When to Add Supers to a Standard Hive
Excerpted from: When to HoneyAdd Supers to a Standard Hive
If you haven’t done so already, it may be time to think about adding honey supers to your hives. Honey supers
are essential for honey collection, but perhaps just as important for relieving overcrowding inside the hive.
During the spring build-up you can lift the back of your hive to gauge how full it is. Keep in mind that brood
boxes contain brood, which is lighter than honey. When you reach the point of having two brood chambers
mostly full of honey and brood, you will want to give the bees more space to add extra stores of honey.
You will know it’s time to add a honey super when your bees have filled the brood boxes and are covering the
center of 6 or 7 frames of the next box.
In terms of the best timing for when to add honey supers, a good rule of thumb is to super your hive when
eight of the ten frames in the top brood chamber box are being used for brood and for nectar/honey/pollen
storage.
Once the honey flow begins, there can be a rapid buildup of honey, so we suggest monitoring closely and
adding more honey supers in advance of when they are actually needed. It is better to give your bees more
room than less during the honey flow.
How high you go with honey supers depends on how strong your
bees are going into the nectar flow and also on the nectar availability of the season. If it is too hot and dry or
too wet and damp for the bees to fly, this will affect the amount of nectar coming in.
Propolis: The Glue Holding The Frames In Place
Bee propolis is a sticky, brown substance sometimes known as bee glue. The honey bees gather tree resin,
the main ingredient in propolis, from buds and cracks in the bark. Read a full discussion of propolis.
All of this spring activity can lead to overcrowding and confusion in the hive. When colonies are jammed
up in this way, it increases the likelihood that the colony will swarm – meaning that the old queen will fly
off with a large portion of the workers, plus whatever stored nectar they can stuff into their honey
stomachs, to look for new housing.
An early-supered colony will have a larger nest volume needing climate control, and they will have a lot
of empty real estate to protect from nest invaders like wax moths. Also, the workers may rush up to the
super and start filling it with honey before they have finished putting much away down below, on the
periphery of the combs in the brood chamber — honey they will need when winter comes.
Even newly-established hives must be watched carefully to be sure there is enough room for honey
storage. You can’t always expect to get surplus honey from a new colony, because they typically must
devote their resources to building up their numbers, to making wax for the combs, and to storing enough
honey for their own use during the winter. But if conditions are good, you can sometimes add one or two
supers and get a small honey harvest in the first year.
Most beekeepers like to use a queen excluder between the brood chamber and the honey supers, to
keep the queen from laying eggs in the frames that are to be harvested for honey. A queen excluder is a
sheet made of thin metal bars or of perforated plastic that fits over the brood chamber. The workers can
come and go but the queen, with her wider body, can’t squeeze her way through them to get into the supers.
Honey supers are shorter and thus lighter than brood boxes but are otherwise identical, and they use
the same types of frames and foundation sheets. The size of super that you use is a matter of personal
preference. A shallow super (5 ¾ inches high) weighs about 40 pounds when full; a medium super
(6 5/8 inches high) weighs about 60 pounds. If you decide to use a standard deep box (9 5/8 inches high)
as a honey super, it could end up weighing 90 pounds when full of honey, something most beekeepers
would rather avoid.
Take this quick quiz and see how much you know about honey bee anatomy. Honey Bees play an
important role in pollination. Give the quiz a try!
Ever wondered where bees go in the winter? Take a look at the winter survival strategies
of native bumblebees, and native solitary bees.
This guide features regional native plants for the Great Lakes that are highly
attractive to native bees and honey bees.
Bee propolis is a sticky, brown substance sometimes known as bee glue. The honey bees
gather tree resin, the main ingredient in propolis, from buds and cracks in the bark. The bees
add salivary secretions to the resin by chewing on it and add beeswax to the mix. Propolis
has a little pollen in it, too. When analyzed, propolis contains about 50% resin, 30% wax and
oils, 10% salivary secretions, 5% pollen, and 5% amino acids, vitamins, and minerals.
Hive Tool
The honey bee workers use propolis as a construction material, similar to plaster or caulk.
They cover the interior surfaces of the hive with it and fill any gaps and cracks. Bees also use
it to strengthen their honeycomb. In a man-made hive box, the bees will use propolis to seal
the lid and hive boxes together. The beekeeper uses a special hive tool to break the propolis
seal and remove the lid.
Propolis is known to have antimicrobial properties, and many scientists are studying the
potential uses of propolis as a therapy for certain diseases. Propolis is particularly effective
at killing the microorganisms that cause gum disease. It has also been shown to be effective
at inhibiting the growth of certain cancers.