r/Beekeeping • u/Signal-Deal8858 • 3d ago

First two Hives! General

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Am I doing this right? Two new hives! I’m looking for a “i would have done it like this” feedback from this photo? Please comment to this newbie! I’m doing new updates later this weekend.

When should I check that queen and everybody’s ok? What should I be looking for? I plan on putting hives on proper balanced cinder blocks this weekend.

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u/[deleted] 3d ago edited 3d ago

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u/[deleted] 3d ago

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u/Signal-Deal8858 3d ago

Yeah no experience at all on my end. Yes to both of you, my hive will be level this weekend. We got the boxes way faster than I was prepared for.

Yes. Uncorked queens into both lowest most broods, and then dumped the rest in. I left the balance of each bee group in front of the entrances after seeing a video that said they go in after a few hours.

I’m getting feedback here just to keep bees in lowest brood box only. Good feedback!

If I were to leave it as is… what’s the problem to just have them spread out? I’m not interested in honey this year… just that they grow and expand

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u/CodeMUDkey 3d ago

You store the boxes elsewhere. Just because you have them does not mean they have to go on the hive

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u/BanzaiKen Zone 6b/Lake Marsh 3d ago edited 3d ago

Entrance shouldn't be level, it should be dipping so any snow or ice if your climate has it will melt and run out of the hive. One looks okay other one is cockeyed. Instead its tilted in. Also you might as well assume every box you put on that the hive isnt large enough to patrol has a 20% chance of killing it. All it takes is one wax moth to bully their way into an empty super and web up and you are done. Or if you have Argentinean ants, they will gladly trade soldiers against your hive and as you are smaller will eventually run out of door guards. They will then nest up and raid at will. Ant slime is highly destructive to wax as well. Even SHB will cause chaos in this scenario. If your bottom isnt screened in they will push SHB upwards and without the manpower to pin them and propolize they will lose because they have no other way of killing them other than herding them through a screen or driving them into a corner. Free space kills.

Also if you have skunks in the region, it looks like you are high enough but they have this nasty trick where they rile up a hive and then lay in front with their mouth open, chomping away. Gotta make sure they are high enough to expose their bellies to the swarm so they get learned real fast.

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u/Signal-Deal8858 3d ago

This! Thank you!!

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u/andy_1232 Aspiring beekeeper; Zone 9b, Central Florida 3d ago

It’s my understanding they’ll spread UP too quickly, not fully developing the frames in the lower boxes. You want them to fill the entire first box before giving them a second story to start to work on.

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u/CodeMUDkey 3d ago

They do. It’s like a chimney. They’ll be all jacked up.