Transferring Frames Of Brood From Nuc To Hives

[Jen]

Last time I checked my nucs was two weeks ago I think. I moved a frame of brood from the nuc to one of my weaker hives. I'll prob have to do this again in this next week. So, when I move a frame of brood from a nuc, should I shake the nurse bees off it before I add that brood to the hive?

[apisbees]

If your using brood from a nuc to support a hive you need to evaluate the hive to know why this needs to be done and is the queen worth saving. If it is because the hive has been broodless for the last 30 days while they raised a queen then yes  give then the resources. If the queen just cant build up and you have given brood before it may be time to pinch her. If the hive needs brood and bees and the nuc can spare then then yes move the bees with the frame. Make sure that there are enough bees to care for the brood if only brood is moved. If you are giving brood in the hopes that they will raise a queen It is to late for that now even in sunny California.
Hopefully I answered your question somewhere in here.

[pistolpete]

Typical bee keeping answer: Well, it depends ...

I sometimes use extra bees and brood from a Nuc to make a strong hive even stronger for better honey production.  Kind of a modified 2 queen system.  I usually take the bees and the brood.

[Jen]

Hi Apis and Pete ~ I'm simply trying to manage a nuc. My nucs now are bearding more than my hives, but all in all none of them are bearding much.

Anyway, I don't have the knack down for managing a nuc yet. Trying to keep two queens banked and wintered. I keep forgetting that i need to check on them more than the hives. It will be three weeks. Last check the nucs were full of brood and nowhere for queen to lay, honeycomb stuffed everywhere.

So I just need a place to put the extra brood that the nuc makes, and replace with an empty pulled frame for the queen. Keeping the nuc at 2 frames of brood/larvae/eggs, a frame of honey, and frame of pollen, and an empty pulled frame for the queen. Not neccessarily in that order.

I know that I could be building another nuc with the extra brood, but I don't want that many nucs. Focusing on 2-3 hives and two nucs as my apiary.

I have three hives, and two are not bustling, so I can put the extra brood in one of those two.

[apisbees]

Then by all means move as much brood and bees as needed to keep the bees in the nucs content. Inspections every 7 to 10 days to keep on top of queen cells being built.

[iddee]

Make the nucs double deep for winter.

[tbonekel]

Hey Jen, I've been keeping bees about as long as you and I still can't wrap my brain around the advantages of keeping and maintaining nucs. I've read all the reasons and I certainly won't argue against it, but one of the reasons that I don't do it is exactly what you are going through. You have a nuc that is busting. If you have a hive that doesn't need the resources, then what? For a person wanting to expand their operation or sell queens, I can see it, but at this time, I don't care to become anything more than a hobby keep with just a handful of hives. From what I know of you, aren't you kind of in that same position? I highly respect the knowledge and advice from the regular posters on this board. They have been keeping bees way longer than I have, so let me be clear that I don't think they are wrong. I just want you to look at your situation and what works for you. I would say just turn that nuc into a 10 frame hive and be done with it, but then I don't know your winters and what kind of hive you need to over winter.

[lazy shooter]

Man on man, did Tbonekel hit the nail on the head.  He expressed my sentiments exactly. 

If you have a few hives, it is sage advice to keep a nuc so that there is a replacement queen available at all times.  That is simple and easy to understand.  But, the nuc grows or dies, and let's assume it prospers.  The nuc out grows its house and needs more room, hence another hive is started and now there is not a replacement queen available.  Then you need to make another nuc, and the circle remains unbroken, but  it is getting larger.

If one is a successful beekeeper as a hobbyest, the their apiary grows.  Apparently, one has to get rid of one or two colonies (hive or nuc) each year.

Cattle are easier!

[LazyBkpr]

Hey Jen, I've been keeping bees about as long as you and I still can't wrap my brain around the advantages of keeping and maintaining nucs. I've read all the reasons and I certainly won't argue against it, but one of the reasons that I don't do it is exactly what you are going through. You have a nuc that is busting. If you have a hive that doesn't need the resources, then what? For a person wanting to expand their operation or sell queens, I can see it, but at this time, I don't care to become anything more than a hobby keep with just a handful of hives. From what I know of you, aren't you kind of in that same position? I highly respect the knowledge and advice from the regular posters on this board. They have been keeping bees way longer than I have, so let me be clear that I don't think they are wrong. I just want you to look at your situation and what works for you. I would say just turn that nuc into a 10 frame hive and be done with it, but then I don't know your winters and what kind of hive you need to over winter.

   If she keeps those nucs, she doesnt have to buy a replacement queen, and the nuc offers something to play with instead of fussing with the production hive. Jen does like to peek often.
   Nucs offer resources to fix problems, and I dont care who you are, your eventually going to have a problem. Then the problems can be fixed by stealing resources fromt he nucs, instead of the production hive...
   No, its not a necessity at all, and if you dont want nucs, then you shouldnt keep them. If, on the other hand you like the idea, the go for it!
   Management is as she is doing. Swapping out brood frames about every 21 days with drawn frames from the hives. if you dont have room to swap out those brood frames, freeze them, decap them, put them back in.. the bees will clean them out and the queen will re lay in them.

    As stated Mrs. Jen.. do what needs to be done!  If your weak hive does not have enough bees to cover the brood, then make sure to take nurse bees from frames of open brood. If your taking a capped frame, shake the bees off. Then pull a frame of open brood, and shake the bees from that into the hive your strengthening. Nurse bees dont care who the queen is so long as she IS.

[rober]

early on I would have snuffed the non performing queen & given the hive a frame with eggs to make a new queen or given the hive the queen from the nuc & let the nuc make a new queen. at this stage I think I'd snuff the queen & combine one of the nucs with it. it's getting late & you want a strong hive going into winter & a strong queen to get things going next spring. & I'm with iddee. put a 2nd story on the remaining nuc if you plan on overwintering it. I have 2 2 story nucs I plan on overwintering. i'll sell them in the spring or use them if needed. overwintered nucs make strong hives.

[Jen]

Tbone - this is the first year I have tried nucs. I have 2 and they are doing well, except that, like I mentioned, I haven't gotten into the rhythm of checking them every 10 days or so. Last year I had to buy 3 queens which cost me $100. This year I learned a little more about swapping out my resources, and I only had to buy one queen for $50. Thought I would give it a whirl and see how I do with nucs. I like the idea of banking queens, they're expensive!

Scott- I have much more experience this year and don't see the need to peek as much as I did the first year. But the information I learned in my peeking year is invaluable 

"if you dont have room to swap out those brood frames, freeze them, decap them, put them back in.. the bees will clean them out and the queen will re lay in them"
 
     I like this idea! Last year it would have mortified my to kill brood, but I'm getting more scientific about the management of the bee world now.
     So when you say decap them, do you mean with the decapping fork comb thingy? like when you decap honey?

http://www.amazon.com/Keeping-Stainless-Steel-Uncapping-Fork/dp/B00H1P4UR6/ref=sr_1_fkmr1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1439246013&sr=8-1-fkmr1&keywords=decapping+fork+beekeeping

"As stated Mrs. Jen.. do what needs to be done!  If your weak hive does not have enough bees to cover the brood, then make sure to take nurse bees from frames of open brood. If your taking a capped frame, shake the bees off. Then pull a frame of open brood, and shake the bees from that into the hive your strengthening. Nurse bees dont care who the queen is so long as she IS.

    Okay, this makes sense Thanks

[pistolpete]

I disagree with the "freeze the brood frames" bit.  You're talking about frames of capped brood here.  A lot of resources have gone into that frame to get them to that stage.  Might as well throw money in the garbage.  IMO there's always room somewhere for a frame of capped brood. 

 To me the best solution to long term Nuc management is to make them 2 high (two 5 frame boxes) or 10 wide (standard one box hive).  This will enable the Nuc to grow to the point where it can be split into two Nucs or left in tact with enough stores to winter on.

I don't maintain Nucs other than in the spring for queen rearing.  I do run one or two small hives at any given time.   Around the end of June I decide to either let them grow to two boxes, or combine with another hive for great honey production. 

[Jen]

Pete, have you ever had a brood box fill all ten frames with brood... curious

[LazyBkpr]

I disagree with the "freeze the brood frames" bit.  You're talking about frames of capped brood here.  A lot of resources have gone into that frame to get them to that stage.  Might as well throw money in the garbage.  IMO there's always room somewhere for a frame of capped brood. 

   If you only have two or three hives? No, there isnt always enough room for capped brood. When you have hives on the verge of swarming, and nucs that are about to overflow as well, you need to do something.. I suppose you could always just let it happen and throw your money in the garbage when they ALL decide to swarm.
   Not everyone has a dozen hives or more. Not everyone wants to keep creating more and more nucs/hives.
Dont forget the entire purpose of keeping the nuc in the first place. YES, it is to use...  To take resources from INSTEAD of the production hive. it is meant to be used to FIX problems, from a weak hive to a queen less situation..  We have all been there. But, there will come a time, when nothing needs fixed, no queens need replaced, and your hives are all strong and booming... Especially if you only have three or four of them!

   You dont want more hives. You dont even have the equipment for another hive, and you dont know anyone that has the equipment or wants another hive/nuc. The solution is to begin pulling an occasional frame of brood. Not ALL of the brood, but enough to maintain the hive at its current level. You want the older bees replaced, but dont want them to gain more of a population... If you dont do something, they will swarm. Swarming IS the goal they have set their sites on...   It would be nice if you could have a chat with them, and explain the situation, and get them to agree to cut back and maintain, but its just not that simple...  waste a little brood, or lose half your production hives and nucs.
   I dont like it either, and I usually have some place to put brood, but like I said, if you have only a few hives, andeverything is going too well, you have to make the choice on what to lose.

[Zweefer]

Thank you for once agin speaking my thoughts before I can Lazy!

[Jen]

Scott, that's what I did a couple weekends ago. I think I pulled two frames of brood and eggs from each hive and put them into my 2 week hives, then replaced with empty pulled frames. maintaining 2 frames of brood/eggs/larvae, one empty for queen to lay in, one frame of honey, one framed of pollen and assorted whatever. That makes up my 5 frame nuc. I'll make another post about managing a nuc, because I need to know more about wintering it, and some other questions.

As usual, I love my panel of experts here ~ 

[pistolpete]

Ok Scott, you have some nice points there.  I guess my experience has been a little different.  Every time I post a Nuc for sale on line, about 5 people want it and it's off my hands within a day.  Then later in the season I want my production hives overflowing and that gets rid of any extra bees.

Jen: there is some pretty easy money to be made in Nucs if you're geared up for it.  This spring I took my 4 wintered hives and made up 9 Nucs over the course of a month.  Sold 7 of them for a total $1050 (if my memory serves me right) .  I kept one Nuc, combined one and caught a swarm.  That took my hive count to 6.  Making up Nucs becomes super easy with practice.  Raising queens for them all has been the tricky part for me. 

There is of course a trade off.  I will have 50 or 60 Lbs of honey per hive instead of the 150 average in our area. To sell $1000 in honey takes a heck of a lot more work.

[LazyBkpr]

I dont disagree with that at all Pete, that is the way to go, the way to do it if you possibly can!

[Jen]

Earlier this year I had done some pretty good thinking about overwintering nucs... because others on this forum were talking a lot about selling nucs in the spring. I like the idea! and I like the idea of having a little bee bank account.

Hmmm, I don't think I can do it this year tho, I had too many queen problems that set back two of my three hives this spring.

We'll see what this month of August gives my hives ~

[iddee]

""I disagree with the "freeze the brood frames" bit.""   

So do I.
There's always room for another box on top. There's always a sale for a nuc, or a group to donate it to.  I would compare killing 3000 larva to my neighbor spraying a small swarm.