Planning for honey supers this spring
Hello, I started two hives (now three medium boxes each) last spring. This will be my first spring to try and get honey. I was planning to purchase two medium boxes for each hive to use as honey supers. These will be new frames too. A few questions:
1) Is a queen excluder recommended?
2) Will the workers build out frames on new frames above the queen excluder (if I use one).
3) Should I "prime" the new honey super box with a built out frame from the existing medium boxes?
4) Should I add one medium box super and wait for that to get filled before adding a second?
Any other recommendations? Thanks for your help!
Eric
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I recommend to have 3 or even 4 medium boxes ready to be used as honey supers. Some of my hives require 6 honey suppers. I use 3 mediums for brood nest. So, I end up with a stack of 9 boxes. During spring, I check my hives every week to determine if there is a need to put a new super on. Old practice, I was told, is to have always an empty super on the top. This year, you will have frames only with foundation, your bees will create honey comb using honey that they make, so your honey crop will be limited.
Bees prefer not to use plastic foundation, I use all wax foundation for honey frames and no queen excluder. I believe that a q. excluder contributes to swarming. The same holds for true for a lack of space for nectar storage.
Regards,
Paul