So it is that time of year where the days are getting shorter and the nights are getting colder. Time to wrap up the hives for winter. We have a mild winter here in the UK so I don’t plan to do much. The poly hives are great for this as they retain heat much better than the wooden ones.
Red and Green poly hive.
These two hives are part of my experiment to leave the flow supers on over winter. I have however realised a small issue with my plans. The issue is “BeeSpace” As we all know there should be “BeeSpace” (~8 mm) between your frames so that the bees can transvers the top and so you don’t crush all the bees as you place one frame on top of another. Langstroth typically has BeeSpace at the bottom of the boxes in that the frames are 8 mm short for the height of the box. Importantly for my set up there is also space for the hive heart to sit on top of the brood box frames. The problem however is that the flow frames fit exactly into the the deep supers. There is no gap at the bottom of the frames.
2 options for the solution:
- Raise the flow frames within the deep super by 8 mm so that they protrude out the top and add a shim to the top such that the roof will still fit snug.
- Raise whole box by 8 mm using a shim at the bottom to create the bee space.
Having set about the first solution I realised that the switch in spring to having a queen excluder that has this bee space would then cause me loads of problems. Bees will fill the gap with brace comb if it is too large. The bees will spend all their energy next year filling the gab between the queen excluder and the bottom of the flow frames rather than making honey! Option 2 it is then.
The shim however creates an issue in itself. It prevents the interlocking of the polystyrene blocks of the hive and could lead to issues with thermal management over the winter. I nice line of ducktape is therefore used to fix this.
Blue and White poly hive
These go down for winter in the same way as last year. I place a rapid feeder on top that is sealed shut. This allows me at a later date to feed the hive if it needs it without opening it to the cold. Again a round of ductape is used to seal this shut from the elements and keep the hive warm. Blue poly had loads of honey stored at the top of the hive so I need to clean this off before i can fit the feeder box onto it. Perhaps this would be a good opportunity to put the blue super on as well as the red and green hives.
1 thought on “Winterising 2024”