Merit of 9 frames in a 10 frame hive

[barry42001]

thought I'd take some wise and sage advice and simply start another thread. I do not understand how it is advantageous in the brood chambers, to use 9 frames instead of 10. from my way of thinking it invites the bees to make a mass of the brood chamber by constructing all sorts of braces comb, which the Queen will used to raise brood and will be destroyed when you open the hive up. I really am not trying to be critical about this I just trying to understand the logic? I won't restate my reasons for 10 frames in a brood chamber. just my convoluted reasoning

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[blueblood]

I have never been tempted or considered using 9 frames in a 10 frame brood box.  Now, I have entertained the idea of using 9 in a medium or other honey super to get more honey.

[barry42001]

I always start 10 frames in the honey supers, until it's drawn, then I pull a frame and allow the bees to finish drawing the comb out past the top bar and side rails.

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[G3farms]

I don't understand the "nine in ten" for a brood box either. Yes they will pull the honey cells on the edges of the brood out a little farther, but the brood cells will remain a constant depth. Now let's just say you want to make up some five frame nucs in a dcoats box, well guess what, only four frames or you crush the extended honey cells.
Pull a frame out and replace it with foundation and good chance for all that extra burr and brace comb to "maybe" roll that queen (not a chance I am willing to take). Look at Jen's pics and there is good proof of that. I know that is not the norm but this is what happened to her hive.

Each to their own, but that is my thinking, it works for me and will continue to keep bees this way.

Now honey supers, "nine in ten" works great as long as it is drawn comb, and that is how I do that also.

[barry42001]

my biggest objections to that 9 in a 10, is the queen just lost 2000 workers. She probably will not lay eggs on the outside of the frame towards the wall the hive. that is still a lot of workers that's lost to my way of thinking. but that is the beauty of freedom of action, everybody's an individual and everybody has their own way of doing things. if it works it works.

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[G3farms]

She will not loose out on laying more eggs, she will just move up into the honey supers 

[barry42001]

I use excluders, and provide several upper entrances I believe if you provide the queen with adequate  space, and provide the workers with the way to bypass the brood area, a awful lot of congestion is avoided and they will take their nectar right up into the honey supers. at least that's how was work for me.

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[Jen]

Hi G3 and Barry 

Because I haven't had any hands on experience with any other hives other than my own for the last three years, I've had to learn some stuff the hard way. From what I understand about my top deep, is that the frames were not spaced correctly and a bit crooked allowing the bees to form comb in all different directions. I'm in the process of slowly correcting this problem this season.

Barry, before I trasferred my small patio hive into the standard lang, I read that nine frames in a 10 frame lang.. leaves room for the grooming bees to drop varroa mites down thru the frames, thru the screen bottom board, and onto the sticky board, suggesting another way to manage mites. Boy! was that a bunch of malarkey! Hense my first and formost problem to solve this season, my fourth.

I'm also in the process of swapping out all the plastic, and my implants.. to all wood frames and wired wax foundation. It might even take a couple of years. But I'm not in a hurry, and my hive is healthy and bustling. And so I continue to learn ~ 

[barry42001]

lol, thank you for confessing that :O actually though I would be more inclined to gently put everything together the way it should be the bees willl work out the difference and do so in short order. I am surprised at the top bars where they sit on the frame rest, that the bees do not have that all propolized to all get out. if they put enough propolis between the top bars even when its warm it's difficult to move them it just glues everything down terribly.

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[tecumseh]

first off I would flatly state that the 'best' way for me does not necessarily mean the best way for you.  I do not, have not and will not argue against any strategy or plan that works for you.  This however does NOT MEAN I will give anyone a pass on advantages or limitation that are misstated or understated. 

I myself place 10 new frames + foundation into a box until drawn (generally season 1 in their employment).  After these are fully drawn I then convert everything from the bottom of the stack to the top with 9 frames.  As far as my own experience 9 frames in a ten frame box is the rule in every commercial operation I have worked for < having worked for multiple decades for people who make their living off of literally thousands of hives should be prima facia evidence that the + greatly out weight the disadvantages when it comes to this strategy.

For the commercial operation this basically accomplishes several things 1) during inspection of the brood chamber this allow you to easily remove one of the center frames without disturbing any other frames in the box and without rolling all the adult bees on the faces (4) of the frames..... 2) in the transport mode this allows for a bit more room and less crowding in the brood chamber < basically if you are moving bees in even slightly warm weather this limits overheating of the hives and the killing of both adult and brood bees and the hotter the temperature the larger the risk. ONE ASSOCIATION I CAN CLEARLY SEE HERE.... in my own hives even though I do not transport them around during the hotter months I have much less overheating problem when I have 9 frames in the box and more overheating (read melt down) in those boxes with 10 frames in the box.  I would suggest a small but significant advantage is that with 9 frames you do get a bit more circulation up thru the center of the box.  Even if this were not true #1 above would still highly influence me to run 9 frames in a 10 frame box.

Stated vs actual disadvantages... in the brood box you will get a slight thicker comb towards the top of the frame in the brood nest.  this can create some problem if you try and cram 5 frames in a 5 frame nuc box but it certainly presents no problem if you only use 4 frames (which is basically what I do).  9 frames DOES NOT mean that the queen will lay any less and contrary to Barry assertion a queen will lay into the outside frames if there is nothing to prevent her from laying there and even if you removed the 2 very outside frames there is still enough brood space left (7 frames) that if did use an excluder to confine the queen to the bottom most box this would still represent plenty of laying room as long as there are no limitation to the queens laying (here this basically means either CAPPED honey or a SOLID FRAME of pollen)  < the first you can scrape capping and over a fairly short period of time remove this limitation but the second is a bit more dicey and I suspect represent a much larger problem for a longer period of time than most folks might think.

9 or even 8 frames in a box for honey collection will give you NO more honey but it does make the uncapping much easier.  as far as I can tell the total honey from either 9 or 10 frames is about the same.

during transport 9 frames can move around a bit more than 10.  I address this when necessary by using my hive tool to crow bar the frames into opposite corners <this essentially leaves two small triangular open spaces along the two sides of the box.  in the same manner come winter time I commonly 'crow bar' the frames together and then come spring time space them out evenly once again.

I do get a bit of cross built comb but I remove this when necessary as I do any excess comb along the top or bottom bars < in my own employment in commercial operation the willingness to do this time involved task is often time what distinguishes a good employee from a bad employee.... basically the time you devote to this task really means everyone who comes behind you task is much much easier.

and finally a Barry snip...
I use excluders, and provide several upper entrances I believe if you provide the queen with adequate  space, and provide the workers with the way to bypass the brood area, a awful lot of congestion is avoided and they will take their nectar right up into the honey supers. at least that's how was work for me.

tecumseh...
sounds like I could have written that myself and this is basically 'the plan' I devised for myself after reading Jerry Hayes article 'is a queen excluder a honey excluder'.

[apisbees]

the honey stored in a 9 frame verses a 10 frame super comes down to the bee space between the frames will be the same in either case so in a 9 frame you have 10 bee spaces and in a 10 frame you have 11. So a 9 frame super will yield a small amount of additional honey, only if the frames are spaced before any of the cells are caped and there has been an intense enough flow for the bees to fill the super.
If you could get a queen to lay from top bar to bottom bar and from one end bar to the other the best queens could only fill 8 frames with brood. In the hive bees like the honey and ring of pollen around the brood so in reality the queen will use 12 to 14 frames for brood. The rest of the frames will contain honey and pollen. so dropping to 9 frames in each of the brood boxes will not effect the bee population of the hive unless the brood chamber becomes congested with honey and pollen. But this can happen whether 9 or 10 frames are used.
All references to frames is for the standard Langstroth size.

[blueblood]

Wow, good thread.  Tec, I wouldn't have accepted the 9 frame practice idea had you not explained it from a commercial point of view.  That certainly makes sense and I can see the back yard keepers advantages in relation as well.  I appreciate the many old farts on here such as you and Apis.  It's like having a living reference library.

[riverbee]

thank you tecumseh, and thank you apis.

[barry42001]

first what I would like to point out is that at least one and instance the nine frame brood chamber was an accident, nothing intentional about it. of course I can't refute Tec, from a commercial beekeeper's perpective. as a backyard beekeeper while i understand the concept of proper ventilation, I've never had comb meltdown or sag, ever. with that said most of my experience comes from up north, we'll see what Florida has the offer with regards to that. I have always run with 10 frames in the brood chamber never less. even after you squeeze the frames together there will be adequate space between the number one frame in the wall and the number 10 frame and the wall the pry frames apart. of course I make it to practice to remove one of the end frames anyway this way as I start to remove other frames in the course of the inspection I avoid rolling the bees. the beauty of keeping bees is that every beekeeper has their own methodology on how they keep their bees. and what works is  what works. there is a vast difference between a commercial operation and a backyard operation. for the moment I will maintain my colonies in the method that I believe will work for them and me. keeping bees in New York State is not the same as Florida I have to adapt to what it is down here hopefully I won't have any issues where I'm currently  located that I had previously .
for the moment that's all comment on the subject.

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[LazyBkpr]

Tec;
 This however does NOT MEAN I will give anyone a pass on advantages or limitation that are misstated or understated.


   YAY I didn't say anything! So no slinking away in shame!!!!

  heheh..  Thanks for the perspective. I really did want to understand the reasons. Mrs River cleared it up for me pretty well in PM's but this also helped.

[barry42001]

lol I never did do some slinking away well. in my formative years in beekeeping nowhere in my readings did they ever discuss anything less than 10 frames in brood chambers.

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[Jen]

This kind of conversation is how new inventions are designed. I'm always open to what is new on the floor. This has been a wonderful educational thread! Nice going everyone.

[G3farms]

Would be even better if RB could have shared here! 

Getting private lessons huh LB 

[tecumseh]

and thank ya' Barry and Lzybkr for your good sense of humor and once again even beyond this small question 'if a strategy works for you... how could I possible argue with that?'

[Jen]

Barry- ""if they put enough propolis between the top bars even when its warm it's difficult to move them it just glues everything down terribly.""

Regardless of what hive and how many frames I've used (had to burn three) my bees have propolised everything in site, I could have mortared a house by now. Glue monsters they are