Not much is worse than checking on a beehive…and seeing a lot of baby bee cells in with your honey.
You can’t get the honey out without killing the baby bees. And you can’t get the baby bees out without ruining the honey.
Not a good situation.
So how do you keep the baby bees out of the honey?
The best way to prevent baby bees (or brood) from getting in the honey is to keep the queen bee from laying eggs in the honey cells. That is simple enough…right? I mean, if you can keep the queen from laying eggs in the honey cells, then you fixed the problem.
That should be easy enough…
Well, sort of…
If you have a beehive with wax foundation and you put a new swarm into that beehive, the bees will often start to draw out honeycomb on several different frames at once.
They may start building comb in the upper hive box…and they may start building in the lower hive box. I have even seen them build comb in both boxes at once.
Baby bees in the honey? Hmm…
Is this a bad thing? No, but it can lead to baby bees in the honey. Here is why…
The queen bee always lays eggs in the newest and freshest honeycomb. That is just how honeybees do it. So, if you have a frame hive, the queen bee will find the new honeycomb and lay eggs in that honeycomb.
Often the bees will draw out comb in the upper hive boxes, and then start to put honey into that comb. At the same time, the queen bee will smell the new honeycomb and lay her eggs in it.
The result? Baby bees in the honey. Not the easiest to work with.
If you have a frame hive you can try to use a queen excluder to keep the queen bee towards the bottom of the hive. This does not always work. Furthermore, is a queen excluder really good for your beehive? The excluder forms a barrier in the hive. Such a barrier is not a natural feature in wild beehives. In natural hives, the queen bee is free to roam about the hive at will.
But, if the queen can go anywhere in the hive, won’t she lay eggs anywhere she chooses?
If you have a Top Bar Hive, the solution is simple!
In a top bar hive there is no foundation. The bees begin building honeycomb at the top of the hive box. They draw it down towards the floor of the hive. So, the older comb is always towards the top of the hive.
And the newer comb is towards the bottom of the hive. The picture on the right displays this building process.
Since the queen always lays eggs in the newest comb, the baby bees will always be towards the bottom of the hive.
And the all of your honey will be towards the top of the hive, since the honeybees prefer to put the honey into the older honeycomb.
If you take a look at the Cut Comb Honey Harvest post you will see how I harvest the top hive box from a Warre Hive. This box was completely full of honey. There were no baby bees at all, since all the brood was laid in the new comb in the bottom of the hive.
By the way, it is important to add hive boxes to the bottom of the bee hive so that the bees can always build comb downwards towards the floor. Since each box has a set of top bars, the comb is separated into sections the height of each hive box, making it easy for you to handle each box as a unit of honeycomb and honey.
So, in summary, when you use a top bar hive and let the honeybees build their own honeycomb without using wax foundation, you will hardly ever have baby bees in with the honey.
This translates to easier beekeeping for you, a more natural beehive for the bees, and a much more sustainable beekeeping experience since you don’t need to buy or use a metal or plastic queen excluder.
I like that. How about you?
13 responses so far ↓
rick // February 19, 2009 at 1:09 pm |
the pic above, I can’t see how this fits in the box’s that you’ve shown how to build. can you explain please. thanks rick
Nick // February 24, 2009 at 6:10 pm |
rick – The picture above illustrates the building process of the honeybees as they draw out honeycomb within the beehive.
Nick // February 26, 2009 at 10:16 am |
Hi again Nick – glad my question wasn’t too stupid then!!
So if I’ve got it right……
The process starts at the top with the queen laying amongst these combs, but as these fill up I put more boxes below which will be started on by the workers – she smells new combs and moves downwards. By the time the top one is full and ready to harvest, any babies she laid there at the very beginning will have hatched anyway, leaving nice grub free honey!
Nick // February 26, 2009 at 8:12 pm |
Nick – You got it! Once the bee larvae have hatched, the bees vigorously clean the cell and prepare it for honey storage.
Dan // March 18, 2009 at 6:14 am |
Hi Nick just love your site and by the way i am a member of a BK club we are hobby BKs and i put your site on ours i hope you don’t mine our site is http://cba.stonehavenlife.com
Nick // March 28, 2009 at 11:09 am |
Dan – No, I don’t mind at all! Thank you very much for doing that. You have a great site, by the way.
eastlakecounty // April 18, 2009 at 5:30 am |
I hope you can answer this question; it’s not about the warre hive but the top bar hives that only have one level. If that makes sense.
I’ll be installing my bees next month. Will the bees put honeycomb on one top bar at a time? Or will they draw down their comb on all the bars?
I know this sounds stupid. I’m very excited but not very confident, however, I have a lot of faith in the bees to do whatever they do correctly.
Nick // May 8, 2009 at 12:47 pm |
eastlakecounty – Don’t feel bad asking questions! The bees will indeed build comb on all of the bars at once. They will draw the comb down more or less uniformly across all of the top bars in the hive box.
eastlakecounty // May 8, 2009 at 7:27 pm |
Thanks, Nick. I appreciate your help.
So after the bees hatch, do the worker bees then put the nectar and pollen in the comb that previously had eggs and larvae?
(total newbie here)
Nick // May 28, 2009 at 9:03 pm |
eastlakecounty – Yes, after the bees hatch, the house bees clean the cells and ready it for honey and pollen storage. The honeybees are fastidiously clean. A good example to me the beekeeper!
nonoy // September 11, 2009 at 12:54 am |
I’m from the philippines,eager to know about beekeeping, as of now I am browsing about this site to learn more and I am very thankful for being enjoy reading your technologies about this and having the chance to discuss through email, my 1st question is that how can I have a queen for culture after I have construct my boxes?
workwithnature // January 12, 2010 at 3:31 pm |
Hy nick love the site, am setting up something simular.
I think the Warre Hives are amaising.
I have a few questions for you if you dont mind,
how do you prevent the bees criss crossing the comb together,
how do you stop the boxes from getting stuck together,
also if you were to sell the honey say as cut comb wouldn’t the cells the queen layed in have cocons left in it therefore it would become a problem if that is what you intend to do.
I love the hole idea of having a peoples hive and the more simpler and natural the better, I feel if these things could be also made easeyer then the public would take it up much more readally
mike // May 31, 2010 at 4:16 am |
I donot have bees (my wife wont let me ) But I do have an interest in bees .I have lernt alot from this site Thank you Mike