had drawn out the foundation we used to replace frames removed for the split they didn't touch the super.  They just started pulling wax in the super this past weekend.  We did replace the queen early this spring.  As already stated they had plenty of frames to work on.  That leaves temperature inside the hive.  We do use upper entrances but the bottom entrance is still open to the 3(?) inch opening.  I wonder if removing the entrance reducer would have helped.  We have had some unseasonably cool weather so...  Then again, the hive was obviously strong enough that it could have clustered for the cooler temps.  I would guess they were also strong enough to repel any would be invaders.  Hmmm.  Maybe air circulation, or rather lack of, added to the desire to swarm.

[tbonekel]

I think you are right.  The term production hive typically is a hive that is for honey production. But, it could, of course be the production of anything, queens, brood, wax, etc....

It is difficult to not become frustrated when doing everything you feel is right, only to have them decide to do something on their own. If you had your bees in double deeps and they were filling it pretty well, then yes, you probably could have removed the entrance reducer. There should be more than enough bees to protect their investment. But that's not saying that is the reason. Bees are very good at controlling the inside temps, regardless of the entrance, outside temp, etc...

Here is how I look at my situation. I have five hives. At this point, I really only want enough honey for my family and a few friends. If every one of my hives produced really well, that would be way more than I could ever use. That would be a blessing. Having the extra hives allows for some "issues" along the way. If you are just starting out, consider this a great learning opportunity and don't beat yourself up about any thing you might blame yourself for.

[tedh]

Thanks tbone.  I like that.  Right now we have 2 overwintered hives in double deeps.  We are in the process of building up another 7 hives.  If all goes well and barring any winter losses (over optimistic perhaps ) we hope to have 9 double deep hives next spring.  Our goal was never to produce tons of honey.  We would like to produce enough honey for ourselves and our family, parents, brothers, sister, etc..  So maybe the idea is that not each hive will produce lot's of extra honey but over all we'll have enough for our purposes.  Kind of like farming.  Plant some seeds, tend some plants, harvest some grain, hope to sell for more than you have in it.  More about averages than what each individual hive produces.  Thanks, Ted

[LazyBkpr]

Ted, you go through the motions..  Maybe pull a light split out of the hive. Give them extra room, add foundation, and make sure the brood area is not getting plugged with pollen and or nectar.. add in a new queen for a bonus to swarm prevention.. and they still swarm...   it happens...

    New queen should make a big difference, provided they had room in the brood area..  I watched one of my hives swarm on the hill, and was a bit confused, until I checked it out... the lower box was packed TIGHT with pollen.. a capped cell or larvae here and there.. second box had honey in four of the ten frames, with honey and pollen around the volley ball sized brood area, and a honey cap over the brood area 3/4 of a frame deep.... with nothing in any of the two drawn supers above.. completely empty...
    I should have pulled the honey cap out and moved it to the top and replaced it with drawn frames, they wouldnt have swarmed..   I didnt catch it in time...  went through the rest of my hives and equalized the pollen frames a bit, moved some honey up....  Hope they hold till we get back!

[brooksbeefarm]

For honey production i look for strong hives that built up early, go in and find the queen and and put her in a  nuc with a couple of capped brood frames and bees. I make sure they have eggs and open larva in the mother hive.They will make another queen and the brood left will hatch out leaving the work force with only honey production until the new queen is bred and laying. This has worked for me to get a good honey crop and a new queen and no swarming, which they probably would have because of the fast build up.I will usually put two or three med supers of drawn comb on for them to fill and keep an eye on them, because they can fill a super in a weeks time on a good flow. Sometimes you come up queenless but you've still got the old queen. Jack

[pistolpete]

Like LazyBkpr said, sometimes you can do everything right and they'll still swarm.  The swarming impulse starts several weeks before they swarm and if your interventions happen after they have already decided, it's a lost cause.

I'd like to expand on Efmensh's 1st point: room in the hive.  I think room in the brood nest is more accurate.   You can add 5 supers, but if the brood nest is congested and the queen is running out of room to lay, they'll swarm anyway.  Periodically checkerboarding the brood nest in a strong hive during swarming season helps.  The brood frames can be used to make up Nucs or get moved up above the excluder to hatch out and encourage the bees to start using the super.

This year I had a hive that had their queen removed to a Nuc at the and of April and their brood nest had lots of room.  They raised 2 new queens and swarmed anyway.

A production hive should hit their peak strength shortly before your richest nectar flows of the year.  That's quite a tricky thing to achieve and takes good knowledge of your bees and your nectar producing plants.

[LazyBkpr]

   Well said.
   Production hive..   attempting to keep it as strong as possible and still prevent swarming..  if swarming occurs, all is not lost.. the remaining bees will continue gathering nectar while they wait for the new queen to emerge, get mated, and start laying.. so often, even a hive that has swarmed will produce 120 lbs of honey, you just have to use more care about how much you take.

[Riverrat]

 Cant stop swarming but you can give them room.  Add honey supers and make sure the queen has room to lay by moving frames around

[Lburou]

For honey production i look for strong hives that built up early, go in and find the queen and and put her in a  nuc with a couple of capped brood frames and bees. I make sure they have eggs and open larva in the mother hive.They will make another queen and the brood left will hatch out leaving the work force with only honey production until the new queen is bred and laying....

This works for me too, with the caveat that timing is everything when you do this.

[sc-bee]

.. so often, even a hive that has swarmed will produce 120 lbs of honey, you just have to use more care about how much you take.

Must be nice. In my location if a hive swarms, honey production is done....

[LazyBkpr]

With no brood to care for the extra bees foraging can almost make up the difference.  If they dont bring in nearly as much, then there was not much to bring in to begin with.. Meaning, the flow had ended by the time they swarmed, or by the time the extra foragers were leaving the hive for the first time.  Thats what Lee was talking about with timing being right.

This works for me too, with the caveat that timing is everything when you do this.